Tampa Fl area residents-need your advice

[the kabuki]

DH & I are planning on scoping out the Tampa area sometime in the next few weeks with a possible relocation in mind. For those of you familiar with the region there, could you give me some recommendations on areas/communities/cities to visit?

We're a family of 5 (kids ages 12,8 & 4) looking for newer home communities, they MUST be family friendly with year round residents. Home sizes in the range of 2200-2600 sq ft , $325,000 to $400,000 price range, with very good schools.

Currently we live in a suburb with 70,000+residents, within 20 minutes to major shopping areas to the south of us, more open farm land 20 minutes north of us. Our subdivision has tons of kids of all age ranges, schools are rated very good. DH is in the construction/plumbing field, so we'd need to be closer to where the building is going on.

Any suggestions?

 

[Aidensmom]

New Tampa and the Brandon/Valrico area will have lots of what you are looking for.

 

[Brianne]

Aidensmom is right. I really liked the looks of Fishhawk Ranch myself, but we didn't have the time to have a home built. I'd imagine there'd be resale homes available now though. The Brandon/Valrico/Riverview area is increasing in value a lot---the property value for our home has already jumped about $20k in about 3 months or so, according to the tax assessor's site.

 

[the kabuki]

I've taken a look online at Fishhawk Ranch (strange name though?) and it's marked as one of the places to visit.

Any other specific communitites in the above areas? Certain builders?

Oh, one more question, are all homes down there in these "gated communities"? Up here in MI we have subdivisions which I'm guessing are about the same without the gated part? But we also have a fair share of homes that aren't necessarily in a subdivision, just streets with homes. Do they call them communities because they're more, I guess the word would be, planned with the pools, parks,etc?

 

[Poohnatic]

There are both gated and open access around here. Fishhawk is the big game in town. That said, the infrastructure is not there if you have a wreck on I75, like what happened this morning. Coworkers got stuck on N/B I75 coming from Fishhawk Ranch and Gibsonton for 1 1/2 hours. The other person took 301 and also experienced delays.

The price you're willing to pay, for that square footage, you will not have a problem finding exactly what you want-even custom.

Prices appear to be leveling in this area right now, after a long time of explosive growth.

If you want further info, feel free to PM. Been down here 18 months and we are happy we made the move.

Suzanne