“The Urgency To Buy Is Gone” In Florida
A housing report from Florida Today. “Stan Smith, professor of finance at the University of Central Florida, said the latest numbers from the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight indicate there is no housing bubble bursting or about to burst. ‘Central Florida housing markets are currently experiencing the soft landing that many hoped for,’ Smith said.”
“‘As we watch the effects of higher inventories and discounts on new homes, it is possible that the situation may change. But, for right now, the Central Florida housing markets look like a good investment. It may be raining, but the sky’s not falling yet,’ Smith added.”
“‘We’re only having a soft landing, if you believe we hit the bottom, and, let’s face it, the inventory hasn’t gone anywhere. There are more than 10,000 properties in Brevard County. The buyers are coming back, but there’s so many more homes to choose from that sellers have to be realistic,’ said Gene Collins, president of the Melbourne Area Association of Realtors.”
“‘The urgency to ‘buy quickly or it won’t be available’ is gone, so that makes for a fabulous time for buyers,’ Collins said. ‘It’s all on their side of the ledger. Short-term (interest) rates are down, and you have a lot of Realtors who want to work with buyers.’”
“Collins said he expects January to be a strong time for seller, but they have to price their houses smartly. ‘Just because a guy next door got $300,000 for his home last July doesn’t mean you’ll get that in January 2007,’ Collins said. ‘You have to be realistic.’”
The Herald Tribune. “Michael Tringali is having trouble making payments on the massive real estate-related debt he accumulated with help from his former partner, Neil Mohamed Husani.”
“Tringali faces deadlines on three more loans, totaling nearly $34 million, payable in the next three months.”
“The pending foreclosures are the first sign of financial trouble resulting from the series of multimillion-dollar transactions by Husani and Tringali during the last two years, deals that, to some observers, typified the excesses of the boom-boom real estate market of 2004-05.”
“They also represent the strongest example to date of the potential risks that the region’s lenders put themselves in by assigning so much value to the properties when market prices were much lower.”
“Attempts to sell his land to other developers or to get more financing have fallen through. In the meantime, Tringali has not been able to sell houses fast enough to pay a debt that now amounts to nearly $87 million.”
“The ones most to blame for the situation are the banks that lent Tringali all that money, says Jack McCabe, a real estate industry consultant. ‘I don’t know of any other builder in the state that got that kind of credit with minimal assets and experience,’ McCabe said. ‘He is a perfect example of the recklessness on the part of developers, appraisers and bankers that permeated the recent housing boom.’”
“When Tringali met Husani in May 2004, he abandoned his conservative approach to development and home building and went on a whirlwind buying spree. Between July 2004 and January 2006, Husani spent $42 million for about 1,900 acres of land.”
“He then sold the property to Tringali in cashless transactions for $98 million, and Tringali used the high purchase prices and accompanying appraisals to obtain $83 million in loans from seven banks.”
“The market slowed dramatically in 2006, especially in the Myakka City area that is home to two of Tringali’s active developments. ‘It’s been a horrible year,’ said Jim Schmitt, a Realtor who formerly worked for Tringali’s real estate company. ‘There are so many homes on the market.’”
“More than a dozen customers have opted out of contracts, causing Tringali’s inventory of unsold homes at Golden Verna to swell to 19. ‘The big hook was that they were only asking for $2,500 deposits for houses,’ said Mark Pierson, who bought several homes in Golden Verna. ‘Now everyone has gotten buyer’s remorse. Mike is sitting on a bunch of houses and the market is dead.’”
“Residents at Golden Verna are worried that Tringali is not going to have enough money to build the clubhouse and pool he promised. ‘There’s a lot of very unhappy people out here,’ said Larry Bartgis, who owns a Golden Verna house. ‘They charge us $500 a year for a pool and it hasn’t been built yet. That’s not right.’”
“So far, the delays have caused three builders to either postpone or cancel their plans to build in the subdivision.”
“‘It’s a soft market and they don’t want customer deposits sitting around,’ said Mary Smedley, who is the head of sales for Tringali’s La Vista Homes.”
“Tringali remains confident that the market will pick up once home buyers realize the values he is offering. ‘In the long run, the market will turn around. Don’t forget that baby boomers want to move here and they will have to have somewhere to live.’”
‘Central Florida housing markets are currently experiencing the soft landing that many hoped for,’ Smith said.’
Tell that to this guy:
‘Now everyone has gotten buyer’s remorse. Mike is sitting on a bunch of houses and the market is dead,’ said Mark Pierson, who bought several homes in Golden Verna.’
A hard to follow article:
‘With home prices high and trading hot, they hoped to sell their Virginia home at a premium and move to Bradford County, (FL) just outside Keystone Heights. But as retirement approached, post-Katrina construction costs skyrocketed. The Jenkins scaled back on their dream home. Then, the housing boom tanked and the couple was left with a Washington area home they were not entirely sure would sell as quickely as they might have liked. They lowered their asking price but there were still no buyers. The point at which they hoped to be in Florida came and went and their Virginia home was still on the market. Gene postponed retirement.’
‘Titled ‘Tough Choices: Shaping Florida’s Future,’ the report warned that the state’s economic boom, fueled by new housing starts, is bound to end, and when it does, the Legislature will have to do a much better job of prioritizing how it spends diminishing revenue streams. Citing a previous survey, the report said ‘Perhaps the most disheartening finding is the widespread feeling that Florida residents are not getting their money’s worth from their current taxes.’
100 reports on a crashing market and this “econo-clown” picks the one BOGUS (please read the report) bullish report to claim its OK??
See Sarasota is FUBAR. Just like I keep telling everyone. This Tringali guy and his buddy artificially inflated the land comps here in Sarasota.
Perhaps the most disheartening finding is the widespread feeling that Florida residents are not getting their money’s worth from their current taxes.
As regular readers will know, I used to work for the govt in S. FL (City of WPB), and let me tell you, the waste present in govt down here is staggering. I have a good friend who is caught up in a crooked land deal with another govt agency down here; the politicans are going under left and right, and the taxes just don’t stop.
Ask yourself (if you live in S. FL), are you getting 2X the services that you did 3-4 years ago? Because it’s costing you that much more. The govt down here is rolling on money, the politicans are skimming it off the top (some getting caught, most getting away with it), and people are being crushed by the tax burden. Its a very, very sad situation.
I will be happy to discuss this in more detail, if other are interested, but let’s just say, the waste is staggering in govt down here. They have SO much money (more then they expected), they can’t think up “pet projects” fast enough.
My favorite example (because I am helping pay for this Taj Mahal):
http://www.cityofwpb.com/city_forum.htm
I am particularly fond of the huge glass dome on the top of the building; very “Arab prince” like.
Reminds me of the new waterfront court house built in Boston a few years back….dripping in luxury. Paid for by the MA taxpayer.
Yeah, we already have the courthouse dripping in luxury, so now on to City Hall.
http://www.countyjudges.com/Judges/PalmBeach/palmbeach.html
The building on the left. Sorry, I don’t have a good picture of it; but let’s just say, no expense was spared in the construction of this building.
‘The Jenkins scaled back on their dream home. Then, the housing boom tanked and the couple was left with a Washington area home they were not entirely sure would sell as quickely as they might have liked. They lowered their asking price but there were still no buyers. The point at which they hoped to be in Florida came and went and their Virginia home was still on the market. Gene postponed retirement.’
This article is leaving something out- just because Florida prices are high, and they also can’t sell their house as hoped, means that they must postpone retirement. What they are probably leaving out is that they already bought some FLA crib, and now must double pay.
Bradford County? People from out-of-state need to learn that most north Florida counties are prison counties, where the only available jobs are $25,000 per year positions as guards at a penitentiary, and where local revenue is generated by turning the county seat into a speed trap. Thinking that any of these places are great locations for a dream house, or for a land investment, is 1926 thinking.
“Stan Smith, professor of finance at the University of Central Florida, said the latest numbers from the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight indicate there is no housing bubble bursting or about to burst.
Another dolt driving backwards towards the cliff looking in his fogged up rear view mirror.
Interesting, Smith apparently lives in Florida but is so clueless he uses as a point of reference a widely understood outdated report to conclude there is no bubble around him.
The term “ivory tower” has never been more apt.
It is hard to see a bubble when you live inside of one.
Not Stan Smith of that dream bastion of acedemia excellence, University of Central Florida who just happens to be SunTrust Chair of Banking and professor of finance; contact: stan.smith@bus.ucf.edu.
Hm. SunTrust. Their website has them as “An equal housing lender”. What do I find under SunTust Corporate family but “SunTrust Mortgage, Inc. One of the nation’s largest bank-owned mortgage companies. Originates, purchases, sells and services mortgage loans.”
Dr. Stan Smith. Another an unbiased RE commentator. Here’s his mugshot http://www.bus.ucf.edu/ssmith/bw2003.jpg
Nice detective work, Stan.
talk about spin … study was probably sponsored by SunTrus as well ..
they’r all liars !!
“Tringali remains confident that the market will pick up once home buyers realize the values he is offering. ‘In the long run, the market will turn around. Don’t forget that baby boomers want to move here and they will have to have somewhere to live.’”
With this guy’s track record, I’d be skeptical at best regarding any of his predictions. Also, has he forgotten the other probably 9 “luxury” properties available for every 1 “baby boomer” who allegedly is moving to Florida? People do not become wealthy by throwing their money away recklessly.
Like all the other optomiss out there, this guy is full of blind unfounded hope.
Baby boomers WILL move to FL. Ok, time to scoop up all the houses, drive the prices up, then sell it back to them.
What!? You mean they don’twant to move here now? Oh sh*#, what am I going to do now? These things cost too much too hold on to.
Sadly, there are literally millions more like him that made the same bet.
Hey, Florida can’t have “baby boomers [that] want to move here” because they keep telling us they’re all moving to Arizona!
“Don’t forget that baby boomers want to move here and they will have to have somewhere to live.’”
Hehehe. This mindset allowed many Floridians to suspend disbelief. Increasing taxes, insurance, and prices, however, killed the mythical cash cow.
ROTFLMAO now. There is a quote for the C&C Florida annals.
LOL
Those mytical “Baby Boomers” with all that money. Good thing we have them, they are going to save every bubble market out there. AZ, FL, CA, OR, etc. Thank God for these people who have nothing but money and stupid to come buy the overpriced crap we have for them!
Oh, and thank God they don’t need to sell their homes up North to make this move. They can just buy the POS in some bubble area and keep their home up north too. Oh wait, you mean they might have to sell to be able to buy? Hmm.. Who is going to buy their home up north for 2X the actual value? Hmm.. I sense a problem in the ponzi scheme here. Its perpetuated on the idea they can sell up north for a TON on money, and then move down here with a box of stupid in tow. If they can’t sell in their bubble area, the whole thing comes crashing down.
So stupid.
Everyone I know of that generation would not TOUCH S. FL with a 10 foot pole. They think its crazy here, and in my parents words “Has become just like NYC/Long Island, its a place for the young and beautiful now”. I am not sure about that, but its NOT a place to retire, that’s for sure. Unless you like 4 hour traffic jams to go 60 miles, that is.
Retired people, from my VERY unscientifc study, typically want to SLOW down. Not move into the middle of a downtown, move on the outskirts and enjoy a simple life. Sorry, I just don’t see my parents standing in line to get into Resort (trendy nightclub in Cityplace). These areas were built for yuppies. When all the yuppies got priced out, people started the myth of retirees to keep the market going. This is a myth people, wake up!
Moreover, lots of these baby boomers are going to live close to their grandchildren whereever that might be.
Good call, Charles. That’s what I plan to do. When Florida living was easy and cheap, it’s allure was great enough to bring large numbers of retirees here, away from their families. Now that the cost advantage is long gone, family ties will exert stronger pressure on these folks. Further, and this may be a contentious issue for some, in the coming recession and stagflation, there will be quite a few young people out of work or underemployed who will greatly appreciate an invitation from Mom & Dad to weather the storm under their roof.
its
My eldgerly grandmonther was living alone, and recently moved to Portland OR to be closer to my uncle who can look after her. Why does everyone assume the elderly want to die in FLA? Being near family makes much more sense.
Well said.
“‘The urgency to ‘buy quickly or it won’t be available’ is gone, so that makes for a fabulous time for buyers,’ Collins said. ‘It’s all on their side of the ledger. Short-term (interest) rates are down, and you have a lot of Realtors who want to work with buyers.’”
Let me guess - Its a good time to buy??
In the words of Jim Carey (from Liar, Liar)
“Good Call!”
More than a dozen customers have opted out of contracts, causing Tringali’s inventory of unsold homes at Golden Verna to swell to 19. ‘The big hook was that they were only asking for $2,500 deposits for houses,’ said Mark Pierson, who bought several homes in Golden Verna. ‘Now everyone has gotten buyer’s remorse. Mike is sitting on a bunch of houses and the market is dead.’”
Sell them all to that “econo-clown” at the Uninv of Central Fl!
The best they could do was a professor from the University of Central Florida. What, there were no professors from the Vero Beach Community College and School of Cosmetology to proclaim the soft landing?
better yet, ask floridians about there tax and insurance bills this year. they will break down in front of you. people begging to sell their homes, because of the taxes and insurance. even my eye doctor is telling me that he has to downgrade. and yet, more properties are being built.
blood is on the streets of south florida!
“There’s a lot of very unhappy people out here,” said Larry Bartgis, who owns a Golden Verna house. “They charge us $500 a year for a pool and it hasn’t been built yet. That’s not right.”
Tringali says construction delays are not entirely his fault. He did not realize that the clubhouse and pool required a commercial permit, and he did not expect to have to make as many revisions to his plans.
“I know they want a clubhouse and believe me I want to give it to them,” Tringali said. “We have the money set aside. We are just waiting for the permit.”
Who is going to buy in this development after a story like this? Anyone who does need a lobotomy!
More evidence that real estate attracts stupidity….Tringali didn’t know he needed a permit to build stuff? Sounds as dumb as a “Flip this house” episode.
The Verna Bethany area is in the most remote easternmost part of Sarasota County. For most of the past 106 years since Sarasota was inhabited and founded this was mostly wilderness, and was inhabited only by the most leathery skinned Florida cracker rednecks and mosquitoes. And I mean this most literally.
As a young deputy sheriff back in 1985 I had to go out there once in a while cause someones cow got rustled. As I recall people in Verna Bethany take cow rustling serious to this day.
The housing bubble has caused seemingly upscale specuvestor people to decide to buy a property in a part of the county in which all the inhabitants are similar to those on Green Acres, and pay high prices to boot.
For those of us from Sarasota, the term Verna Bethany conjures up images of Mr. Ziffel and his pig Arnold Ziffel and Mr. Haney.
I even know one old man from the verna bethany area who doesn’t even have all the fingers on his hand. Or two many teeth. He’s pretty much the poster boy for this area also.
Oh yeah. If ya’ll want to sit and talk a spell ya’ll better grab a chaw of red man tobacco and get yerself a spittin cup too. Thats standard also.
Honestly the houses there looked like Oliver and Lisa Douglas’ shack/ house.
That is why it is hilarious that these developers now call it golden verna. Thats like giving Arnold Ziffel a golden jacket to wear and calling it golden pig. Hilarious.
After the bust gets done and these developers fail I recemmend that they rename Golden Verna more appropriately. Hooterville. Mr. Haney never fleeced anyone more effectively.
How is the fact that he did not know what he was supposed to know not his fault?
From Animal House:
“Hey, you &%&* up. You trusted us.”
“Husani and Tringali inflated land values through property flips. They then used values that were way above what the market was paying to get bank loans that not only covered the original cost of the land but provided Tringali with more money to finance development.”
Oh yeah baby. This article has everything including fraudulent loan borrowing, suspension of disbelief, FBI investigation, and a disappearing partner — he left the country.
Is Tringali really as dumb as he sounds OR is he mounting a ‘I’m too dumb to pull this off’ defense?
Someone find the link to his blog - just google: I am facing foreclosure and I am dumbing than Casey.
*dumber
“‘Central Florida housing markets are currently experiencing the soft landing that many hoped for,’ Smith said.”
One thing that fuels the irrational behavior in the markets are the shills like professor Stan Smith at the University of Central Florida. For many of these ‘experts’ they only thing they have is their reputation. I’m glad the internet will allow these quotes to be saved and later retrieved to expose their lack of intelligence or business acumen.
“For many of these ‘experts’ they only thing they have is their reputation.”
You forgot the research grant funding from the local REIC constituency.
I think he must also be their football team’s offensive coordinator.
Shill is right. His official title is “SunTrust Chair of Banking and Professor.” I wonder how much SunTrust bank paid UCF for the naming rights.
“Stan Smith, professor of finance at the University of Central Florida, said the latest numbers from the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight indicate there is no housing bubble bursting or about to burst. ‘Central Florida housing markets are currently experiencing the soft landing that many hoped for,’ Smith said.”
Could this fellow be our “hedge fund analyst?” Because wasn’t HFA talking soft landing just yesterday?
GS - don’t forget that falling in Sh1t is a soft landing.
“‘The urgency to ‘buy quickly or it won’t be available’ is gone, so that makes for a fabulous time for buyers,’ Collins said. ‘It’s all on their side of the ledger.’”
Except for the net worth implications of catching a falling knife. Good thing that 98% of Americans don’t know what “net worth” means…
I have to be honest — statements like ” babyboomers want to move here and they will have to have somewhere to live ” just make me want to vomit. I’m a crusty babyboomer, and the ONLY place I would want to live in Florida is Marco Island. ( Or possibly Disney World for a month out of the year). After reading estimates of $17000 annual expenses for maintaining a ” nice ” residence in Florida including items such as property taxes, HOA’s, and hurricane & other property insurance premiums, my husband & I are in no hurry to move there year-around. Truthfully, there ain’t much we can’t rent for $2000 - $ 4000 annually for 2-3 months in the winter. I think that we’re far wiser to rent in Florida or Arizona for the winter months after we retire than to buy over-priced new spec. builds in order to bail a couple of pie-in-the-sky boys who overspent and who are now counting on the good old, much-maligned, ( we want your money, oh yes indeed we do, we may hate the fact that you even exist, but we want your money, honey ), baby-boomer retiree “boom”. Sadly, I don’t think that the prospective baby-boomer retiree boom will ever really materialize, at least in monetary terms. Baby boomers are the fastest-growing demographic of the homeless, from an article that I recently read, as jobs dry up and pensions are non-existant. A lot of their problems are their own fault, due to lack of savings, but in many ways, the societal changes have left my peers in disarray. There is no safety net like the one created for our parents’ generation. Almost defined-benefit pension plans left, jobs going overseas, and a justifiably worried and somewhat angry double set of generations following. I doubt that there will be very many baby-boomers making the trek south to enjoy paying $500 annually for the use of non-existant swimming pools at “Golden Verna”, one of the ill-fated subdivisions thrown up in a hurry by these stupid, wishful developers. I know we won’t be. We can live in Michigan in one of two paid-for houses ( the second will be paid for in 6 years we believe ) for a annual cost of $4500 including taxes and insurance, on each residence, and the other can be rented out for a monthly check….as I previously wrote, we can rent any condo or reasonable home in Arizona or Florida ( except for a Palm Beach mansion ), including a condo on the less special end of Marco Island, for about $3000 annually if you shop carefully. I just priced out rentals in the Arizona Republic and in Marco Island’s newspaper when I was visiting my father there last year, and there are a lot of owners who are not charging an outrageous price per week, but will be glad to settle for $ 1300 to $ 1600 monthly for a nice winter-rental condo there.
“Baby boomers are the fastest-growing demographic of the homeless, from an article that I recently read, as jobs dry up and pensions are non-existant.”
Liberated equity which was invested in the huge glut of overpriced high rise luxury condo towers and ghost tract home developments in the middle of the desert is not going to brighten this picture. Too bad that Fed efforts to reflate will only encourage more such folly.
Silverback — Very insightful post. One polite suggestion:
Please use open space.
Yes silverback, please make use of paragraphs in your writing.
It’s hard to read when you make one big huge giant paragraph.
Good points. Baby boomers are toast. Many never even got pensions by the way (those in hi-tech) and became unemployable after age 45 due to being “overexperienced”.
In hi-tech, early 30s is now ‘overexperienced’. In the eyes of management, 5 years experience is ideal; enough experience to deliver something decent, but not enough experience to demand a high rate.
Very very true.
Oh NO! Why are you being so rational?
You are going to disappoint a lot of people down here in Florida. We are counting on the baby boomer cash cow to pay a substantial portion of our taxes and cover our investment follies. Our entire economy is now structured in accordance with your prompt migration.
Please, say it is’nt so. Reconsider your decision. We are going to roast if you don’t move to Floridan and buy one of our overpriced speculative homes. For the love of god, have mercy. After all, it’s great time to buy!
The cash cow done got rustled.
See my above cow rustling post.
It’s not the ‘cash cow’,but the fatted calf ready for the sacrificial slaughter…we will name her..Hmmm. I know!
“The golden verna’
Golden Verna sounds like some sort of weird sex act.
mrktMaven,
Please direct your plea to illegal aliens who are at least holding cash. I wouldn’t count on any tax help, but maybe they’d buy your spec homes.
I posted my comment above before I read this, but IMHO, this represents the majority of the BB generation that I interact with on a regular basis.
I think your ideas are much more in line with the “norm” for baby boomers then what I hear developers/people spouting off down here on a regular basis.
Let’s say I GAVE you the home I have now. No morgage at all. The carrying costs (taxes, ins, HOA, etc) are still right around 25K a year. That’s before you have done one lick of maintance to the place; before you pay the electric bill/water/cable/etc. Anyway, you get my point, to live in this home, even if you bought it for cash, is going to run about 25-30K a year, plus whatever maintance you have/decide to do.
I don’t know what situation most retirees are in, but that seems like an awful lot of money to me commited to my housing costs. I would like to hear what other people think, but I just don’t think that is “in the cards” for most of the BB generation retiring to S. FL. Yes, some can afford it. But the volume of homes we have down here in the 400-800K price range is staggering. We keep hearing the BB are coming to save that segement of the market (as well as the condos). I just don’t see that happening.
Average 60-69 year old has net worth of only 210k.
http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/RetirementandWills/PlayingCatchUp/YourFreeFinancialReportCard.aspx
Check out net worth by age table half way down the page.
“The carrying costs (taxes, ins, HOA, etc) are still right around 25K a year.”
Yikes!
I did the numbers for the house we’re in now (a gated golf community on a big lake, with clubhouse and tennis/fitness center. Annual member fees (includes HOA and capital improvement loan payoff) plus property taxes plus insurance is just under $6K. However, the golf is extra and they really sock it to you- $17 per round including cart. Add another $500 annual slip fee if you have a boat.
Bill — what are income taxes like on pension income? Also, are there any other unusual taxes, like high car tag fees there?
Very cogent points, Mike Fink. I agree with everything you’ve posted, and again, that’s why we’ll be renting, not buying, if we plan on doing the 6-months by the grandchildren, and 6-months out of the cold, routine, when we retire.
“‘As we watch the effects of higher inventories and discounts on new homes, it is possible that the situation may change. But, for right now, the Central Florida housing markets look like a good investment. It may be raining, but the sky’s not falling yet,’ Smith added.”
I bet he said the same thing when Hurricane Andrew was coming to shore.
I bet every seminar group in the country used the old “baby boomers will come” ploy to inspire real estate investments .
You can see by Donald Trump that one of the methods developers had in getting buyers was by the real estate seminar ploy.
Pump the seminar people/investors up than offer suggestions of great investment spots .I believe this is why we had so many locust buying up these new home tracts in remote parts of the Nation . Now many of these places are ghost towns/speculator owned homes waiting for the BB to come.
” ‘I don’t know of any other builder in the state that got that kind of credit with minimal assets and experience,’ McCabe said.”
My guess is that McCabe probably hasn’t looked hard enough.
Sorry, that should read ” almost NO defined-benefit pensions are left “
almost
The remaining pensions will be gutted because they invested in MBS and failing hedge funds.
Test
GetStucco, I’m sorry - it is a very long post when I read it in its entirety. When you suggest using open space, are you referring to putting a line-space in between each paragraph ? Thanks for letting me know.
Yes silverback. Paragraphs is what he means.
Listen Captain Jack, I have fought better swordsmen than you from the deck of my fighting frigate “The Golden Retriever”. I just thought that he meant some kind of program. When I wuz a wee one, we called ‘em paragraphs, which is a term I am familiar with. So don’ts be gettin’ fresh wid me, yung - un. Or I’ll sic me Golden Retriever on ye.
Retirees were moving to Florida when they could buy an 80k condo, I doubt they will with the avg condo at 200-300k, plus increased property tax and insurance.
Also average 60 year old has 100k in their 401k, hardly enough to be buying overpriced Florida real estate.
I think Fl has achieved the status of “Its too late to buy now, you HAVE BEEN PRICED FOREVER”! So what happens to prices now??
What County was down 44% YOY?
Ft Myers
Statewide only a 2% drop in condo prices October, but a lot of counties are hurting.
http://media.living.net/statistics/2006/Oct%2006%20Condo%20Chart.pdf
Condo prices are waaaay down all over the state from summer 2005. Be careful about reading cherry-picked comparisons that find the one year-to-year or month-to-month number that looks good, as in minimal drop. There is a riverfront condo in Brevard County that we used to want to buy into; trouble is, about 25% of the units currently are for resale and the building is barely more than two years old. Prices still too high, still too many flipper-owners. A very nice condo in Cocoa Beach is for sale at its 2004 purchase price, a slight net loss to the owner if it goes for full price. If it doesn’t sell soon, I bet it will be at the 2003 price. The most recent report I read was of a 68-69% year-on-year drop in the number of condos sold there. Think that is going to cause a measly 2% average drop in prices? No way. The new paradigm ain’t worth a pair ‘a dimes.
Cocoa beach would fall into the Titusville Melbourne Palm Bay area which is down 17% according to the chart I posted.
2% down is for all of florida, different cities had very different results.
October #’s show Indian River County down 14%, from $249,900 to $215,000 YOY. Treasure Coast (Indian River, St. Lucie, Martin) as a whole down 8%.
I have lived in Indian River my entire life and it truly is a bedroom community, in the past relying exclusively on retirees. There is very little industry to speak of, and we are losing alot of middle income folks that have resided here for a long time. Median priced house in 2002 was about 130k, which was affordable to most working residents. 215k is still way to high though.
“Tringali has not been able to sell houses fast enough to pay a debt that now amounts to nearly $87 million.”
Everytime I feel sorry for myself for some imagined misfortune, I’m gonna reread this quote about Mr. Svengali’s huge hamster wheel of death.
I just love the mental image. A RE idiot, running in a huge hamster wheel, with some running chainsaws bouncing around in there with him. Or perhaps a drawer of kitchen knives; running up one side of the wheel and falling on the poor idiot in the middle.
Great mental image; the hamster wheel of DEATH!!
My vision is a guy/builder who has a bunch of money in a off-shore account based on cooking the books and playing the fraud game on the original land loans with his friend . This guy still has to make a showing that he is finishing the tract .
Want to bet that this guy will go BK before the pool is built ?
Hamster wheel of deBt.
…..When Tringali met Husani in May 2004, he abandoned his conservative approach to development and home building and went on a whirlwind buying spree. Between July 2004 and January 2006, Husani spent $42 million for about 1,900 acres of land
“He then sold the property to Tringali in cashless transactions for $98 million, and Tringali used the high purchase prices and accompanying appraisals to obtain $83 million in loans from seven banks….
So mohammad husani flipped it for a cool 56 mil in cash!!!what’s wrong in this picture…
So i can use my partner to offload and he can then claim bankruptcy. We split 28 mil later in the canary island bank.
“The bank that helped finance Neal Husani’s $125M Sarasota project says it didn’t know about his grand theft conviction” http://tinyurl.com/y4ypst
From FED up’s link:
“The day after the Herald-Tribune ran a story about Husani’s real estate transaction, a package arrived revealing that Husani was convicted of grand theft in 2002 for making off with $14,000 in furniture, and that he has a history of writing bad checks.
With that kind of background, it was surprising that a major lender like Fifth Third would give Husani such a large loan…”
The bank claims it did a background check on Husani and it revealed no problems in his background.
Here’s a bank I’d avoid at all costs, and if I owned shares, I’d dump them.
Interesting to note that while Hussani and Tringali got the loans for eight different banks for the eight transactions, all banks used the same real estate attorney. He chose the same appraiser for six of the eight appraisals. No down payment cash has been found on the transactions that the attorney was supposed to hold in escrow…
‘Central Florida housing markets are currently experiencing the soft landing that many hoped for,’ Smith said.”
Interesting interpretation of a situation where most sellers can’t sell their properties at their current listed prices. I guess Smith thinks that if sellers could sell, they would sell for the price they wanted to sell for. Thus there is no problem.
Sort of like, how much wood could a woodchuck chuck…
Now I’m a pretty simple person and clearly some of this high end economic theory goes right over my head, but I would guess if the number of homes on the market is rising, the number of homes sold per month is falling, the carrying cost of homes is rising faster than incomes are rising, we are coming off a period of speculative excess and trillions of dollars of ARM’s are starting to be reset higher, then this is not a soft landing in the making.