Three Brands. One Vision for How You Live.

Most people know Cari Ann Carter for real estate. But real estate has always been about more than transactions. It's about how people live—what their homes make possible, and what they need from them as life changes. That belief is the thread that connects everything Cari Ann does.

Cari Ann Carter Group

The real estate side is where it all started. Cari Ann has spent nearly three decades helping buyers, sellers, and relocating clients navigate some of the biggest decisions of their lives. Her team ranks in the top 1% of Twin Cities producers—among more than 22,000 licensed agents in Minnesota—with career sales exceeding $700 million.

What sets the work apart isn't volume. It's approach. Cari Ann and her team offer concierge-level service, which means staging guidance, strategic marketing, and real attention to the details that affect both price and outcome. The focus is on the life behind the move—not just the transaction.

That perspective led directly to her best-selling book, Are Your Roots Right? Rightsize Your Space. Reclaim Your Life. It's a practical guide for anyone asking whether their current home still fits the life they want. Not a push to downsize. A framework for making a clear-eyed decision—and moving forward with confidence, whatever that looks like.

Fresh Roots Living

So many people have the home they dreamed of—and aren't really living in it. Takeout replaces the family table. Gardening feels like a luxury. Rest becomes something to earn. Somewhere in the busyness, the most nourishing parts of daily life get set aside.

Fresh Roots Living was built to change that.

It's a weekly Substack publication and Instagram community centered on kitchen, garden, home, and seasonal life. Recipes, planting guides, home routines, seasonal projects. But more than content, it's a way of thinking about home—as something you actually inhabit, not just maintain.

The heart of it is simple: when you cook from your garden, tend something growing, or slow down enough to make a real meal, something shifts. You feel more settled. More present. Home stops being a place you manage and starts being a place that supports you.

That's what Fresh Roots Living is for.

Free subscribers get the weekly newsletter. Paid Inner Circle members receive the full archive, bonus content, and monthly downloadable guides—planting calendars, preservation planners, step-by-step build instructions—designed to be used, not just read.

DIY Designer Homestead

DIY Designer Homestead is Cari Ann and Steve's 17-acre property in Grant, Minnesota—and the Instagram account and content that documents life there.

It's a working homestead: organic gardens, food growing, outdoor builds, and the kind of projects that take real time and effort. The content is hands-on. Cattle panel archways. Kitchen renovations. Farm-to-table dinners. Seasonal harvests. The DIY Designer name reflects what the property actually is—a place where design sensibility meets practical, physical work.

For people who want more connection to land and home, this is the most tangible expression of that. It's not a lifestyle concept. It's what happens when two people with a design background decide to build something real.

How They Connect

These three brands aren't separate projects. They come from the same perspective: that how you live at home matters, and that most people want their homes to work better—not just look better.

The real estate work informs the lifestyle content, and vice versa. Cari Ann has spent decades watching people figure out what they actually need from a home. That experience shows up in the book, in the Substack, and on the homestead. It's all one conversation.

Whether you're buying or selling, looking for a practical recipe, planning a garden bed, or thinking about a bigger DIY project—there's something here that connects.