Kristen Lueck of Compass and the Andy Bovender Team joins the podcast to share how a decade-long career in content marketing and PR — including negotiating celebrity endorsement deals for brands like Diageo, Tabasco, and Post Cereals — became the unlikely foundation for a thriving real estate business in Wilmington, North Carolina. After renovating a beach home and building a personal property, Kristen earned her license just two weeks before being laid off from a healthcare tech company, giving her the runway to dive headfirst into real estate. She breaks down why Wilmington remains one of the country’s best-kept secrets, despite being among the fastest-growing metros in North Carolina, and walks through the distinct personalities of the area’s beach communities — from the luxury exclusivity of Figure 8 Island to the car-free simplicity of Bald Head Island to the approachable price points in Brunswick County.
The conversation also dives into the realities of investing in coastal real estate, where Kristen helps clients reverse-engineer the right property based on whether they want short-term vacation rentals, midterm rentals for travel nurses and Camp Lejeune military families, or downtown Wilmington ADUs. She shares why rental investing is never truly passive, how she builds long-term advisory relationships with clients, and why her most powerful marketing strategy isn’t a shiny new channel — it’s the un-sexy fundamentals: one-to-one agent outreach, authentic content, and showing up as a human first. Kristen and Jeff also unpack the compounding value of networking with agents across the country, both for referrals and for the cross-market education that makes you sharper in your own backyard.
Kristen Lueck | Wilmington NC Realtor
https://bovenderteam.com/agent/kristen-lueck
https://www.instagram.com/kristensellsthecoast/
About the host:
Jeff Hamm is a real estate broker with Ivester Jackson | Christie’s International Real Estate, serving Lake Norman & Charlotte, North Carolina and Banner Elk, North Carolina. He specializes in luxury, waterfront, mountain, and investment property, with a focus on buyer representation. He is also the founder and host of The Best of LKN and Banner Elk Living.
Learn more and contact Jeff:
LKNreal.com
BannerElkLiving.com
Jeff Hamm is a North Carolina real estate broker with Ivester Jackson | Christie’s International Real Estate, serving two of the state’s most sought-after markets: Lake Norman and Banner Elk and the greater High Country. He specializes in luxury and second-home property, from Lake Norman’s waterfront, golf, and lakefront communities to High Country communities including The Lodges at Eagles Nest, Elk River Club, Farm at Banner Elk, Diamond Creek, and Echota. He also works with buyers of condominiums, homes in active adult and family-friendly neighborhoods, and short-term rental and investment properties. His focus is buyer representation, where his relationships with each region’s top listing brokers, builders, and designers give his clients a measurable edge.
Jeff is also the founder and host of two local media platforms, The Best of LKN (since 2020) and Banner Elk Living. Each includes a podcast and newsletter that spotlight the area’s most admired small businesses, nonprofits, and entrepreneurs. He publishes the annual Lake Norman Visitors Guide and Banner Elk Guide, produces regular market reports for both regions, and hosts The Best of Lake Norman Business Network and the Banner Elk Business Network.