Perquimans County has a lot of old buildings for a county of thirteen thousand people. If you are the kind of buyer who slows down in front of a Federal-era doorway, this is a market worth your time. It is also a market where a single misunderstanding — the difference between two kinds of historic designation — can cost you a renovation budget. That distinction is the spine of this chapter.
The Verifiable Record
Per the North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office's own roster, Perquimans County has nineteen properties and districts listed on the National Register of Historic Places. HPO annotates one of them, the Isaac White House, as gone — so nineteen listed, eighteen extant.
Five of the nineteen are districts rather than individual buildings:
Old Neck Historic District
Listed 1996
Rural district. Its period of significance runs 1813–1946 — nineteenth and early twentieth century, not colonial.
Hertford Historic District
Listed October 1998
The town's core district. NPS reference 98001264.
Belvidere Historic District
Listed June 1999
Northwest of the county, with a long Quaker history.
Winfall Historic District
Listed January 2003
The county's other incorporated town, just across the river.
Hertford West Historic District
Listed February 2025
The newest listing in the county. NPS reference 100011161.
Individually listed buildings include the Newbold-White House, Myers-White, Sutton-Newby, Samuel Nixon, Cove Grove, Land's End, Stockton, Belvidere, Jonathan Hill Jacocks, Mitchell-Ward and Fletcher-Skinner-Nixon houses, plus the Perquimans County Courthouse (1979) and the Church of the Holy Trinity (1998).
One claim I am not going to make
You will find sources — and you may find agents — describing Perquimans as having one of the state's leading concentrations of pre-1800 houses. I could not verify that from any authoritative source. Not SHPO, not NCpedia, not the National Register nominations for Old Neck, Belvidere, the Hertford district or Newbold-White. It may well be true; the likely home of such a statement is Haley and Winslow's 1982 architectural survey of the county, which is not available online. But I am not going to paraphrase an unverified superlative into a fact on a page that buyers use to make decisions. The nineteen listings and five districts above are the record I can stand behind.
The Newbold-White House
The county's best-known building sits on Newbold-White Road outside the town of Hertford, and its story includes a correction worth knowing. It was long thought to date to as early as 1685. Dendrochronology — dating by analysis of the rafter timbers — pinned construction to 1730. Both the Perquimans County Restoration Association, which operates it, and NCpedia state the 1730 date on that basis.
It is widely described as the oldest brick house in North Carolina. The Restoration Association says it is "recognized as the oldest brick house in the state of North Carolina," and VisitNC calls it "the state's oldest known brick house." I am attributing that rather than asserting it, because NC SHPO does not publish the claim; the 1971 National Register nomination says only that it is "one of the most important architectural landmarks in North Carolina" and "one of the oldest buildings in the state." It was listed on the National Register in June 1971.
One factual housekeeping note, because it gets said wrong: it is not a state historic site. It is owned and operated by a nonprofit, the Perquimans County Restoration Association, which bought the house and its surrounding acreage in 1973. As of the 2026 season it is open Saturdays only, May through October.
The Distinction That Costs Money
This is the part to read twice.
Does this designation restrict what you can do to the house?
National Register Listing
Largely honorary. That is not my characterisation, it is SHPO's. From the HPO's own National Register FAQ: "Listing in the National Register is mostly an honorary designation. Unless you are using federal funds, permitting, or licensing for a project that affects your National Register listed or National Register eligible property, you may do anything you like with your property."
Local Historic District Designation
A different animal entirely. A locally designated district is created by a municipality's own ordinance and is administered by a local historic preservation commission, which reviews exterior changes and issues Certificates of Appropriateness. HPO says it directly: "Local designation should not be confused with listing in the National Register of Historic Places, which is a federal program administered by the state." A local overlay can control what you do with your own money. National Register listing, by itself, cannot.
The Town of Hertford, Specifically
The Town of Hertford does have a Historic Preservation Commission — a five-member board, with three of five seats currently filled. But what I could not verify is whether a local historic district overlay with mandatory Certificate of Appropriateness review actually applies, and if so to which parcels. The town's zoning ordinance article index lists no historic district article and no COA article; the ordinance itself is published only as scanned image PDFs with no extractable text; no COA application form or design guidelines appear on the town site; the town is not on Municode or American Legal; and the town of Hertford is not a Certified Local Government (Edenton and Elizabeth City are). Call Hertford Town Hall and ask about the specific parcel before you write an offer that assumes an answer. If you are planning exterior work, that call is a five-minute item that can move a five-figure number.
The Tax Credit That Actually Applies to a House You Live In
North Carolina's rehabilitation tax credit, in Article 3L of Chapter 105 of the General Statutes, has two halves, and old-house buyers routinely read the wrong one.
The half that matters to an owner-occupier is § 105-129.106, the non-income-producing credit. In the statute's words, a taxpayer "who has rehabilitation expenses of at least ten thousand dollars ($10,000) for a State-certified historic structure located in this State is allowed a credit equal to fifteen percent (15%) of the rehabilitation expenses."
15%
Credit rate on rehabilitation expenses
$10,000
Minimum rehabilitation spend to qualify
$150,000
Eligible expense cap (HPO's plain-language version)
$22,500
Maximum credit
Expenses count within any 24-month period, the credit is claimable no more than once in any five-year period, and unused credit carries forward nine years.
Crucially for this county, the statute at § 105-129.106(c)(5) covers a structure that is individually listed or "certified by the State Historic Preservation Officer as contributing to the historic significance of a National Register Historic District." A contributing building in the Hertford or Hertford West districts can qualify.
Two things to plan around
The federal 20% credit will not help you on a home. IRS § 47 applies only to income-producing property. If you are buying a house to live in, the NC 15% homeowner credit is your credit and the federal one is not.
Article 3L sunsets. The statute expires for expenses incurred on or after January 1, 2030, and for expenses incurred before that date it expires for property not placed in service by January 1, 2032. If a credit is load-bearing in your renovation budget, that is a real deadline, not a distant one.
The income-producing half of the statute (§ 105-129.105) runs 15% on the first $10 million of qualified expenditures, with a 5% bump for property in a development tier one or two area. NC Commerce ranked Perquimans as Tier 2 for 2025 and its November 2025 announcement of 2026 tiers did not list Perquimans among the counties changing — so it presumptively remains Tier 2, which satisfies the bump either way. Confirm the current year's tier before you rely on it.
Buying an Old House Here, Practically
The inspection stack on a house of this age is different in kind, not just in degree. Assume you are looking at some combination of knob-and-tube or early cloth-sheathed wiring, plumbing older than anyone remembers, a foundation and sill condition you cannot see from the street, and — on the oldest stock — framing that was never designed around modern mechanical systems. Get an inspector who has worked pre-war buildings, not one who mostly does 1990s subdivisions. Budget for the survey of what is behind the plaster, because that is where the number lives.
And sequence the tax credit before you start, not after. The credit runs through an application process with SHPO and a fee capped at 1% of completed qualified expenditures, filed on NCDOR form NC-Rehab. Work done before the paperwork is work that may not count.
Does National Register listing mean I need approval to change my house?
By itself, no. NC SHPO's own FAQ says listing "is mostly an honorary designation" and that unless federal funds, permitting or licensing are involved, "you may do anything you like with your property." What can restrict you is a local historic district overlay with Certificate of Appropriateness review — a separate, municipal designation. Whether one applies to a given parcel in the town of Hertford is something to confirm with Town Hall; the published ordinance did not settle it.
Can I get a tax credit for restoring a house I live in?
In North Carolina, potentially yes — a 15% state credit on rehabilitation expenses of at least $10,000, capped at $22,500, for a state-certified historic structure, which includes a building certified as contributing to a National Register district. The federal 20% credit does not apply to owner-occupied homes. The state statute sunsets for expenses incurred on or after January 1, 2030.
How old is the oldest house in the county?
The Newbold-White House is dated to 1730 by dendrochronology, correcting an earlier belief that it dated to as early as 1685. It is described by the Perquimans County Restoration Association and by VisitNC as the oldest brick house in North Carolina; NC SHPO does not publish that superlative, so treat it as attributed rather than settled. It is nonprofit-operated, not a state historic site.
Which parts of the county have historic districts?
Five National Register districts: Old Neck (1996), Hertford (1998), Belvidere (1999), Winfall (2003) and Hertford West (2025). Between them they cover much of the older stock in the town of Hertford, in Winfall, and in the Belvidere and Old Neck areas.
Sources for this chapter. Listing counts, district names and listing dates: NC State Historic Preservation Office's National Register listings roster, cross-checked against NPS records. Honorary-designation and local-designation language: NC HPO National Register FAQs and its local historic property designation pages. Newbold-White dating and operation: Perquimans County Restoration Association; NCpedia; the 1971 National Register nomination (NC HPO file PQ0005). Historic Preservation Commission: Town of Hertford boards page. Tax credit terms and sunset: N.C.G.S. Chapter 105, Article 3L (§§ 105-129.105, .106, .108, .110) and NC HPO's summary. Federal credit scope: IRS, Rehabilitation Credit (§ 47). Development tier: NC Commerce tier rankings.
Questions about a specific property in Perquimans County?
Travis works waterfront, historic and in-town transactions across Perquimans County and can map the financing, the CAMA questions and the due-diligence order to the specific property you are looking at.