‘Watch Charlotte Grow’: A history of rising prices in the Queen City

CHARLOTTE — People have been relocating to Charlotte for decades, even starting a motto in the 1920s: “Watch Charlotte Grow.”

The latest wave of newcomers is bringing big changes that this banking city has never seen. Rents are higher than the national average and coupled with current inflation prices, more people are being forced out of the neighborhoods they once built.

Channel 9′s Madison Carter met with two Charlotte historians, Tom Hanchett and Dan Morrill, who told her that growth like this isn’t new to Charlotte; in fact, the city has never had a decade where it didn’t see growth.

Hanchett told Carter that the rising prices are putting a strain on the city and only benefiting property owners, forcing lower-income families or renters far out of the city.

“All blue-collar folks are getting priced out of Charlotte,” Hanchett said. “The rising prices are great if you own your own home and you have enough money to pay the rising property taxes”.

Many wonder, “Why Charlotte?”

Morrill says a moderate climate, getting more houses for your money, and low property taxes are just some of the reasons people relocated here.

“People are coming from all sorts of places because this is perceived as an economically healthy city,” said Hanchett.

The so-called ‘economic health’ can be loosely translated to wealth, not for individuals moving into town but for developers building the next luxury highrise.

“We tend not to put heavy requirements on folks who are redeveloping places, and that’s not a Charlotte thing,” said Hanchett.

“The greatest wealth the world has ever known is here in this country because of private enterprise,” Morrill said. “But if you expect the private enterprise to have a heart, you might as well ask a teapot to have a heart.”

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