Crews are working on the site for a Holiday Inn Express coming to Porters Neck, and developers said Wednesday that they expect the project to be complete by next year.

The 104-room hotel (scaled down during the planning process from a 150-room hotel proposal) on Porters Neck Road will have an indoor heated pool and 1,000 square feet of meeting space, said Barry Eagle, president and CEO of Wilmington-based Crown Hotel and Travel Management.

Eagle’s company also has a Holiday Inn Express in Leland, along with six other existing hotels and five under construction in North Carolina, counting the Porters Neck hotel. The firm has one hotel in South Carolina, a Hampton Inn & Suites by Hilton in the town of Hartsville.

Placing a hotel in the northern New Hanover County community of Porters Neck took patience; it was part of a multiyear process, Eagle said.

“We found that it was basically the only pocket in all of Wilmington between Hampstead that just didn’t have the hotel accommodations that people are looking for,” Eagle said. “We targeted the area five years ago trying to find the right site.”

The developer of the hotel is Wilmington-based Clarendon Properties, led by John Sandlin, founder and president of Clarendon. Sandlin said the hotel could begin rising on the site as early as next month.

“We would like to be open no later than the third quarter of 2020,” he said Wednesday.

Eagle said that not only did the development take time, it also came with other challenges.

“There’s not a lot of land out there to build hotels,” he said.

The hotel will have a brick facade.

“We wanted to upgrade the facade based on the upscale feel of the area,” Eagle said. “We wanted to keep in line with that.”

Overall, Eagle said, “We’re very excited about the [Porters Neck] market. We think it’s going to be a phenomenal market with the I-140 bypass that comes into that section, the growth out there with all the new restaurants and facilities. We’ve got a new Chick-fil-A out there. We think that’s all going to be fantastic for our guests.”

The site, near a Lowe's Home Improvement, is within walking distance of existing restaurants and a forthcoming Slice of Life Pizzeria location, among other restaurants and stores.

Guests will also have easy access to both Raleigh and area beaches, Eagle said.

He said, “We believe in the ownership group that it’s going to be one of our best sites.”