Stealing home: Ted Parker put $12 million into his dream home. Someone seeking tranquility and 10 bathrooms will pay a lot less.

• Author: Williams, Allison
• Position: NC TREND: House hunters

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In the heyday of manufactured home sales in the 1990s, mobile-home magnate Ted Parker built his own mansion on the edge of Lumberton.

He flew in a woodworker from Switzerland, modeled the pool overlooking the Lumber River after a resort in Puerto Rico and installed chandeliers originally made for singer Michael Bolton. When the N.C. Department of Transportation refused to carve a turn lane on a rural and otherwise empty stretch of N.C. 72, Parker paid for it himself. He suspected the 13,000-square-foot house would attract rubberneckers craning to see over the mile-long wall in front of his 115-acre property. He was right, especially after a "for sale" sign went up several years ago. Now, a new agent from Myrtle Beach, S.C., has a prospect for the property: the Chinese.

It once seemed far-fetched that Chinese real-estate investors and tourists would make the 15-hour trip from Shanghai to Myrtle Beach, flying over preferred Los Angeles and Las Vegas. Then, Founders Group International scooped up 22 golf courses on the Grand Strand in 2014-15, while other Chinese investors scouted the touristy beach town for a location to build a $100 million theme park designed as a Chinese cultural village.

As of mid-April, Founders' parent Yiqian Funding was under investigation by the Chinese government for fraud, according to Chinese publications.

"If you're flying halfway around the world," says real-estate agent Craig Dierksheide, what's another hour and a half to a Robeson County mansion? It is now on the block at $3.29 million, furnishings included. Dierksheide showed it to Chinese investors in March, and they may...