Dr. Beach, America's preeminent beach expert, just named Siesta Key Beach in Sarasota the best beach for 2011. Dr. Beach, who is also known as Dr. Stephen Leatherman of Florida International University, says, "The powdery sand is nearly pure quartz." Wide swaths of open beach and gentle waves make it a paradise for anyone. There's plenty of room to throw a blanket down and take in the sun's rays, walk along the water line or play a game of volleyball.
If you are looking for other great beaches where you can enjoy this Memorial Day weekend, check out my links to information about the other great beaches in the Tampa, St. Petersburg, Clearwater and Sarasota areas. Happy Memorial Day Weekend!
With condos and homes selling for up to 60% off their all time highs, investors, move-up home buyers, and luxury home buyers are finding value in Florida real estate. In December 2010, almost half of all buyers paid cash in the major markets in Florida. In the Tampa Bay area, over 44% of all buyers paid cash. In Miami, over 54% of buyers paid cash.
Last year about 28 percent of all sales in the U.S. were cash transactions, according to the National Association of Realtors®. In 2008, the rate was only 14 percent. In the last week, Zillow, The Wall Street Journal, and the Florida Association Of Realtors have all taken notice of this positive trend.
Follow the green........when the cash buyers come back in significant numbers, watch for the market to improve!!!
Steve Eckhardt, Broker, Luxury Real Estate Professional
Internet usage has grown 121% in the past five years. So what are people doing less? Listening to the radio and reading things like newspapers and magazines. Did You Know ...
...For more than one-third of home buyers, the first step in the home-buying process was looking online for properties.
...90% of homebuyers used the Internet as an information source when buying a home
...77% of Internet homebuyers drove by or viewed a home they saw online
...36% of buyers first found the home they purchased on the Internet
...Americans spend nearly a quarter of their time online on social networking sites and blogs, up from 15.8 percent just a year ago (43 percent increase) according to new research released from The Nielsen Company. If you're not using Facebook & Twitter to promote your listings, you are missing the boat.
...June 2010 was a major milestone for U.S. online video as the number of videos streamed passed the 10 billion mark. The average American consumer streaming online video spent 3 hours 15 minutes doing so during the month. (Source: Nielsen VideoCensus). House Video is IMPORTANT. Did you know YouTube is the 2nd largest search engine behind Google?
The city of Tampa is showing its strength in recovering from the recession. In a study of the economies of 150 cities worldwide before, during and after the recession, Tampa ranked 74th in terms of economic growth from 2009 to 2010. This was a huge improvement from its 120th ranking over the 2007 to 2010 period. its ranking was even better during the 1993 to 2007 period, when it ranked 83rd.
The 150 cities studied by Brookings Institution in its Global Metro Monitor were chosen not by their per capita income, but by their positions as areas of high-value and high-impact economic activity in their respective regions and nations. Their gross per capita income varies from less than $1,000 in Kolkata, India to about $70,000 in Zurich, Switzerland or San Jose, California. Additionally, nearly 80 percent of these cities have average incomes that are higher than those of other cities in their regions or nations.
With the above criteria, the selection of Tampa as one of the 150 cities for the Global Metro Monitor means that Tampa is a high-value and high-impact city in Florida. Brookings carried out the study together with the London School of Economics and Deutsche Bank Research.
The two other high-value Florida cities chosen for the study are Miami and Orlando. Before the recession, Orlando had the strongest economy among the three, with a ranking of 40th. Miami followed with a ranking of 66th. Tampa was then 83rd. But over the 2009-2010 period, Tampa surpassed them in terms of economic growth rate. Miami ranked 78th while Orlando ranked 85th.
74th - Tampa
78th - Miami
85th - Orlando
Among the three Florida cities, Tampa posted an income growth rate of 2.5 percent rate over the 2009-2010 period. Orlando posted 1.7 percent while Miami posted 1.6 percent.Before the recession - over the 1993 to 2007 period - Orlando was the most prosperous among the three cities. it ranked 40th on the Global Metro chart with an income growth rate of 2.2 percent and a job growth rate of 2.9 percent. Miami had an income growth rate of 2.1 percent.
Tampa has been recovering faster than Miami and Orlando partly because it didn't have the condo overbuilding problem of Miami and the sudden-growth challenges of Orlando. Additionally, Tampa has been able to maintain the community spirit that makes a city thrive amid challenges.
Moody's Analytics economist Chris Lafakis said the Federal Reserve will remain aggressive, with a quantitative easing plan that he equated to "basically flooding the global monetary system." Lafakis predicted the strategy would lift asset prices, reduce corporate borrowing costs, and increase the willingness of consumers to spend.
Lafakis predicted substantial growth in Florida's economy, mentioning that the Miami, Orlando and Tampa areas are expected to recover "quite significantly" due to a rebound in population growth and an increased willingness of people to travel to Florida for vacations. "The story of pent-up demand is true in no place more so than Florida," he said.
Now is the time to purchase a new home if you plan on taking advantage of Florida's homestead exemption next year!! You will want to make the most of this Buyers Market in the next couple of weeks to benefit up to $50,000 in tax exemptions in 2011.
Realtor friend Maria Norton reminds us that technically part of the Florida Homestead Exemption, the Save Our Homes Amendment goes one step further in protecting homeowners by limiting the annual increase in tax assessment to 3 percent per year for properties that qualify. That means that even if the value of your home suddenly spikes (and hopefully it will) you won't get hit with an unexpectedly large spike in property taxes, as well. (Home construction and other improvements may disqualify you from receiving the 3 percent limit, so discuss the benefits or drawbacks of such projects before you take them on)
Starting in January 2009, Florida property owners also began receiving this type of protection on their second homes when a law went into effect stating that the rate increase on second properties would be capped at an annual rate of 10 percent per year.
When it comes to the Save Our Homes Benefit, another term you'll hear a lot is "Portability." Portability is the ability of a homeowner to retain the benefits they've accrued through SOH, even when they move to another home of greater or lesser value.
For instance, logic says that Florida homeowners benefiting from the Save Our Homes benefit are paying less-than-market value for the property taxes on their homes, as the amount they pay each year is capped (unlike taxes in the open market). As such, it's natural to assume that some residents would be reluctant to move and take on higher property rates, along with a potentially higher mortgage.
To prevent that, Portability allows you receive a similar benefit on your new home, even though it's assessed at current market value. Pretty cool, right? The amount will vary depending on the value of your new home, and whether you are upsizing or downsizing on your move. (If you're upsizing, you'll be able to keep the entire benefit. If you're down-sizing, you'll receive the same percentage of the benefit applied to the new home's value.)
Time to make your move...
Initially Posted in Sales, Towers of Channelside, jmc realty by Steve McAuliffe
Call Me At (813) 765-1182 To Find Your Perfect Home.
Rates on 30-year mortgages fell to the lowest level in decades for the ninth time in 12 weeks, pushed down by traders anticipating a move by the Federal Reserve to pump more money into the economy.
The average rate for 30-year fixed loans dropped to 4.27 percent, mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday. That's the lowest on records dating back to 1971, and down from 4.32 percent the previous week.
The average rate on 15-year fixed loans, a popular choice for refinancing, dropped to 3.72 percent from 3.75 percent. That was lowest on records dating back to 1991.
In the years 1950 through 2008 Florida grew by more than 125,000 residents every year. But, for the year April 2008 through 2009, Florida lost residents for the first time in over 61 years. Last year's population decline, a result of the economic slump, was the first since 1946, when military personnel left the state at the end of World War II. It seems as if that slump has come to an end after just one year.
In the latest report from April 2009 to 2010, Stan Smith, director of The University Of Florida's Bureau of Economic and Business Research, estimates that Florida added a modest 21,000 residents between 2009 and 2010. "At the state level, foreign immigration continues to be relatively strong, and the state also continues to have substantially more births than deaths, which are really the drivers of Florida's growth in the last year," Smith says.
While population growth isn't the only factor that can affect housing prices, it is certainly a positive sign that the Florida market is stabilizing. The largest population gains were in some of the biggest counties. Miami-Dade led by adding an estimated 8,253 residents, followed by Hillsborough, 6,353, and Broward, 5,834.
Steve Eckhardt, Broker, Luxury Real Estate Professional
Early last week NAR released the national numbers for July sales. Overall sales saw a large drop 27% from June and 25% year-over-year from July 2009. While the pundits debate whether the sharp drop in overall sales was a meaningful indicator of market activity or just a product of the expiration of the home-buyer tax credit and artificially time-shifted demand, they all seem to have missed the fact that while overall sales were sharply down, sales in the $1M+ price segment were UP in every region across the country and more than 6% nationally:
"Luxury homebuyers have been buying this summer," said Laurie Moore-Moore, CEO of The Institute for Luxury Home Marketing (ILHM). "After waiting in the wings, many affluent buyers spent the summer shopping for value and snapping up trophy properties."
Statistics would indicate that she's right. According to The National Association of Realtors (NAR), for 2009 million-dollar and above home sales were just 1.2% of total sales or about 61,500 sales nationally. In July 2010, million dollar plus market share was up to 1.9%. While sales of homes in the $500,000 and above range rose dramatically in June, the million-dollar-plus market segment was the only price range in July showing positive growth compared to last year. "The mix of what is selling has shifted in favor of homes priced at $750,000 and above," added Moore-Moore.
It is likely that the 0.7% increase in the national median sale price for July was largely function of this increase sales at the upper end as opposed to growing price strength in the lower-priced segments of the market.
Bottom line: The luxury segment is outperforming the market overall, and this is a good news story that needs to be told!
Steve Eckhardt, Broker, Luxury Real Estate Professional
According to data released by California based RealtyTrac Inc., total foreclosure filings in the three-county region surrounding Sarasota jumped to 3,349 during July, a 40 percent increase from a month earlier and a 10.6 percent increase from July 2009. While much of the reason for the rise stems from resets on adjustable-rate loans, market watchers are also seeing an increase in commercial foreclosures. Records also show a steady flow of luxury properties going into foreclosure. At least eight homes in the million-dollar-and-over range fell into foreclosure in July. The largest was a $2.08 million loan on a 5,569-square-foot house on Osprey Point Drive.
While the increase in foreclosures may seem high, don't expect much further downward pressure on pricing. Sarasota property sales are at their highest levels since 2005 and inventory has been cut in half. Now is the time to buy, before these opportunities are gone.
Steve Eckhardt, Broker, Luxury Real Estate Professional
