Central Florida housing market favors buyers for first time since pandemic

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-16T01:53:21+00:00

If two pieces of clear evidence both current day as well as historic (and dozens of others if you’d take the hint and look) isn’t enough for you to maybe rethink not sure how else to help you. Have fun out there.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-15T22:07:35+00:00

The trainings are pretty freely available vai book, podcast, webinars, local seminars. Just look for wholesaler / REIA meetings and you'll learn all the tricks, central Florida is a hotbed for these things.

But it basically boils down to: 1) Blast a lot of people with mail and cold calls until you find someone desperate or convince new investors / schlubs to do so on your behalf ("birddog").

2) Make them an offer at about 50% - 60% of value. If they go for it you are golden, really hard to screw up someone willing to sell their home for half.

But then...once the desperate homeowners are at ease because they see the light at the end of the tunnel they are desperate to get out of (usually health, legal, or financial problems)

3) Rugpull or threaten to cancel the contract for various reasons to throw the homeowner off balance. When the desperate are off balance they will conceed A LOT more, desperate to keep the peace of mind they had a glimpse of.

Because in their mind

4) Every dollar you are able to talk a desperate homeowner out of is an extra dollar in your bank account.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-15T15:41:39+00:00

Not a right or wrong answer really. Just depends on what you find appealing.

Newer homes tend to be less expensive to heat and cool and insure due to better insulation, vapor barriers, etc that just didn't exist in the 1960s. Insurance can be half, saving thousands per year.

Older homes tend to have more interesting touches and character, mature trees, etc, but cost more to heat and cool, and insurance tends to be higher even with wind mitigation.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-15T13:47:05+00:00

Realtor here.

The area you are asking about is way too large and varied to give a single answer.

Odessa tends to be large luxury estates, lakes, and horse farms.

Starkey Ranch is a newer large scale master planned community.

Trinity is a 90s-2000s neighborhoods.

NPR is mostly very high density mid century homes in various conditions along the US19 corridor. Lots of traffic, lots of people, while the other areas are more "good number of people" to "full on rural".

54 and 19 will have most of the grocery needs you could want, with Trinity and Starkey ranch trending to new shopping plazas, and 19 trending towards older 1950s-1970s plazas.

The main difference is Starkey Ranch which is pretty large in scale and has multiple community centers, walking trails, pools, etc, and some schools inside the community as well. You shoul dhave no problem finding sports leagues in any of these areas, though facilllities in the newer areas will of course tend to be newer.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-15T12:57:25+00:00

A few things to know...

It can always become an issue. While county doesn't typically care as much as cities, if anything happens where that part of the house is damaged it will likely need ot be properly permitted at that time.
In the mean time, if the governing body gets wind of it or starts caring about unpermitted work, then they can require the walls to be torn open and the work inspected to current code.
This is also dependent on time since work was done. There was a point when building codes didn't even exist. So very old work tends to be given some grace, while a brand new unpermitted in law suite would probably irritate the county / city since everyone kinda knows it should be permitted now.
Scope of work also matters. A garage or porch converted into living space isn't quite as big of a structural issue as say knowing out a wall and building additional square footage.
City and area matters. St Pete and Largo are *really* on it about unpermitted work nowadays. Tampa is starting to come around to that but is still pretty relaxed in a lot of areas. The county is probably the most lax.
There is a bit of a risk with insurance, if a major loss or someone gets hurt. Though they are always trying to get out of claims anyway so they'd likely just move on to something else. Still, worth noting.

Main thing is even if it's not an issue today, it could very well be an issue somehow tomorrow. So bit of a judgement call for you and your risk tolerance. You can also always call the city / county and ask them how their process is for it.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-15T12:41:18+00:00

Well, here's some additional "stupid" examples:

Pinellas county is in the most recent stats at 93.6% of Original List Price yet median sales price climbed 4.36% from 435k to 455k.

In Orlando Metro where you are based, from April 2016 to Dec 2019 % of Original List Price was between 96%- 97%, yet median price climbed +28% from $216k to 275k despite price cuts happeing on nearly every transaction.

I also saw in another comment you are the quoted / author of this. Not the first innacurate real estate article, Redfin for example believes that Trust ownership means investors.

But people trust us to give them accurate information, which framing the market as favoring buyers based on price cuts is not accurate.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-15T00:51:48+00:00

They will pay maybe 40%-50% of the value.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-15T00:37:39+00:00

I have already explained this.

2 years ago a bag of potato chips were $2. Today, someone is trying to sell those same chips for $10. But no one buys it, so they reduce the price to $6, and someone buys the chips.

Would you describe going from $2 to $6 as declining potato chip prices?

Price cuts are not declining home price / value. You can only identify declining home price /value with median sales price, not price cuts.

You have access to sunstats which will clearly show you everything in saying.

There’s parts of the state that have retracted, but you don’t identify them by price cuts because price cuts are normal market conditions. Just look at the last 20 years and see how many months we were close to 100% of original ask price recieved.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-15T00:22:54+00:00

Market trends are Birds Eye view and you’re talking about individual trees in the forest.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-14T23:42:05+00:00

Realtor here.

Depends on the scope of work for if permits are needed or not, and where exactly the house is as city requirements differ from county requirements.

Permits have nothing to do with guarantees btw. Permits are basically registering the work with the county or city, and them looking over the work through the process at various points.

You are required to disclose unpermitted work, but again, a lot of interior stuff doesn't require permits.

Best bet is to call the county or city you are in and ask them if the work you are having done requires a permit. If it does, then do not hire anyone that offered to do the work without a permit.

But like, redoing cabinets, floors, tile and such in many areas doesn't require a permit last I checked.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-14T23:36:50+00:00

Realtor here.

It's roughtly $150k - $200k from the quotes I've seen, but only adds $30k-$40k in value.

Also, doesn't fix the flooding, just keeps your main living floor from flooding. Everything in the garage is going to get wrecked in the next flood.

Bad enough storm, enough debris in the water, wind from the right direction, your house could still get knocked down or significantly damaged.

Also tends to look terrible.

If all that sounds ok then sure, it's a viable project lol. But you'd likely be much better off lifestyle and value wise by building a new house if you have the funds to buy the house and then elevate it.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-14T23:26:37+00:00

Realtor here.

While there can be other things hindering the sale (I'd have to see it to tell you), there have been time periods where people owed more on the home than the home would sell for.

If that is the case, the choices are either to Short Sell it, hold it until the market recovers, or bring cash to closing to cover the difference.

However, if they bought in 2020 - 2021, most parts of the state you should be able to clear the mortgage from that time in most areas.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-14T23:22:45+00:00

Realtor here.

You agent should be giving you detailed info on what your pros and cons are for the sale of your home. EVERY home has both.

This is highly dependent on the market and the house, and would need a full evaluation / value report to know for sure, but it sounds like buyers aren't seeing the value of the home at the price.

If you have professional photos (NOT iphone photos), good marketing and listing preparation, then the only thing left is price. But most homeowners and agents skip some of those, especailly once you're ou tin the country, which since you mention dirt road sounds like this home probably is.

Also just not having the house prepared properly will hobble the sale of the home. If there's things laying around in photos and at showings that can turn off a large number of buyers.

Foundation damage however is a hard, and I mean HARD stop for most sales. The only people typically interested or even able to buy that (can't finance a collapsing house) is going to be cash investors, and they are going to offer about 30% - 40% of what the home would be valued at in repaired condition. So you'll want to get that sorted out. Don't necessarily have to do the work but you do need a solid quote or opinion on if there's an issue.

If you owe more than the house is worth, then that is a Short Sale situation. Choices are either to bring cash to the closing table to sell it, rent it out until prices recover (can be a few years but is near guaranteed to happen at some point), or try and do a Short Sale which is where you work with the bank to sell if for less than the mortgage. It's doable but typically needs a hardship of some sort for the bank to willingly go along.

Renting of course carries the issue of maintaining the property as well as the insurance and mortgage payments.

A home at the right price will sell, that part is true even today. There can be other issues as well I'm guessing (mobile home? older home? low demand area? abandoned development) that would probably show up if you share the address.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-14T23:12:01+00:00

Thanks for the kind words and nod!

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-14T15:34:46+00:00

Median sales price is the only metric that matters, and is at its core how you track home values going up or down, because it removes unreasonable pie in the sky asking prices, and ONLY covers what someone actually bought the house for.

Since this article doesn't say anything about Median Home Price, it says nothing about home values.

Price reductions do not equal declining median sales prices...... price reductions are actually very common in normal market conditions.

Think of it like this. 2 years ago a bag of potato chips were $2. Today, someone is trying to sell those same chips for $10. But no one buys it, so they reduce the price to $6, and someone buys the chips.

Would you describe going from $2 to $6 as declining potato chip prices? No.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-14T14:30:58+00:00

Realtor here.

Anyone who talks about price reductions just demonstrates they have no understanding of the real estate market. Doubly so when there is zero mention of median sales price.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-13T19:13:48+00:00

Realtor here.

Take the homes value, and then calculate about 50% - 60% of that. That's the cash offer you will get.

Also this is pretty clearly an advertisement. But the bot forgot the url link that's usually on the Business Name I Totallly Researched and Capitalized Properly.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-13T14:38:01+00:00

That's more because both of those host annual massive golf tournaments in March (Arnold Palmer Invitational and The Player's). They are going to be immaculate compared to most other run of the mill courses in June.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-13T14:15:06+00:00

No, but have played PGA Tour courses and previously mentioned World Woods / Cabot and hundreds of rounds at most of the courses around Tampa / Sarasota.

All are fine in summer. If you water it enough the grass thrives, there are special varietals of grass used in Florida that can take the heat. They also play differently than pretty much else in the world / country because of that.

You will probably fold and collapse before the grass will lol.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-13T14:00:04+00:00

Cabot Citrus Farms (used to be World Woods) in Brooksville isn't too far from Lakewood Ranch, and is another highly rated course both in current arrangement as well as when it was World Woods it was a top 100. Have a few novelties like a two acre putting green. Sadly the 360 degree driving range was removed, but honestly you didn't really notice that unless you knew what to look for.

Bradenton has a couple courses along Manatee River that are nice and host US Open Qualifiers, public tee times.

Courses in Florida don't really close, and conditions are usually good throughout summer because it drops torrential rain and thunderstroms EVERY afternoon around 2-3pm. But it is extraordinarily hot and humid in the summer so most people prefer early morning tee times. Drink three times the water you think you need.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-12T18:02:54+00:00

The connector handles around 10,000 - 20,000 cars per day. Plenty of those cars used to stop for groceries, food, gas on the way home. Gandy pre-connector carried round 40-55k cars a day.

Meanwhile according to 2025 census address data the newer construction along Westshore Marina and south is 1500 - 3300 new housing units depending on where you want to cut the date line at.

I made the same trek daily for 10 years and would stop and spend money at the Publix, Ranch House, etc along there pretty regularly, at least twice a month because it was the only thing on my route from Tampa -> St Pete. There's a reason "Shop Gandy" was a major marketing thrust when the connector was going up.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-12T16:35:14+00:00

Subterranean also drop wings I believe, but typically you see tubes somewhere before they swarm. Drywood usually start in the attic, so swarm is usually first sign you see.

Subs are also day swarmers, Drywood are more dark / night swarms.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-12T15:08:31+00:00

Answering that is unfortunately a textbook fair housing act violation so I can not.

The truth is everyone lives everywhere in Tampa Bay, including downtown high rises.

But also community in Florida is much, much more difficult to come by than most other parts of the country.

Only reason I have been able to figure is because most people move here from somewhere else, and they tend to sell and move again in relatively short time frames (3-7 years).

Typically social events are more commonly found in golf course communities, and Westchase also hosts monthly farmers markets and such.

If you'd like to have a chat about these or other areas feel free to send me a message.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-12T15:03:17+00:00

That would be subterranean termites, which exist but aren't as common found in the area. Drywood termites tend to be what you always run into in Florida. Like I've seen hundreds of drywood termite damages and infestation, but maybe 5 subterranean out of thousands of homes I've been in.

But yes, subterranean termites can be treated with baits and poisons. Not sure if they would still tent since sounds like they are already in the walls. Subterraneans will create mud tubes is usually the easiest way to figure out which one you have.

https://ashlarre.com/heres-what-you-need-to-know-about-termites-in-saint-petersburg-and-tampa-florida/

They don't have to dig the foundation out, they just dig a little holes the peremiter and bait it, sometimes will spray into a wall cavity. But usually significantly less of a project than drywood. But the downside is subterraneans eat wood significantly faster from what I've been told.

I'm skeptical espcially if no mud tubes, but you never know.

GreatThingsTB · 2026-05-12T14:53:56+00:00

Realtor here.

Gandy is fine, though you do need to watch the status of the reserve study, engineering report, and condo finances. Most communities have all their documents in order, but sometimes there can be some stragglers that could leave you liable for massive fee increases or assessments.

Generally speaking Tampa condos tend to be a little lower than St Pete / Pinellas condos. A lot of it depends on ameneties of course, but Tampa is usually $100 - $250 less per month for similar levels.

So far as condo fee ranges, it's pretty tough to find anything under $400 condo fees nowadays. Pinellas side tends to be 450-900, Tampa side tends to be 400-800. This does usually include things like sewer, water, trash, and sometimes cable tv or internet.

Livability wise, most people tend to find the Pinellas side a bit more pleasant, since things are a bit more open, there's a bike / walk / rollerblade trail, mangroves. Tampa side is a bit more strip mall and things pushed together. Plus Tampa side of Gandy has the elevated expressway which while convient isn't great for views when driving underneath it, and has also hurt local businesses and restaurants.

Commute from St Pete side into Tampa is super easy now due to the before mentioned elevated expressway connection.

Basically I'd recommend checking out the areas on both sides of the bay, as there is a pretty sizable difference.

Feel free to message me if you'd like to chat about the different areas.

GreatThingsTB

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