Hallie & John Olsen
Hallie & John Olsen
Atlanta, GA
Where are you from?
Hallie: We’re both from the Midwest. I’m from Iowa, and John’s from Kansas, but we’ve lived in Atlanta for twenty-five years.
John: We met in college. I went to the University of Kansas, and Hallie went to the University of Missouri in Kansas City. She worked with a lot of my fraternity brothers, and we knew each other for a few years. She wasn’t a fan of mine at first! But my roommate and his girlfriend set us up on a date our senior year.
Hallie: Both of us wanted to go to the same concert, and our friends kind of tricked us into going together. I got in the car and realized, Oh, it’s John! And the rest is history. Married, three kids later.
How did you find Kiawah?
John: In 2015, I started playing in an event here called the Friendship Cup, a two-man best ball tournament over three days at the Kiawah Island Golf Resort.
Hallie: He went that first year, and it was all guys. He came back with photos, and I said, That looks amazing. I’m going next year! So a bunch of the wives started going too, and they had events for us while the guys played golf. We had such a blast.
What were your first impressions?
John: Hallie started exploring while we were playing, and we realized this place was even better than we thought. When it came time to think about a second home, we came back and toured Kiawah Island Club. I don’t know if there’s a better place in the South. It was a no-brainer.
Tell me about finding your home.
John: We bought a lot on The Ocean Course in 2022. It was incredible, but we realized after a few trips that it was a little too far from everything for us. We decided to sell and bought a condo because we were tired of renting. It was nice to have a place where we could leave things! We bought a lot on hole thirteen of River Course, and we just got our plans approved!
Hallie: It’s perfect. We love the River Course area—it feels private, but still close to everything.
What do you like to do here as a family?
John: We always rent bikes—it’s the best way to get around. We ride the trails and take long walks on the beach.
Hallie: We love the sunsets. We’ll bring a football or volleyball and play until the sun goes down. The Sports Pavilion, the gym—I love it all. We play a lot of golf too. We were at Cassique yesterday morning. We love playing nine holes before the kids wake up. And tennis! Pace is playing in a tennis tournament on the Island this weekend.
Tell me about that!
Pace: I play a lot! On weekends, I play in tournaments, mostly local, but we’re starting to travel out of state now. I want to play in college, so I just signed with an agency to help with that.
What is your long-term plan?
John: I don’t think the River Course house will be our last one. Maybe one day we’ll end up back on The Ocean Course, or maybe on the beach. The goal is to build something that our kids will always come back to.
Hallie: We’d love it if they ended up nearby, maybe at the College of Charleston. We’re a family with major FOMO. We always want to be together—and Kiawah is the perfect place for that.
What do you think makes Kiawah so special?
Hallie: In Atlanta, our lives are so busy—school, sports, traffic. I spend hours in the car every day. Here, our transportation is bikes. We’re together, not running in different directions.
John: It’s the simplicity. We feel like we can really slow down here.
