buying a house in florida

[jessie32]

my hubby only has 10 years left to work.hten we can go in live in florida for the winter months.i would like to know when should we start looking for a place to buy or should we just rent a apt when we are there.i would like to know if anybody owens a house there and how much it cost to live there.orhow much it would cost just for know going a couple times a year.i would like to talk to him about it but i would like to get some info first.what do you think i should do?thanks for the help.

 

[Feralpeg]

There is a housing boom in the Orlando area. The prices of houses are climbing rapidly. If you are interested and able to do so, you might think of buying now for later. You won't lose money. As more and more people move here, the property values only increase. If you wait, you will be paying more later.

For instance, I paid $250,000 for my home a year ago. The same home is now selling for over $300,000 with the same builder.

When I started looking, I arranged for a real estate agent to show us around one day while here on vacation. I just looked at things on the internet until I got a general idea of where I wanted to look. The agent showed us various properties. We are very happy with the home we chose.

 

[SheDaisy0088]

The housing market here in Florida is going thru the roof. When we bought our house 10 years ago we paid $38,000 for it. Now the houses in my development are going for $110,000 to 130,000. Our townhouse is 2 bedrooms and 1.5 bathrooms. We are looking to sell and move to Texas. Fortunately for us the houses in our area sell quickly.

Unfortunately the rental market isn't much better. The prices keep going up and up. More people are moving into the state than are moving out.

I would say to just start looking and see what you can come up with.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

I agree--we have been in our home six years. We bought it for $97,000. When we got our Home Equity Loan to build our pool in March '04--they maxed us at $185,000. Homes in my neighborhood--3 of them....are all listed for over $300K with and without pools.....and one of them is under contract.

I would start the search now and buy when you can. Some think the market will ease up--which I will agree to a certain extent. I seriously doubt that homes will go in reverse on value.

 

[Luv2Roam]

The price of housing is big talk around this area. It is amazing. I am SO thankful we bought our house Spring of last year.
Housing was steadily climbing each month even then. But now....
I know someone who is having a house built in this area.
During their looking period, they saw a vacant lot and spoke with the builder.
3 - 4 weeks later they decided to go for it. The price of the house increased $4,000 during that short time frame.
We have lived in our house just over a year. Our house's value has increased 35% since we bought it.

 

[SJSKJ]

One good way to find home in any area that is usually priced under market value is to look for a HUD, VA or bank foreclosure. A lot of times you can find really good deals on homes this way. A lot of times they are in need of some TLC (carpet, paint, etc.), but most of the time, you walk into a home with instant equity.

You can search HUD foreclosures in Florida at: http://hud1.towerauction.net/FL.htm

VA foreclosures at:
http://www.ocwen.com/reo/reocitylist.cfm?statechosen=FL

Bank or corporate foreclosures are usually listed individually through various real estate agents in the area. You just have to ask.

Good luck!

 

[frannn]

First I have to convince DH to move out of NY, because by then he'll be able to retire from NYPD. I have a close friend who is looking to move to FL now, and like the above posters, had the cost rise for her from about 200-250K in a few month's time. Things like this make me wonder if the costs will move up to almost match NY, since so many people are moving from here to there. I figure that kind of defeats the purpose, so I am going to revisit my future plans. I am confident that the value of my house here will increase enough (hopefully at a higher rate than FL), so that when the time comes for us to find a place to go, we'll still be able to have our choice of a bunch of states. I was really longing to end up in FL, very close to WDW, but I realize that FL may actually become what I am moving away from. DH and I pay a premium to live in NY, supposedly because it's wonderful to be near the big city, and all the action. We go to the city maybe once every two years. I'd rather live close to FL, in a nice, quiet state, where my $ goes very far. I would love to live in WDW, but realize that if I live really really close, it wouldn't make as much sense to me to stay onsite, eliminating one of my big draws.

 

[dzneelvr]

For the prices of real estate that are being quoted by the posters, you may want to move down to Florida for the year. A business friend moved from northern Illinois to Celebration (WDW's planned community) 2 summers ago and loves it. I don't believe the house costs were any more than what's being thrown about. Celebration itself is a model community with all utilities underground (they weathered the past hurricanes extremely well) and they just drop over to WDW for their evening meal when the mood hits. (I'm jealous)

 

[CarolA]

I would actually suggest waiting.

Real Estate prices have been inflated somewhat by a housing shortage caused by last year's hurricanes. Assuming that there are no major storms over the next year or so at some point supply and demand will catch back up with each other which could actually cause a small decline in values. My father's subdivision still has SEVERAL homes which cannot be inhabited due to the storm. PRices for replacement homes are being inflated due to a shortage of contractors....

 

[jessie32]

thanks for all the help.i guess we will start looking but wont jump into anything going back maybe next year so i guess we can look at that time.i dony know if we will buy or just travel.i real love DISNEY..so i would love to move there.so buying a house now i could talk to him into going there ever year.but thank you all for the good ideas.

 

[ArielsMommy]

When we bought our house 4.5 years ago, we paid $152,500. Houses on our block (in a golf course community) without pools are going for double. These houses even have less square footage than our house. I have heard that it has been predicted that within the next 25 years Florida's population is going to grow to be 3rd in the country. Only behind NY and CA. HTH

 

[Nicolepa]

For the prices of real estate that are being quoted by the posters, you may want to move down to Florida for the year. A business friend moved from northern Illinois to Celebration (WDW's planned community) 2 summers ago and loves it. I don't believe the house costs were any more than what's being thrown about. Celebration itself is a model community with all utilities underground (they weathered the past hurricanes extremely well) and they just drop over to WDW for their evening meal when the mood hits. (I'm jealous)

Unless they've changed their CC&R's since Celebration started building this family would not be able to buy now in Celebration. We looked when they were first starting to develop and they said that you had to be the primary resident 9 months out of the year and you could not rent your home out. (We wanted to buy a house, rent it out for a few years and then use it as our vacation home.)

 

[TEK224]

I've been pondering this idea also. I have about 15 years until retirement. Was thinking about moving to Florida. But I like the area where I live and I like to travel also. I thought if I bought a house in Florida to go in the winter and then came back to my house here for the summer, I'd have the best of both worlds.

But then I'd be worried about the house I wasn't in for 6 months. Is everything ok? What happens if repairs are needed (pipe breaks, etc.) I don't think i'd want to rent my house out when I wasn't there. Plus I'd have two property tax bills, utilites, etc.

So right now I'm leaning toward keeping my house I own now as a home base. Then instead of putting money out to buy a second home I can travel to where I want to go, staying 3-4 weeks and then return home (to rest), before planning another trip. That way I'm not tied in to one place and I don't have all the major bills to pay on a second house. And in the event any financial concerns arise, I can stay home in an area I like.

Just my way of thinking.

 

[Nicolepa]

So right now I'm leaning toward keeping my house I own now as a home base. Then instead of putting money out to buy a second home I can travel to where I want to go, staying 3-4 weeks and then return home (to rest), before planning another trip. That way I'm not tied in to one place and I don't have all the major bills to pay on a second house. And in the event any financial concerns arise, I can stay home in an area I like.

Just my way of thinking.

My FIL has been pondering this for several years. My MIL wants a 2nd home up here so she can come and stay for long periods of time. He figured out that for what it will cost him to have a 2nd home he can spend $5000 for rent for the month of the year he wants to travel. This also enables him to stay in different places (he's a golfer) each year.

 

[CarolA]

I think a lot of the prices you are seeing are for nice "primary" homes. My Dad lives in what is referred to as a Park Model in Lake Wales. Prices are very reasonable especially when you consider it is a second home. It is actually much nicer then I would have believed prior to seeing the inside and the community. Plus he lives in a Senior Community which means they have lots of activietes, friends etc...

 

[AllyBri]

Unless they've changed their CC&R's since Celebration started building this family would not be able to buy now in Celebration.


It changed a few years ago. I want to say around 2000.

 

[desiab]

We are nowhere near retirement age, but if the opportunity should arise with a job offer for DH we would consider moving to Florida. Does anyone know of a good website to get a general idea of the cost of living in counties around WDW? I would like to move within 2-6 hours from Disney in a town with comparable COL to where we currently reside.

 

[stemikger]

It really depends on where you live, but the real estate market is pretty hot all over.

I live in Staten Island, New York. I'm only 15 miles from the city so my house went through the roof.

I bought it 11 years ago for $135,000. Today I can get $420,000. So even though the houses are going up in Florida, they are going up even faster in places like New York and New Jersey.

So if they do go up, your house is going up just as fast, if not faster. It really depends on what market you are in. If you are in the middle of no where, you might not be as lucky. Good Luck

 

[ducklite]

We signed the contracts to build our home just about two years ago--it ended up costing us about $400K. It's now conservatively worth $600K, and that price has nothing to do with the hurricanes, rather it's a hot neighborhood in a hot area. We spent several years looking for the right town/community/builder and when we finally found it, we just knew it was the right place.

It was originally going to be a vacation home and then a retirement residence, but plans have changed and we've been living there quite a bit--and I'll be there full time by early July.

stemikger is right about the housing market going through the roof all over the place. We're in suburban NJ, about an hour from midtown NYC, and the townhouse I paid $120K for nine years ago is now worth at least $300K. We're getting ready to sell it. We've mentioned this to a few people, and just by word of mouth have already got real estate agents calling us asking if they can bring buyers by! We've got someone coming tonight...

Anne

 

[kandeebunny]

We've had a house in Fl since the early 80's and we live in NH it's MUCH cheaper to maintain even in the summer months our air bill was only like $90 versus the $500 a month to heat the NH house in the winter. We bought it at about 70k and its now selling for 250k its a 2 brdm 1 bath condo.