THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, September 15, 1996 TAG: 9609130071
SECTION: HOME PAGE: G1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MARCIA MANGUM, HOME & GARDEN EDITOR
LENGTH: 162 lines
IN HIGH SCHOOL wood-shop classes, Charlie Anderson constructed a hutch and a dry sink while the other boys built footstools and end tables. At age 14, he replaced the roof on his family's house.
With his background in wood-working, repairs and renovations, Anderson, 49, now builds custom homes throughout Hampton Roads. And next month, as for the past 10 years, his work can be seen at Homearama, the annual home-building show sponsored by the Tidewater Builders Association.
This year Charlie Anderson Builder Inc. was chosen to construct The Virginian-Pilot Reader Home, designed in keeping with preferences expressed on surveys conducted by this newspaper. Homearama will be held Oct. 5-20 at South Shore Estates, off of General Booth Boulevard and Red Mill Road in Virginia Beach.
Throughout every stage of the planning and building, Anderson's enthusiasm for and expertise in his craft have been apparent. ``I like the creativity of building something,'' Anderson says.
If you've been to Homearama in the past decade, you might remember the name of an Anderson house - the Monet, the Mona Lisa, the Da Vinci, the Rembrandt. ``I name my houses after artists, because I think there's a sort of artwork in a house,'' he explains.
Anderson's houses have won an award each year he's participated in Homearama. Over the course of a decade he says he's won every award in the show, but the ones he's proudest of are for Best Quality Craftsmanship. ``There's only one award I go after, and that's the craftsmanship, and I go after that on every home I build,'' he says.
``There's not anything in the construction industry that I have not done, hands on, from electrical to plumbing, building cabinets, plastering, painting, hanging wallpaper, installing tile and doing trim work,'' he says. ``When I'm building a house and subcontract all this out, I can tell if it's being done right.''
Greg Robertson, owner fo G.H. Robertson Construction, has known Anderson since high school and worked with him through the years. He says Anderson's houses are recognized for their woodworking and detail inside and out.
``As a builder, if I were going to have a home built, I'd go to Charlie,'' Robertson says. ``Charlie gives people a lot of home - he stands behind it. He'll go back years later and take care of things that need taking care of.''
From the first bedroom he was hired to paint to the million-dollar home he's building at Church Point in Virginia Beach, doing it right has always been important to Anderson.
Anderson isn't sure where he got his interest in construction - his mother was a restaurant hostess, his dad a crane operator - but it's something he's always liked. Maybe it came from his grandfather, who was a carpenter but died when Anderson was young.
Sandy White, Anderson's sister and an agent with Womble Realty, remembers her brother's ambitious shop class projects. ``When he was a kid, he built my mother's furniture,'' White recalls. ``His shop teacher would call and bait her, saying, `Guess what you're going to get.' ''
Anderson was drafted into the Army in 1967, shortly after graduation from Granby High School. It was the Vietnam era, but Anderson was sent to Korea instead.
After his military duty, he worked briefly for Virginia Power and then a local department store. ``But I was always interested in construction,'' he says. ``I quit because I wanted to get back outside.
``I had a person give me the opportunity to paint a bedroom in their house, and I quit my job. I've never had a day without work since.''
When he started his general contracting business in 1971, he did mostly painting and remodeling in some of Norfolk's older neighborhoods. Business grew through referrals, and he began specializing in kitchen remodeling and later room additions.
In the early years, about 90 percent of his work was in Norfolk, where he grew up. ``I got a lot of renovation work in the historic homes in Ghent,'' he says. ``The first thing I learned from that is when you go in and start tearing out things from old houses, you see the problems and you know how to correct them when you build new houses.''
The work in Ghent and Larchmont also taught Anderson about quality building and time-tested materials and methods, White says. ``That's where he got his eye and ability for custom homes.''
Anderson tries to combine old-fashioned craftsmanship with modern technology to build homes that will last. ``Fifty years from now, my homes will be the same as they are now,'' he says.
He compares the improvements in new houses to the advancing technology in the auto industry - there are many new features for comfort and safety, ranging from more electrical receptacles to larger windows to accommodate firefighters.
``All these things add cost to the house,'' he says, ``but they all add value. When you buy a new house, you're not just getting something new, you're getting something highly technical.''
Anderson is tuned in to what's hot on the market and incorporates it in his houses, Robertson notes.
He also is picky about every facet of construction, starting with the site plan and foundation of the home. He's one of a handful of builders who draw their own plans.
When he began in the business, he'd hire an architect, but then he'd start making changes and redraw the plans. Soon he was doing it himself. Now that his business has grown, he says there are times he wishes he could hire out the plans, but he knows he'd change them.
Although Anderson still occasionally undertakes major remodeling jobs, he mainly builds new homes. Typically he builds 10 to 15 custom houses a year, mostly in the range of $250,000 and up.
``All of my homes are real custom-built homes,'' he says. ``They're designed just for that person, and they're not repeated.''
This year's Homearama is a little different for him, because normally he builds his show home for a particular client. This year he built it to suit the conglomerate wishes of more than 1,800 call-in voters.
Anderson is building a variation of the popular ranch-style model home he created in his Southwood development, in the Great Bridge area of Chesapeake.
Southwood is a joint effort between Anderson and builder Larry Hill. Each bought 23 lots and began developing custom homes on them in early 1995. The development is about 70 percent complete.
Anderson said they chose the Southwood site in Chesapeake because they wanted to build high-quality homes on wooded lots of at least 15,000 square feet. The builders also looked for a neighborhood served by a high-quality school system, so they chose the Great Bridge area.
In addition to the Southwood development, Anderson is in the midst of what he describes as the most interesting project of his career thus far. It's a transitional-style home in the Church Point section of Virginia Beach that costs more than a million dollars.
``I've built houses that were very expensive before, but basically they were just big,'' he says. This one is different. For starters, it has a six-car basement garage. Like most local builders, Anderson had never built a basement, but he's engineered one that now that he's confident won't leak.
Other features that set the house apart are several two-story rooms, an unusual kitchen design and a specialty look in each room, complete with lots of trim work, one of Anderson's hallmarks.
``It's nice to do a house where people can afford to put the special things in it, where people can really afford to do it the way they want,'' he says.
Anderson currently has five employees on his payroll, in addition to a long list of subcontractors and businesses he regularly works with.
For the past eight years, he has worked with Hudgins Interiors to design interiors for many of his clients. ``I know when one of his customers comes in I can tell them they've picked a really honest guy and one who's the best at craftsmanship,'' says Sharon Webster, interior decorator and manager of Hudgins.
``I've never had a negative comment as far as craftsmanship or how he handles his customers,'' Webster says.
Anderson and his wife, Linda, have lived in the Woodards Mill section of Chesapeake for 12 years and have six children, ranging in age from 7 to 22.
Anderson says two of his sons, ages 14 and 11, are showing an interest in his business, going to job sites and doing some work with him. He's hoping that interest will last.
``I'm in this business for the long haul. I've never quit what I'm doing - I've been in construction, I'm still in construction and I plan to die in construction. And when my kids get old enough, I'll teach them how to do it.''
Family and children are important to Anderson, who is serving as the Stake Young Men's President for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
He has responsibility for ``wholesome'' activities and programs for about 200 boys, ages 12 to 18, in an area stretching from Smithfield to Nags Head.
Before taking on that duty, he served for five years as a bishop in the church.
Robertson, who attends the same church, says Anderson gives a tremendous amount of time to their church, in addition to carrying his workload and family time.
``He does a lot for people that they don't know about,'' Robertson says. ILLUSTRATION: COLOR PHOTOS BY RICHARD L. DUNSTON/The Virginian-Pilot
LEFT: Michael Croy installs trim in the Reader Home at South Shore
Estates in Virginia Beach.
BELOW: Charlie Anderson shows his Homearama house, designed to suit
the wishes of our readers.
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