The Cunnane Group, Inc., was already a fourth-generation New York-based builder and contractor when it added home building and traditional-style communities to its repertoire in 1984. When the family-owned and operated company moved from New York to Charlotte in 1996, Holly Hill Farm (as it was named by a previous landowner) was its first Queen City property acquisition after considering other tracts of land in south Charlotte and northern Union County. The Cunnane's preferred the convenience and beauty of what would become Holly Hill Farms neighborhood and their first of numerous local developments. 

When the Cunnane Group acquired the property in 1996, there was a stately, Georgian Colonial mansion at the apex of Holly Hill Farm Road near the intersection with present-day Percy Court.  The house sat to the right of the large oak trees that remain today and overlooked the pond, which was known locally as a good “fishin’ hole.”  Landowner Ruth Holland, a pioneering lady who started a
successful homebuilding career in the 1950s and passed away in February 2020 just shy of her 100th birthday, created the home especially for her family and called it Holly Hill. Ruth had the opportunity to sell the property to the Raintree development but loved the setting of the home and declined to do so. She later sold to another buyer who subsequently passed the property on to the Cunnane Group. 

 

An existing sketch plan slated 70 home sites for the land, but the Cunnane's preferred a less dense version that left open space on at least one side of as many lots as possible, cutting the plan to 60 lots. When property grading began, the developer further made the decision that a small, offshoot cul-de-sac originally planned halfway down Percy Court on the left was too steep and subsequently consolidated six of those planned lots into two 2-acre lots.  These were eventually combined to become the home of Cunnane family matriarch and patriarch, Elaine and the late John Cunnane Sr. 

From 1998-2000, the Cunnane Group built 51 all-brick homes in Holly Hill Farms ranging from approximately 2,200 to 4,500 square feet, with new home prices running from $249,000 to $422,500. The average new home sale price (according to Mecklenburg County real estate records) was exactly $332,500.

In 2002 construction was to begin on a speculative home on one of the four empty lots remaining at the end of the upper Fairchild Lane cul-de-sac.  When strategic soil borings began, however, a large “farm hole” was discovered, making the parcel unstable for building. The hole went as deep as 22 feet and contained years of tree and other flora remnants, some possibly dumped there after Hurricane Hugo hit the region in September 1989. Cunnane made the decision that it was financially impractical to build four homes on the tract and left it vacant at the time.  At one point, the Holly Hill Farms Homeowners Association considered using the lots for common area that included recreational amenities, but the instability of the lots and associated expense of rectifying that were a liability and cost-prohibitive. 

Cunnane eventually decided to combine the four lots into one and hired a professional soils engineer to excavate and stabilize the site. During the process, hundreds of truckloads of refuse were hauled away and replaced with fill dirt. The site became the home of Cunnane Group president John Cunnane Jr. and family in 2004.

This final house in Holly Hill Farms brought the homesite count to 52 homes on 43 acres that include 17 acres of common area, an unheard-of ratio of private land to common area in south Charlotte neighborhoods. 

The original driveway of the Holly Hill property had the same sweep as the current Holly Hill Farm Road, and Cunnane kept the established namesake for the main artery of the development. An attempt to name the side streets for Southern literary figures succeeded in one (Percy Court) being dubbed for author Walker Percy, but other suggestions of Faulkner, Twain, and Wolfe were denied by the city of Charlotte, and Arrington Manor and Fairchild Lane were chosen in their stead.

Land records for what is now Holly Hill Farms, as well as surrounding parcels in “Providence Township” prior to the area being absorbed by the city of Charlotte, are on file with the Mecklenburg Register of Deeds.

The Cunnane Group built what they consider a “conservation cluster” neighborhood that preserves the character of the land while featuring respectably sized lots.

At the time of Holly Hill Farms’ development, the community standard in Charlotte regarding sidewalks was one side of the street only, with most sidewalks dead-ending in cul-de-sacs.  Cunnane wanted walking connectivity around the neighborhood to encourage sociability, so the firm chose to construct sidewalks on both sides and around the cul-de-sacs. This facilitated a defining feature of Holly Hill Farms: the morning or evening walk, where many neighbors have met, become friends, and caught up with each other over the years.

The Cunnane Group always believed that Holly Hill Farms was a “sleeping gem” in south Charlotte. With two Cunnane families choosing to live in Holly Hill Farms, that opinion rings true.

Key facts about Holly Hill Farms:

• Holly Hill Farms sidewalks total exactly one mile encompassing all five cul-de-sacs.

• Holly Hill Farms owns the neighborhood road and traffic signs as well as the streetlights, which are maintained by Duke Energy.

• All utility wires are buried (no poles).

• Holly Hill Farms contains 52 homes on 43 acres that include 17 acres of common area.

• There are 15 original homeowners (or their heirs) still residing in Holly Hill Farms.

• Two families from the neighborhood’s family-owned and -operated developer, Cunnane Group, make their homes in Holly Hill Farms.

• Eight homes feature swimming pools.

• The common-area pond is stocked with bass, bream, and crappie, and residents and their guests are welcome to fish the pond for catch-and-release only.

• Diversity amongst neighbors has always been strong in Holly Hill Farms, with at least 20 nationalities and 16 languages represented over the years.

• Wildlife spotted includes an abundance of deer; birds including geese, ducks, hawks, owls, songbirds, hummingbirds, and woodpeckers; rabbits; squirrels; raccoons; and an occasional fox and coyote.

• Nadine Cunnane Di Iorio, sister of John Cunnane Jr. and a principal at the Cunnane Group, was 
  the architect for all 52 homes in Holly Hill Farms.

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Many thanks to John Cunnane Jr. for significant historical input.

Researched and written/edited by:

Bruce Hensley (President, Holly Hill Farms Homeowners Association) and Jill Hensley
September 2020

Updated August 2023