June Belle Homes crafts an HGTV experience for small-town homebuyers

June Belle Homes’ move to downtown Valdese aligns with owner Justin Keisler’s mission to restore a personal touch to homebuilding, something he said many large production builders have lost as workloads have increased and artificial intelligence has been adopted to improve efficiency with fewer faces.

Keisler’s experience in construction began long before November 2020, when he opened June Belle Homes in Hickory. He still remembers being mesmerized as a child walking through job sites with his father. After time in the military, he jumped back into the field, studying architectural technologies in college and opening his own design firm.

His design work led him to national builders and then to a local production builder, where he worked his way up to vice president of construction services. After working there for 15 years, the company was building a little over 100 homes a year. While he enjoyed the work, he felt the pull to provide a more intimate experience for customers, hence the creation of June Belle Homes.

“When I started June Belle Homes, the idea was to put customer service as the focus of our business for new home construction every day,” Keisler said. “My whole vision and goal is to make it a one-stop shop, where it’s very easy for my clients.”

June Belle Homes offers initial designs all the way through to construction completion for both new builds and remodels, Keisler said, adding all services are handled in-house. The process begins with interviews to learn how clients want to live in their home and what they need from the space.

“The focus is to try to give them the HGTV experience, but like the real version,” Keisler said.

Keisler currently employs a full-time staff of six, with two part-time employees, but said he’s expecting to grow. Since opening in 2020, the company has built about 30 new homes and completed close to double that in remodels.

The company’s typical new home costs between $700,000 and $800,000, though Keisler said many projects exceed $1 million. A large chunk of the company’s business is people moving from places like California, New York, New Jersey, Texas, and Washington, many of whom are at or near retirement age.

As Hickory began to attract more neighborhood and national builders and the housing market started to shift westward, Keisler decided it was time to make a move. With June Belle Homes already serving many customers in the Lake Rhodhiss area, he said Valdese became the perfect fit.

With his wife’s hometown being Morganton and his daughter attending dance classes in Valdese, Keisler was already familiar with the community. He ventured to check out 259 Main Street, the former location of Foothills Thrift Store, on the day of the Valdese Christmas Parade last year and fell in love with it.

At the time, the building had dated carpet and large bookshelves covering all the windows. The space has since been transformed into a showroom on the bottom level, a conference room with glass walls on the mezzanine, and office and conference room spaces on the top level.

“When I saw the building, my vision was just to kind of bring it back to its former glory, keep the charm and keep the character, but renovate it and kind of give it some new life,” Keisler said.

He also repurposed parts of a 100-year-old freight elevator into his desk and a table that’s located downstairs in the showroom. Keisler said he likes to incorporate repurposed items into his home designs whenever possible, but it still boils down to what a client wants out of their home.

Of the homes his company has built, some have included dance studios, home Pilates gyms, and LEGO rooms. A current project includes an entertainment complex, which includes a basketball court, tennis court, golf simulator, and more on a family compound.

“We’re not building one for the masses,” Keisler said. “We’re building it straight for our clients.”

While most of June Belle Homes’ new construction is located in the Lake Rhodhiss area, Keisler said he wants to push work farther west as well, serving a 50-mile radius stretching from Statesville to Lake James.

Keisler said the move to Valdese is about more than just following the market’s direction. It’s an effort to become rooted in a small-town community, adding that June Belle Homes is preparing to be a sponsor of the Waldensian Festival.

“We have every intention to be a good neighbor,” Keisler said.