Walter and Susannah Garrett

A Labor of Love

Susannah Garrett decided to go for a run along Alone Mill Road, where she lives with her husband Walter. Barely a minute after she started running, she saw something that made her abandon her exercise: a Realtor hammering a “For Sale” sign into the ground in the property adjacent to Susannah and Walter’s. Sprinting back to her house, she called friends to tell them the lot that they had all had their eyes on for months was finally on the market. But it was too late.“Before I could even get three phone calls out they said it had already sold.”

Walter and Susannah’s house is located on the Maury River on the outskirts of Rockbridge County. How quickly the adjacent property sold is indicative of the hotreal estate market Rockbridge County has becomein the last couple years.

The Garretts found the lot where their home now sits by spending time on the Maury River. “We used to canoe by and we would always just see if there were places for sale on the river, but typically it’s big parcels that we couldn’t afford,” Walter said. “This was a tiny parcel.”

The Garretts are different from most other transplants here. They both come from places smaller than Lexington and the surrounding area. Walter is from Tappahannock (population just over 2,000 people) while Susannah is from Whitestone (population: 352).

After spending a few years in Montana and Colorado after going to James Madison University together, the couple decided that they wanted to move closer to home. They knew they wanted to live in Virginia, but thought areas like Charlottesville were too busy for them.“

Rockbridge was a happy medium with still being rural and having good job prospects,” Walter said.

They bought their property in 2013.In 2015, the couple laid the foundation. In 2018, they lived there in a camper and started building on the foundation. After a while, they were able to live in the basement while they completed the upstairs.

Now living in their completed house, Walter works as a landscaper while Susannah does interior design. They moved here because of the river, years before the market got hot. But they have still felt the effects of the new residents due to their services being in high demand. They have been busy lately with the influx of buyers who have come to Rockbridge County.

The newcomers and their home builders seem to expect all the laborers to make it work, Susannah said, “So we’re all a little overworked right now.” She didn’t see this happening before Covid. “So many out of town people want a country house, but it's sight unseen.”