It's hard to believe, but we are over half way through 2015.
It's been a very good first 6 months for coastal real estate. 2015 is easily
on track to have the most sales of any year since 2005. There has been an
increase in sales in each of the last 4 years with 2014 having the most sales
of any year since 2005. Through the first 6 months of 2014, there were 303
sales. There have already been 388 for the first half of this year.
Homes are seeing larger price increases than vacant lots, while both are
selling at the highest rate since 2005. You can see in the chart below
that all of our markets fell sharply from 2005, and then bottomed out between
2010 and 2012. Most of the buyers this year feel they are purchasing
well under top of the market prices and that there is still plenty of room
for the market to rise.
AVERAGE SELLING PRICES OF
HOMES
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Vacant lots, on average, are not seeing as large of gains as
homes. However, some areas are seeing nice gains, especially those
areas where construction is most active. The average selling price for
a lot in Port St. Joe is currently $30,777, it's $71,768 in Mexico Beach/St
Joe Beach/WindMark, and $124,086 on Cape San Blas/Indian Pass. I'd have to
say the North Cape is still the hottest market, followed by Mexico
Beach. Port St. Joe is also starting to see a nice recovery on vacant
land as well as home prices. Building remains red hot
near the beaches. Builders are extremely busy and there are
63 homes under construction in Gulf County, 7 in PSJ, and 23
in Mexico Beach.
We started the year with about 590 properties on the market and
had dropped to 560 when I sent out an update in April. It's crept back up to
590 with a number of sellers starting to "test" the market at
higher prices. The buying hasn't slowed down and there are 95 properties currently under contract. There aren't many desperate sellers these days, but we
are still seeing some foreclosures. Here are the 6 homes and 15 lots currently on the market as foreclosures. The majority of the
foreclosures listed are selling for pretty much the same prices as everything
else. Some even go for higher prices because of the word
"foreclosure" attracting extra buyers that convince themselves
it must be a great deal just because it's a foreclosure.
I've only been able to go fishing twice this Summer, but was
also able to help out again with the Golly Whopper Classic. This was our 4th
year putting on the tournament and I've enjoyed watching it grow. We had over
88 participants this year and paid out $11,085 in prize money. I hope those
of you that fish will plan to come next year. It will again be the first
Saturday of Federal Red Snapper Season. Bonita Thompson that works with
us was part of the team that won the Red Snapper Division and is
pictured below. Here's a link to more information about the tournament from The Star.
It would be fun if 98 Real Estate Group was the top producing
company in the world, but I can at least say we are the top producing company
in Mexico Beach/St. Joe/WindMark for 2015. We are also selling a number of properties
in Port St. Joe and on Cape San Blas. I appreciate everyone that works
with our wonderful team that has now grown to 12 Realtors.
Our company production just passed $98,000,000 since opening in 2011.
The 4th of July was great once again and I hope you have been
able to enjoy our wonderful area.
Have a great weekend,
Zach Childs
Broker/Owner
98 Real Estate Group
850.819.0833
zachchilds@gmail.com
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