Real Estate Supply

[Smiling JOe]

... but I still believe it is generally true -- buyers of $1 million houses are cash buyers. Or will be again. Especially secondary homes....

Recently I read a brief article in Florida Realtor, Jan 2006, p8, entitled "Mortgage Free," which stated that the US Dept of Housing and Urban Development and the US Census Bereau reported "that close to 40% of the nation's residential properties do not have mortgages." This covers owner-occupied homes and rentals. The name of the report is "Residential Finance Survey: 2001."

I know that number has changed since in the last five years due to many people taking out home equity loans, but I thought the article was relevant to this discussion. You can learn more at www.HUD.gov

 

[DBOldford]

Husband and I had a good laugh at the idea of me/us being "bullish" investors. We are quite conservative and highly diversified, believing in diversified long-term high yield mutual funds and "blue chip" stocks combined with bonds and cash instruments, real estate holdings via the strategy of location/location/location and contained in low-interest, fixed-rate mortgages, absolutely no debt but for those mortgages, and having an annual budget that we live well within at all times. We have learned from friends more affluent than us what the very wealthy have always known, that one can have many of life's luxuries at very minimal or even no cost. For example, we travel often and usually first-class, seldom purchasing an airline ticket, because we put every possible expense on a credit card offering air miles and pay the balance each month. I enjoy a week at Canyon Ranch every year, compliments of a little investment portfolio that yields the cost of the trip and then some, an investment made with that goal in mind. We are not necessarily market savvy investors, but we like to sleep nights and plan to fully retire early in life.

Back to the subject at hand...I believe that South Walton has yet to see its real estate values peak. That will come with the advent of the new international airport and as baby boomers seek quality of life retirement places without the necessity of proximity to major employment opportunities. Our species will always be drawn to coastal areas, our attraction to the primordial soup. The largest concentration of our national population and the most highly educated and highest income segment is largely centered along the country's coastal areas. And when this occurs, the stodgy naysayers of the investment world (probably entry level stockbroker types and insurance peddlers) will be sinking into their firmly planted footprints in the sand, still screeching, "Chicken Little is right!" You know the real estate investors' prayer, "Please, Lord...give me just one more real estate boom and I promise not to p--- it away this time." :clap_1:

 

[Unplugged]

Great post Donna - one of the BEST I've read in this Forum :clap_1:

 

[TooFarTampa]

Great post Donna - one of the BEST I've read in this Forum :clap_1:

No doubt. Words to live by right here:

We are quite conservative and highly diversified, believing in diversified long-term high yield mutual funds and "blue chip" stocks combined with bonds and cash instruments, real estate holdings via the strategy of location/location/location and contained in low-interest, fixed-rate mortgages, absolutely no debt but for those mortgages, and having an annual budget that we live well within at all times.

:clap_1: :clap_1: :clap_1:

 

[GreenWaveDave]

Back to the subject at hand...I believe that South Walton has yet to see its real estate values peak.


Go Donna! Go Donna! Go Donna!

I know there are many more people out there who do and will believe the same....(because it's true!).

 

[Rita]

..... And when this occurs, the stodgy naysayers of the investment world (probably entry level stockbroker types and insurance peddlers) will be sinking into their firmly planted footprints in the sand, still screeching, "Chicken Little is right!" ....

 

[dbuck]

There is one thing that can scare away potential buyers and that is "insurance." What if you buy and then your insurance company drops your coverage. I have read that some owners are not going to insure their property and take a chance that nothing happens. We certainly couldn't afford that chance.

 

[Smiling JOe]

There is one thing that can scare away potential buyers and that is "insurance." What if you buy and then your insurance company drops your coverage. I have read that some owners are not going to insure their property and take a chance that nothing happens. We certainly couldn't afford that chance.

Many Gulf Front owners can afford this. Many of the Gulf front homes are older, and the land may be worth more with a clean slate.

 

[SHELLY]

We are quite conservative... absolutely no debt but for those mortgages, and having an annual budget that we live well within at all times.

Excellent strategy! As a "quite conservative" investor, I'm betting you don't hold a fistful of pre-construction condo contracts? I'd be interested in hearing your personal thoughts (not the rah-rah real estate slant) on current preconstruction sale investments and the condo market glut along the panhandle. Do you envision y-o-y double-digit appreciation in these completed units (and resale condos) over the next couple of years--or ever again?

Also, if you envision SoWal built out (and up) with affluent communities (of ever-increasing property appreciation) populated with folks who don't have to work for a living, where are the folks who will be required to service this booming population (i.e., non-affluent people who DO have to work for a living) supposed to live?

 

[GreenWaveDave]

Also, if you envision SoWal built out (and up) with affluent communities (of ever-increasing property appreciation) populated with folks who don't have to work for a living, where are the folks who will be required to service this booming population (i.e., non-affluent people who DO have to work for a living) supposed to live?

Yeah, I'm sure developers are too dumb to realize there will eventually be opportunity to make money on these types of products to serve that need further inland. You're right, no affluent communities that I can think of out there seem to have service workers available to support them from surrounding communities that are more affordable. That could never happen!

Just seeing what it's like to be a cynic.......I think I like how it feels to be positive better!