A question for local realtors or anybody has experience with real estate market (Oviedo: sales)

[beckycat]

What has been the trend for home values in Seminole County? Does it look like there is any light at the end of the tunnel for homes to stabilize of start to go up? From what I've been seeing values are still going down somewhat and then you have the other listings at last years prices. I don't know what to think. Is this going to be a long haul or does it look like the market is starting to correct itself?

[AONE]

It is very specific to neighborhoods. As the distressed sales lessen the prices seem to be increasing.

There were some areas I could get 2/2 condos for 20 k where they are 35-45k a year later

Lake Mary seems pretty stable as a whole. Some parts of Longwood are just starting to see some drops (Alaqua) others are holding on

Oviedo has held pretty constant and as the distressed are dropping off the rolls prices have risen.

Winter Park has already seen some increases. In the last 90 days they have sold a bakers dozen homes over 1 Million. Several went above the asking price. the High was 3.5 Million.

What's generally good for Orange county is so for Seminole and the trends are pretty much hand in hand.

Will we see more distressed sales this year? "experts" say so but I haven't seen it yet.

I have seen a great many commercial places find tenants recently which gives me a sense we are past the worse of it. In most cases if you waited to buy then you didn't get on the boat at the right time. While there are some great deals still they are getting to be much fewer in number. IMHO

[beckycat]

Originally Posted by AONE

It is very specific to neighborhoods. As the distressed sales lessen the prices seem to be increasing.

There were some areas I could get 2/2 condos for 20 k where they are 35-45k a year later

Lake Mary seems pretty stable as a whole. Some parts of Longwood are just starting to see some drops (Alaqua) others are holding on

Oviedo has held pretty constant and as the distressed are dropping off the rolls prices have risen.

Winter Park has already seen some increases. In the last 90 days they have sold a bakers dozen homes over 1 Million. Several went above the asking price. the High was 3.5 Million.

What's generally good for Orange county is so for Seminole and the trends are pretty much hand in hand.

Will we see more distressed sales this year? "experts" say so but I haven't seen it yet.

I have seen a great many commercial places find tenants recently which gives me a sense we are past the worse of it. In most cases if you waited to buy then you didn't get on the boat at the right time. While there are some great deals still they are getting to be much fewer in number. IMHO

Are the foreclosures still pulled from the market? I don't see many if any?

[Tlaurino]

Foreclosures are still rampant in the market. They are moving very fast though most of the listings I see are gone within a week or two. This is a good sign it signals the bottom of the cycle. Means the smart money is buying everything they can get. Remember JDR during the depression. Im no expert in FL real estate in fact I dont know a good area from a bad one had to ask advice on locations several times from the posters here. But I do know some of these values cant be beat. And when they are gone from the market there is no place but up for home values

[tworent]

I buy and rent out a lot of SFH and 2 years ago you could work with the bank. Today good deals are gone in days great deals are gone in hours. The house I bought last week my first bid 49k at 9am 3-4 rebids I got it for 62k by noon the next day. The only resin I was able to get it was the person I was bidding against wanted it as a primary residence and could not go over 60k and the bank needed to close in 10 days. I see no end in sight right now to be able to buy houses that are good deals.

[tktktk]

The answers so far in this thread seem balanced; but I would be very careful about asking questions about long-term predictions to realtors or anyone else. Remember that very few people saw the housing crisis coming until it was too late. And some of those who saw it coming didn't speak up...just my 2 cents.
I don't think anyone can predict exactly when or how long a recovery might be. At best you can evaluate recent and short-term trends (which have zero chance of being 100% reliable as long-term predictors)

[beckycat]

That maybe a good sign if the foreclosures are going quicker. The only thing is how much longer are they going to be available. I think once they fizzle out that will help bring values back. The problem is that when they figure comps those are bing included which brings values down quite a bit.