Northern Neck native Gregory Packett of Tappahannock’s Packett Properties is a man with a mission: he wants to help people get into homes.
“I have built and sold million dollar-plus homes, but I also want to help everybody that wants to get into a home, get into a home,” he explains. “Helping people—whether it’s a house you buy or build or a rental apartment—is [our focus].”
Packett’s dad was also a builder who later started Revere Gas in Richmond County. His grandparents on both sides were also in the construction business. Packett started his career life as a builder when he was in his early 20s. He bought his first piece of land in Kinsale, built a house and sold it via what he calls “sweat equity.”
While setting rafters in the attic area of a home he built in King and Queen County, he fell backwards to the first floor, shattering his arm in the process. “I had to finish the spec home in Kinsale, so I paid my cousins and others to complete the house,” he remembers.
At the time, he also had been working with his cousin, Keith Packett, on building an addition for another customer, who offered him a desk job in a Manassas mortgage business, while he recovered from the fall.
“I learned the other side of the mortgage business,” he explains. “But I decided the mortgage business was not for me, although it taught me a lot.”
Once he recovered, Packett continued on building, buying existing homes and renovating them for sale or rent. Around 2008 Packett Builders constructed a 16-unit apartment community in Warsaw called Town Center Village. He also did The Landing at Totuskey Creek, a maintenance-free community with 16 acres and 16 homes on Totuskey Creek, a Rappahannock River tributary.
Today Packett Properties is “a full-service real estate company” that includes land development, new home construction, commercial properties and rental properties in the Northern Neck and Middle Peninsula.
In 2012 Packett met the love of his life, Leilani Chan Boon, who at the time was serving in the U.S. Army. She has since retired and obtained her real estate license. Packett states, “She took Packett Properties to another level.”
“My wife has her real estate license, my assistant, Sherry Derby, also has her real estate license and worked in the appraisal business for 30 plus years, we are a one-stop shop,” he explains.
Packett’s commitment to finding people homes stretches back for years. He says he could not build a home for what some customers can afford, so he does one or two houses a year by finding existing homes that can be renovated and sold at a cost that such customers can afford.
He is particularly concerned about young people today who want to buy a home, noting, “It’s a bad situation when a starter home is $300,000.”
Packett, 49, and his wife have two small children and jokes that he is “a late bloomer,” says he tries to maintain a work-life balance while helping people get into a home. Another area of concern, he says, is the need for age 55 plus homes, adding, “There is not enough property for seniors.” He is currently working now to start a subdivision in Warsaw that will provide “an age-targeted community” housing option.
“Development is going to happen regardless, so I like to be a part of it and try to do it right,” he says, adding, “If you want to rent or buy, we can help you.”