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nthony Holmes thought he'd struck gold when he left Virginia for Florida during the pandemic, but now his five-bedroom Tampa home is stuck on the market with zero offers after eight months and five price drops. Despite spending $600,000 on the property, Holmes can't even give it away.
The once-booming Florida housing market has turned cold, leaving many homeowners stranded. Across the state, home sales have slowed to a crawl, with inventory ballooning by over 50% in major cities like Tampa and Orlando while demand has dropped by at least 10%. More than half of Tampa's homes on the market have seen price reductions.
A toxic mix of high mortgage rates, surging insurance premiums, and hurricane risks has cooled the market. Rising insurance costs, which have surged up to 400% in recent years, are a major factor, with some homeowners being dropped by their providers altogether. Holmes was paying $1,700 a year for his insurance but was dropped after Hurricane Idalia swept near the area; now he pays double that amount.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has declared a state of emergency as another monster storm, Hurricane Milton, is set to make landfall this week. These storms have become the final straw for many homeowners who are already buckling under skyrocketing insurance premiums.
The condo market, once a cornerstone of Florida's real estate boom, is also taking a hit. After the 2021 condo collapse in Surfside, which killed 98 people, new laws requiring expensive structural assessments and repairs have been passed, leading to massive special assessments for owners in older buildings. Some units are selling for nearly 20% less than last year.
Institutional investors, who have been major players in Florida's real estate market, are starting to pull back. In Tampa, Orlando, and Jacksonville, they've begun listing homes they once purchased in bulk, hoping to cash in before the market sours further. For now, Miami is one of the few bright spots in the state, but for homeowners like Holmes, the outlook isn't so rosy.
With another hurricane on the way and no buyers in sight, Holmes is just hoping to break even. "I have no doubt that a combination of high prices, high mortgage rates, and high insurance has just totally collapsed the market," he said.
