In all other cases the action must be tried in the county in which the plaintiffs or the defendants, or any of them, reside at its commencement, or if none of the defendants reside in the State, then in the county in which the plaintiffs, or any of them, reside; and if none of the parties reside in the State, then the action may be tried in any county which the plaintiff designates in the plaintiff's summons and complaint, subject to the power of the court to change the place of trial, in the cases provided by statute; provided that any person who has resided on or been stationed in a United States Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Coast Guard, Space Force, or Air Force installation or reservation within this State for a period of one (1) year or more next preceding the institution of an action shall be deemed a resident of the county within which such installation or reservation, or part thereof, is situated and of any county adjacent to such county where such person stationed at such installation or reservation lives in such adjacent county, for the purposes of this section. The term person shall include military personnel and the spouses and dependents of such personnel.
N.C. Gen. Stat. § 1-82
Venue in all other cases
Applied in 27 court decisions — leading case 174 N.C. App. 606 - Hawley v. Hobgood (2005)
Most recently applied in Valleygate Dental Surgery of Charlotte, LLC v. Farrell (October 2025)
C.C.P., s. 68; 1868-9, cc. 59, 277; Code, s. 192; 1905, c. 367; Rev., s. 424; C.S., s. 469; 1957, c. 1082; 2011-183, s. 1; 2025-20, s. 2.1.
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Official source: North Carolina General Assembly. Reproduced from public-domain North Carolina statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.