Sarasota Housing Market is on the Rebound
According to the Herald Tribune today, May 26, 2009, the median sales price in the Sarasota-Bradenton market is showing life, as sales rose in March. Pricing is spurring bidding wars for some properties. Pending sales in some local markets are up double digits. The number of vacant housing units in the Sarasota-Bradenton market is down 30 percent in the last 12 months.
Sarasota-Bradenton builders started only 236 single-family housing units during the first quarter of 2009.
Florida Association of Realtors data from March showed the median sales price in Sarasota-Bradenton up $6,000 from the previous month to $150,000.
“Sarasota is a little more ahead of the curve in getting rid of the existing inventory,” said Polito, director for the greater Tampa Bay area that includes Sarasota and Manatee counties. “We’ve seen prices correct a little more quickly than in other Florida markets and prices have stabilized in the last three months.”
The affordability of homes and condos is the best it has been in years, while availability — of credit, of being able to sell a home up north to buy a retirement abode here — is at a decades-long low, Polito said.
“So affordability is the best it has been in a long time and inventory is down, too, so those are good trends,” Polito said. “Venice, Sarasota and even up into Bradenton are all doing better.
