Condos near Treasure Island... (Clearwater, Sunset: rent, appliances, hotel)

[071402]

Does anyone on CD own or rent a condo on Treasure Island?

any pros , cons or advice on buying one. OK to DM.

[spbbound]

My inlaws are looking at condos around that area but came to the conclusion that they prefer St Pete Beach. The cons for them included 1) traffic in and out of there if you come and go around rush hours. 2) Parking if you plan to host a party, etc. Where most of the condos are, there's not much around there in the way of public parking, and you'll be lucky to get more than one space at most condos. With there often being a limited number of guest spots, having a bunch of people over can become an ordeal. 3) Even as close as St Pete Beach is, with even the normal traffic, you could be looking at 20+ minutes to go door to door. They'll be coming over a lot (grand kid) so that didn't work well for them.

Other than that, great beaches, Publix is close by, couple fun beach bars but nothing like st pete beach. You'd want to look into all the normal condo warning signs like any condo, not just beach-specific.

[071402]

Great points SPb. But where is St pete beach exactly? Isn't it all st pete beach technically?

thanks mch.

[spbbound]

I believe TI is Gulf Boulevard from John's Pass on the north (the first bridge/inlet north of TI) south to the point where Sunset Beach is, and then the couple intercoastal mane made islands like Paradise, Yacht Club Estates and Isle of Capri & Palms. During rush hour, getting out of there to lets say Clearwater or the interstate for example, leaves you with driving up the beach past Madeira or taking Central Ave, and it gets pretty slow. Getting to St Pete Beach means taking Gulf Blvd to Blind Pass (where St Pete Beach starts), through downtown, then back to Gulf Blvd. Even though it's just a few miles, it can take quite a while. St Pete Beach turns into Pass-A-Grille south of the Don Cesar hotel and/or Pinellas Bayway.

In contrast, from the condos along Gulf Blvd in St Pete Beach, you can be on I-275 with typically just three or four traffic lights and 10 minutes time. The downside to the St Pete Beach condos is that nearly all of them were built in the 70's and very few of them have been renovated since that time, so a lot of what you see come on the market is probably asking for $70k to $100k in renovations unless you like ancient appliances and shag carpet. I've found that a lot of the condos in TI are newer and also tend to have been updated more recently. For example, saw this gem in a SPB condo a couple months ago with an asking price of $600k: