Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
If your heart is set on the Keys/Key West - wait a year and try your search again. Housing market is becoming poor in Florida and the Keys were hit by Hurricane Irma, and I'm sure many people will look to their sell their homes - badly damaged or not.
Where did you get that info? You are completely wrong - housing market in Florida is healthy and has completely bounced back after Irma.
Where did you get that info? You are completely wrong - housing market in Florida is healthy and has completely bounced back after Irma.
I obviously don't share your opinion. The OP can believe who they like.
In a place like KW, where most homes are owned as second properties or that of retirees - a natural disaster like Irma reminds people (even those who this time escaped unscathed) what risks they're taking owning a property there.
Hi OP. I feel for you. I live in the Upper Keys, and bought in 2013 at the end of the crash, just barely in time to catch some of the lower prices. I have posted a bunch in the past about what it's like to live here, so if you haven't already, reading those threads would be informative of the reality. It is not a paradise. It is a beautiful place, with many very real problems.
While I clearly understand your love of and strong desire to be here, you made the right decision accepting reality. The posts encouraging you on this thread are not accurate, and while probably well-meant, are actually harmful. Wishful thinking hurts people every day down here. The only thing that truly helps people is cold hard reality when it comes to real estate decisions. The Keys are one of the most expensive places to live in the country. The only thing Hurricane Irma did was to further gentrify the county, in the long run driving living costs upward. Homes that were damaged in the storm will be riddled with mold, which would cause expensive and serious medical conditions for you and your family. They were not built to current code, and are below-flood. The rebuild costs way more than it did a few years ago, and contractors are at a premium. You might be on a waiting list for years to get someone fully qualified and licensed to do the work, and to get all of your permits in order first, and it is a felony to do unlicensed work, so you can't hire someone from outside of FL to do it faster (nor would they even understand the conditions and building codes down here, which are very Keys-specific and even Miami contractors don't get it and end up making a lot of costly mistakes). There are signs posted all over down here about it, and the local govt has promised to crack down very hard later on if they discover anyone has unpermitted or unlicensed work completed on their property - that is a real thing, Monroe County often goes after people years and even decades after such work is done when they happen to find a violation, and the charges are astronomical. Like sometimes as much as 100 or 200k for one average-sized house. No joke. Of course, there is a Bubba system, so if your relatives have been down here for generations and involved with money exchanges with govt employees, you'll be fine... but that is useless to newcomers.
Any house in the Keys purchased post-Irma would be subject to new assessment and the new rates being charged for wind, flood, and homeowner's - all required if you have a mortgage. These costs, and taxes, go up every single year. With the hurricane, they will now make a dramatic leap higher, and we all cover the cost, regardless of whether the house you choose received damage. But a house that is wood frame, or below flood, or V-zone, or in some other way deemed to be a higher risk than others, will be almost completely unaffordable to insure. Before the hurricane, such houses already routinely cost $12,000/yr in insurance for a small home. So you have to expect that the cost of taxes and insurances will be the equivalent of a second mortgage. Any person who buys a house with a mortgage in the Keys, NEEDS to start with a lower mortgage than they think is the max they can afford - because it is a guarantee the cost to keep that same mortgage will go up every year. For example, I have a 1200sqft home, and my mortgage and taxes already cost several hundred dollars per month more than they did just 4 years ago when I bought the house. And my house qualifies for max wind credits. I can't even imagine what the new numbers will be next year when Citizen's ups my rates to cover Irma. On the other hand, my house is now worth significantly more than it was when I bought it, without having done any major work to it. Like about 40% more.
The other thing people aren't considering is that due to the hurricane, housing is now in even greater demand. I could write a book on how much so, and why. It's crazy. But a few of the issues:
First, any house that made it through the storm is now going to go UP in value, because it proved it is hurricane-sturdy. Second, most of the non-seaworthy houses (so to speak lol) had to be scrapped, or significantly rebuilt to current code, so their costs also go up. It's one thing to buy a junk house with cash. It's quite another to try to convince a bank to take a gamble on that with you, in this current reality of sea level rise and global warming that is leading to more frequent and more violent storms on what is basically a sandbar. The banks aren't stupid with their money, they'll side with the scientists all over the world on this one. There are now some 20-30% fewer houses to live in in the county, so guess what that does to prices of houses that ARE livable? Yep, supply and demand causes the prices to go up. Lot costs also increase, because hotels and investors are looking to snatch them up, as there are very few to go around that have ready permits to build due to environmental regulations... so the average buyer has to compete with cash buyers with very deep pockets, making even hurricane-destroyed properties a lot more expensive than you'd expect. Meanwhile, local wages are NOT going up, and they are already significantly below elsewhere.
Problem is, it's not a bubble. OP, you mention the prices being crazy now. Check out what they were 2006-2008. The prices now are basically only 60% of what they were then, and they are rising back all the time. Sure, increased prices lead to foreclosures. But guess what? There are more than enough wealthy people in the world to come buy these houses with cash. The market here is already about 50% cash buyers. That will increase as insurance costs go higher, and mortgages become unaffordable. Against all logic, Hurricane Irma was a free paid advertisement for the Keys. More and more people seem to want to move down here to live now, than BEFORE the storm! I see tons of messages from people every day, posting in local sites down here trying to find a way to move as a brand new resident. They looked past the piles of rubble, saw the turquoise ocean, and said "THAT'S the place for me!" Honestly. It made a lot of people who had never even heard of the Keys before, say "wait, there are tropical islands in the US I can drive to? Sign me up!" Sure, we might have a dip in the market from time to time... but the overall trend is continuously upward well past the demand of homes in most of the rest of the country.
[A note for those looking online: Zillow is fun for casual browsing, but any serious buyer has to look at Realtor.com. It is the only one with up-to-date postings and accurate info, whereas Zillow is always 2-3 months behind to post when sales have occurred, and often the info in the post is riddled with mistakes. Moreover, their "estimates" for houses in the Keys are laughably inaccurate, because they do not understand the market here, which is based entirely around what kind of waterfront or nearby water access a place has, or how it meets building code or does not/what kind of insurance it qualifies for, and has absolutely nothing to do with the true market value of a neighbor's property. It is common in the Keys for million dollar homes to be directly next door to shacks. What a house cost 1 full mile away is totally irrelevant.]
There are other costs with living down here one has to consider too, like the fact that the Hurricane wiped out one of our only 3 hospitals (which was a sh!%%y hospital anyway, so questionable what kind of a loss that was, but still it does matter if you have a heart attack or some other emergency and have nowhere to go but a tent out in the rain like you're in a war zone). Flooding of local streets is a regular thing even with no storm now, so sometimes these cheaper houses are because the street is impassable half the days of the year. I guarantee you, if there is a price below the rest of the market for the house, there is something really wrong with it that will cost you just as much or more as the more expensive house. People aren't stupid. They know what they have here. Additionally, you need to budget for higher costs for groceries and other shopping, with much lower selection than on the mainland. Healthcare through the govt. marketplace is the highest here of any county in the state, because there are few residents to pay into the pool, and Keys residents are a very high-risk population.
If you want the dream, you need to be willing to compromise. In my case, I got roommates. Which, I don't mind, and which helps people out anyway because now there are a lot more people who need rooms than there were before since housing is at such a premium. One of the balancing effects of this increase in housing costs, is that there is very high demand for rentals and the market rate for a single room in a shared house is very high - the cost of a full apartment elsewhere. For any human being with compassion and a heart, that is nothing to celebrate. But, it means if you are fortunate enough to own property, it will always be extremely easy to rent rooms in your house, for high rents. There is a long line of people waiting, and willing to pay full price. (It's an awful situation for renters.) Rest assured though, even if you rented out every room in your house it would not quite be enough to cover the mortgage plus insurances. People are mistaken in saying that the hurricane scared any large number of owners off - especially in Key West. First, Key West was barely hit, they are fine. Secondly, the vast majority of property owners realize that if they move out and simply rent the place out to the endless stream of people who want to rent, they'll be fine. In the Lower Keys, it is easy to rent out for more than the mortgage is worth, for totally subpar places that you don't take care of at all, because tourist demand is so high. The few that sell, will be replaced by a more savvy investor who will turn around and rent the house to the hilt, further flooding our already gridlocked highway.
You also need of course to save your money, because major hurricanes have often struck in Keys history in successive years, or even more than once in the SAME year. So people thinking you can go down and get a deal in Cudjoe and make a profit off of others' misfortune don't understand what they're in for. It's remote, costly, full of mosquitoes and now lacking in basic supplies even more than before. And, a LONG way out to evacuate. And next year, it might be YOUR house that gets totaled. Compromise means saving the money to cover evacuation every single hurricane season, plus the cost of emergency needs or house repairs before insurance kicks in. NOTE, hurricane insurances down here have a deductible of some 17k to start with, so no matter what happens you will be out that money if you need to make a claim!
Compromise means not having a brand new house, or the kind of square footage you could get elsewhere. Prices here are on par with NYC, but you will at least get a bit more square footage than say Manhattan. But you're not going to get the yard size, or any other features that come so easily elsewhere in FL, and most of the country. Having an in-ground pool here is astronomical, because the ground is solid rock and really difficult to dig out of - not to mention that most yards are below flood so the pool may be damaged by regular salt water intrusion and occasional hurricanes.
I'm still so glad I moved here. This morning I kayaked off my backyard to watch the sunrise, pelicans and cormorants diving for breakfast, fish jumping out of the water everywhere as they do here. Last week I saw a huge pod of dolphins hanging out at sunset. Manatees swim behind my house regularly. I have more coconuts in my yard than I know what to do with. BUT, it is not idyllic, and it is not paradise. You need to be willing to compromise basically everything else in your life to live here. A move here is often at the detriment of reasonable healthcare, your relationships with family members, your social life, and most certainly your finances. It drives many to turn to alcoholism, or other harmful practices. Most people who live in the Keys put nearly all of their income toward housing expenses. It has to REALLY be worth it to you. I researched well, and this is a great place for me. But few people would enjoy the reality. It's stressful. Most people leave only a few years later, a lot poorer and a lot sadder than they were when they moved here.
I sympathize with you, OP. I hope though that this post helps to ease your mind in some way, that the Keys are a wonderful place to visit, but a very hard place to live. For most people, the tremendous sacrifices are just not worth it. And it seems you figured out that that is the case in your life. If you're not willing to give up everything else that matters to you to live here, it is not the right place for you to be. Someone who is independently wealthy and can plunk down cash is in another situation. But for everybody else, this is just the way it is. I don't think it's a bubble. Because every time the market here takes a hit, it takes less of one than elsewhere (that's usually true of islands, because the land is limited), and then it goes right back to increasing every time, steadily heading back to the high costs it started with until the next big thing happens. And then the prices start to recover all over again. People love tropical islands. What can you say? You get it - because you love them too. So do I. And the more people like us buy places here, the more it drives the prices up.
I would love to only concentrate on the happy things about living here when I post. But, I have met a lot of miserable people down here. Monroe County has the highest suicide rate in the state. I want to give an honest picture, because for most the Keys paint a pretty picture, but the reality of daily life down here is more negative than positive for a majority of newcomers. Most do not last long before they have to pack up and leave again. Guess why very few people in the Keys ever post to C-D? Because they are all busy working 3 jobs to afford living here. Or too drunk to find their keyboard. Likely, both.
I'm going to drive down to pick up an item in the Lower Keys today off craigslist. The guy was desperate to sell pretty much everything in his house, to try to help pay the mortgage this month. Rent stops for no natural disaster. It's still due when it's due, whether there's a house there or not. Even if the house washes into the sea, the mortgage company still expects their payment. A lot of people don't want to live like that, just to look at a couple of pelicans and some fish.
I obviously don't share your opinion. The OP can believe who they like.
In a place like KW, where most homes are owned as second properties or that of retirees - a natural disaster like Irma reminds people (even those who this time escaped unscathed) what risks they're taking owning a property there.
Bottom line, inventory is hitting the market and after 1 year ends, those owners will start shaving off figures off their asking prices.
Zillow also says my home is worth $1.2 million, which it isnt lol
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
