Litchfield Co., Deercreek announce partnership

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Royce King is coming home. The president and owner of Litchfield Company Real Estate LLC, the Summerton native is bringing his business to Clarendon County. Litchfield and Deercreek at Wyboo announced Tuesday that the companies have reached a sales and marketing agreement, along with the opening of a sales center in the Wyboo community. “We’re going to be providing the sales and marketing expertise for Deer Creek,” said King. “We have now opened an office there, and Beth Hinson Phillips will be the sales manager in this location. With our sales team in place to support the efforts there, we will try to help them market the homes at Deer Creek.” He said the Deercreek at Wyboo Sales Center will operate as the Wyboo Community Satellite Office of The Litchfield Company, which will also offer its real estate services to homeowners in the Wyboo community from this sales center, 2538 Players Course Drive in Manning. King will serve as the broker-in-charge for the Wyboo Community Satellite Office. He said this newly formed association intends to capitalize on an improved South Carolina real estate market, he said. “Seventy-seven million people visited the Crolinas in 2015,” he said. “Of those, 465,000 will relocate to the Carolinas in 2016. Our job is to introduce our share of those people to Deercreek at Wyboo and the Wyboo community.” He said the deal is “near and dear” to his heart. A Summerton native, King is a graduate of Summerton High School and he and his wife, Stephanie, own a weekend home at Taw Caw Creek on Lake Marion. “My dad built Stuckey’s in Summerton,” said King. In the late 1940s, after World War II, King’s father got out of the service and started working with pecan sales out of Summerville with Dave Summers, King said. “He went to Eastman, Georgia, and sold some pecans to a man named W.S. Stuckey,” King said. “Stuckey thought he was a good salesman and gave him the franchise for the Stuckey brand in South Carolina.” The first store was built right in downtown Summerton at the junction of U.S. 301 and U.S. 15. “It was about 100 miles from the North Carolina line and 100 miles from the Georgia line, and you didn’t have Interstate 95,” King said. “It was also about halfway between New York City and Miami. And that was where those two U.S. highways met. All of the people traveling from north to south on any of those roads had to junction right where that store was in Summerton.” “That’s how they chose the first location,” King said. After high school graduation, King attended The Citadel, and then received a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Toledo. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps, becoming a Vietnam veteran, as a hospital corpsman. As president and owner of The Litchfield Company – which was founded in 1956 – Royce provides “team building leadership for the sales executives and staff,” he said, a role he has carried for 21 years. His management efforts have positioned the company as an industry leader with offices in Pawleys Island, Murrells Inlet and Charleston. The company takes its name from its first development in the Pawleys Island area. “We were primarily a development company when we started, but we’ve gravitated and transitioned into sales and marketing,” King said. “We do these services for other developers, nationally and statewide, and we also have our general brokerage division, where we still have real estate listings.” He said the company will provide all these services at Deercreek. “We are extremely pleased that The Litchfield Company, and its strong sales and marketing assets, will be representing Deercreek at Wyboo,” said Deercreek owner and developer John Bruffey. “Having a company with Litchfield’s unsurpassed reputation and proven track record on the ground here to represent us is a winning proposition for everyone.” Phillips, a former Summerton mayor, and broker in charge and general manager for Century 21 and Santee Associates, will be the local project coordinator and sales manager. She said that Clarendon native and Manning High School graduate Will Davis, a sales manager and co-owner of The Litchfield Company, will also be involved in the Wyboo operation. “Will has led Litchfield’s Murrells Inlet office for 10 years, and it is now the No. 1 real estate office in the area, specializing in both new home sales and general brokerage real estate sales,” King said. “We’re looking forward to our partnership and helping Clarendon County grow.” The company is holding a business after hours from 5:30-7:30 today at the new office, 2538 Players Course Drive in Manning.