Coming to Visit/Realtor/Real Estate Shopping (Tampa, Sarasota: for sale, home)

[jwhite58502]

Hello all we (my wife and I ) are flying into Ft Myers in January. The 13th to be exact our inntial plan is to be there for a week, spend 2-3 days exploring areas, a little beach walking/tanning etc... then looking at properties for sale after we get acclimated a little for 2-3 days and then seeing if we are comfortable enough buying our winter/retirement home or plan on comig back to look more later on. We have vacationed in Venice Beach before but plan on looking from Punta Gorda all teh way north to Nature Coast. Looking for suggestion for a buyers realtor who can spend 2-3 days with us going over options/areas/ and even showings. Looking for any and all advice. Thanks

[hiknapster]

Originally Posted by jwhite58502

Hello all we (my wife and I ) are flying into Ft Myers in January. The 13th to be exact our inntial plan is to be there for a week, spend 2-3 days exploring areas, a little beach walking/tanning etc... then looking at properties for sale after we get acclimated a little for 2-3 days and then seeing if we are comfortable enough buying our winter/retirement home or plan on comig back to look more later on. We have vacationed in Venice Beach before but plan on looking from Punta Gorda all teh way north to Nature Coast. Looking for suggestion for a buyers realtor who can spend 2-3 days with us going over options/areas/ and even showings. Looking for any and all advice. Thanks

You'll probably want to put this on the Sarasota forum and points north. Punta Gorda doesn't have their own forum but most of their residents hang on that board and may be able to give you recommendations. Lee County is just to the south of your target area.

That time of year is not always the best for tanning, but I suppose it depends on where you are from. Locals can often be seen sporting winter jackets and sweaters at that time of year, and I am writing about Lee County. It can be a lot cooler up on The Nature Coast.

[kroeran]

Originally Posted by jwhite58502

Hello all we (my wife and I ) are flying into Ft Myers in January. The 13th to be exact our inntial plan is to be there for a week, spend 2-3 days exploring areas, a little beach walking/tanning etc... then looking at properties for sale after we get acclimated a little for 2-3 days and then seeing if we are comfortable enough buying our winter/retirement home or plan on comig back to look more later on. We have vacationed in Venice Beach before but plan on looking from Punta Gorda all teh way north to Nature Coast. Looking for suggestion for a buyers realtor who can spend 2-3 days with us going over options/areas/ and even showings. Looking for any and all advice. Thanks

I would propose that you consider Marco Island all the way up as your target area, and it will take a lot more than a few days to get a sense of the areas, let alone the hundreds of neigbhourhoods to consider.

Also consider that Florida weather is iffy for beach weather Dec 15 - Feb 15 - good golfing weather half the time, jacket weather for some of the time - we find a heated pool at 2 pm is usually doable that time of the year. South W Florida can be considerably warmer than even Sarasota and certainly further north Dec/Jan.

I have heard a lot of anecdotal stories of people that start out at St. Petes and further north, but eventually migrate to SWF to maximize the heat for those critical few weeks.

[justNancy]

Originally Posted by kroeran

South W Florida can be considerably warmer than even Sarasota and certainly further north Dec/Jan.

There is very little difference in temperature between Sarasota and Naples.

BTW, I would never recommend Marco Island to someone who likes Venice Beach.

[kroeran]

Valid points. It seems as though that while they have vacationed on Venice beach, they did not particularly say they liked it, and they are even considering Punta Gorda, a very different type of area. Even if they were focused on a particular situation, I would still advise them to broaden their search.

While my personal view is that it is beneficial to explore the entire coastal southeast US before locking down on a particular area, I would say at the very least that anyone thinking about SWF consider the broader area from Marco up to Tampa, rather than ruling out any particular area sight unseen.

As a third generation snowbird (in training), my grandparents were in Daytona, and my parents were in Port Charlotte, and now we are Fort Myers. It is very frustrating to drive three days or spend money on flights to be sitting Florida in the iffy season and wearing a jacket, and to watch a cold front stall just south of one's location. For full timers and snowbirds, this should be less of an issue, more of an issue for visiting relatives. I agree the average difference is subtle...my research indicates that while there is no difference in the summer, Naples averages 3F warmer in January than Sarasota, which is an important difference if you are a northerner relying on getting in a pool.

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[hiknapster]

Which is why I am puzzled that they would be interested in The Nature Coast. Either they don't understand that goes all the way up to Jefferson and Wakulla counties, don't know that it can even snow up there (although not often it will be MUCH colder than Lee County) or it doesn't really matter to them.

Welcome to the Nature Coast

Originally Posted by kroeran

Valid points. It seems as though that while they have vacationed on Venice beach, they did not particularly say they liked it, and they are even considering Punta Gorda, a very different type of area. Even if they were focused on a particular situation, I would still advise them to broaden their search.

While my personal view is that it is beneficial to explore the entire coastal southeast US before locking down on a particular area, I would say at the very least that anyone thinking about SWF consider the broader area from Marco up to Tampa, rather than ruling out any particular area sight unseen.

As a third generation snowbird (in training), my grandparents were in Daytona, and my parents were in Port Charlotte, and now we are Fort Myers. It is very frustrating to drive three days or spend money on flights to be sitting Florida in the iffy season and wearing a jacket, and to watch a cold front stall just south of one's location. For full timers and snowbirds, this should be less of an issue, more of an issue for visiting relatives. I agree the average difference is subtle...my research indicates that while there is no difference in the summer, Naples averages 3F warmer in January than Sarasota, which is an important difference if you are a northerner relying on getting in a pool.

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