If you are house hunting inside 29492, the first surprise usually arrives in an email from a homeowners' association you do not yet belong to. In Point Hope, Cainhoy Town Association dues for 2026 climbed from just over $700 to $1,400, and the reason is straightforward: the community's signature amenity center, Doolittle Park, is finally opening and needs an operating budget before the household count catches up to what was planned.
That single line item is a better introduction to the 29492 market than any median price. It tells you the two sides of the Wando are running on different clocks, different cost structures, and different negotiating dynamics, even though the portals show them as one dot on the map.
The median is doing a lot of hiding
Pull three sources on Daniel Island for the same window and the numbers argue with each other. Over the three months ending April 2026, Redfin put the Daniel Island median at $1.5 million, with the prior single month averaging closer to $1.87 million and 108 homes sold. Zillow's typical home value for the same footprint sat near $1.097 million in late May 2026, up about 4.8 percent year over year. Movoto reported a May 2026 median sale price of about $1.8 million.
Those figures do not disagree because anyone is wrong. They disagree because the boundary each source draws around "Daniel Island" scoops up a different share of Point Hope and Cainhoy homes, where prices start much lower. In reporting from The Daniel Island News, Point Hope home sales that opened in the mid $300,000s in 2020 now average above $750,000. The gap between $750,000 and $1.87 million is not a market trend. It is two markets, one bridge apart, being averaged into a single headline.
What each side actually is
Once you separate them, the transaction on each side has its own logic.
| Daniel Island proper | Point Hope / Cainhoy | |
|---|---|---|
| Supply posture | Developer described as "essentially sold out" | Approved for up to 18,000 units, phased over 15 to 20 years |
| Typical price signal, 2026 | Trailing three-month median around $1.5M, monthly average pushing $1.87M | Average around $750,000, entry pricing set by builder release |
| Primary product | Resale of existing homes, waterfront and estate inventory in Daniel Island Park | New construction from David Weekley, Pulte, Toll Brothers, Ashton Woods |
| HOA trajectory | Established, mature amenity set | CTA dues nearly doubled in 2026; more amenity operating costs to come |
| Days on market, April 2026 | 64 days versus 51 a year prior (Redfin) | Varies by builder release cadence, not resale comps |
| Comps behavior | Peer sales set price | Builder base price and lot premiums set price |
The two columns read like two different real estate transactions because they are. On Daniel Island, you are competing with other buyers for a finite pool of homes near mature schools, the Daniel Island Club, and the waterfront. In Point Hope, you are choosing a floor plan and elevation while the neighborhood around it is still being platted.
The amenity delivery math nobody prices in
Point Hope's price gap versus Daniel Island proper is partly a discount for unfinished infrastructure. That discount comes with a cost curve, and the CTA letter to residents last November laid it out.
The 2026 CTA operating budget is $1,095,265, with an additional $191,563 attached specifically to Doolittle Park operations. Residential owners cover roughly 12 percent of that budget in the current year, with commercial dues, builder dues, and a developer subsidy carrying the rest. The reason resident dues jumped so sharply is that the community had roughly 200 completed and occupied single-family homes when the amenity opened, versus the roughly 250 households the developer had modeled to support it. Another 76 homesites are expected to be released to builders in 2026, which would bring occupied households above 300 in 2027.
What that means for a buyer: the per-household share of amenity cost is highest right now, at the front of the curve, and eases as more homes close and share the fixed costs. If you buy at Point Hope this year, you are underwriting a park you may love using, and you are doing it while the denominator is still small.
Doolittle Park is the visible piece, with two pools, tennis and pickleball courts, a basketball court, an event lawn, and a covered pavilion. Behind it, Sander's House, a restored nineteenth-century farmhouse, is coming online as a community gathering space, and The Waterline, a five-mile linear park loop, is under construction on a three to six year timeline. Each of those adds an operating line to a future budget.
The build queue is a comp problem
A resale on Daniel Island proper is priced against neighbors. A resale in Point Hope, for the next several years, is priced against whatever the builder next door is releasing that quarter. Recent city filings tell you how full the pipeline is:
- Point Hope Ashton Woods Phase 1A and 1B: 262-unit single-family development on 84.1 acres at 1730 Clements Ferry Road
- Point Hope Pod 4 Phase 2: 91-lot single-family plan on 45.4 acres, Pulte Home Company
- Point Hope North Residential Phase 1: proposed 93-lot single-family development on 54.8 acres at 1698 Clements Ferry Road
- Point Hope Tract 7 Phase 2: 122-lot preliminary plat at 5000 Kitty Hawk Drive, Ashton Charleston Residential
- Brooking Square: 348-unit luxury apartment development by Woodfield on Cainhoy Village Road
- Atlantic at St. Thomas: 71-lot townhome plan at 2815 Clements Ferry Road
When you list a two-year-old home in a section where the builder next door is still opening a new phase at a competitive base price, your buyer has options you cannot match on incentives. That is a resale friction Daniel Island proper does not carry.
What this changes about how you shop
A short list of the moves that follow from the two-market read:
- Do not average the two sides in your budget. A pre-approval sized to a $1.5M Daniel Island resale is a very different underwriting than a $750K Point Hope new build with a builder lender incentive on the table.
- Ask for the HOA disclosure and the multi-year assessment history before you fall in love. In a community under active development, the dues line moves.
- In Point Hope, ask which phase you are buying into and what is still to be delivered. The Waterline, Sander's House, and future creek access at Hopewell are on staggered timelines.
- In Daniel Island proper, price the scarcity. With the original developer describing the island as essentially sold out and Mount Pleasant sitting under a development moratorium, the resale pool is the pool.
- Watch the commercial pipeline as a leading indicator. At The Gates at Point Hope, Philosophia from TYSM Hospitality Group and a Bon Secours Mercy Health urgent care are moving in. A Come Back burger location is targeted for June 2026 nearby. Retail follows rooftops, and it also pulls prices up behind it.
FAQ
Are Point Hope and Daniel Island in the same school attendance area? No. Point Hope is served by the Philip Simmons elementary, middle, and high schools built inside the community. Daniel Island proper feeds into a different set of schools. Confirm current attendance zones directly with the district before you write an offer.
Is the CTA the same as the Daniel Island homeowners' association? No. The Cainhoy Town Association governs Point Hope and reports its own budget and dues. Daniel Island has its own association and its own fee structure. If you are comparing carrying costs across the bridge, you are comparing two separate documents.
Why is inventory building on Daniel Island proper if it is described as sold out? "Sold out" refers to raw developer lots, not resale supply. Redfin's April 2026 data showed 108 homes sold in the month, up from 70 a year prior, with days on market drifting from 51 to 64. That is a normal loosening from very tight conditions, not a shift in the underlying scarcity.
How much of Point Hope will actually be built? The site is approved for up to 18,000 units. The developer has publicly estimated closer to 11,000 to 12,000 over the next 15 to 20 years, and notes that more than half of the 9,000 acres is wetland that will remain undeveloped. Long-term projections estimate up to 45,000 residents on the Cainhoy peninsula at full buildout.
If you are weighing an offer on either side of the bridge and want a clear read on how the numbers, the dues, and the phase you are buying into fit together, I would be glad to walk through it with you. Reach out through Michele Moriarty and we can look at your specific budget and timeline against what is actually available this month.
