South Florida Winter Condo Sales Drop To Level Not Seen Since Great Recession
A review of the South Florida condo statistics shows about 13,733 units traded between November 2023 and April 2024. This is the fewest sales since the 2008-09 season when about 9,940 units traded.
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This was the worst South Florida Winter Buying Season for condo resales in the tricounty region of Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach since the Great Recession, according to an analysis of statistics compiled by CondoVulturesRealty.com.
The Winter Buying Season traditionally extends from November through April when visitors flock to South Florida to take advantage of the weather, events and vibe.
Tourists may have come to South Florida this Winter Buying Season but they were not purchasing condos at the same pace as previous seasons.
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Buyers purchased less than 13,735 condos in the tricounty region between November 2023 and April 2024. By comparison, buyers bought about 15,585 condos in the 2022-23 season. That is about a 12-percent drop in total transactions.
This is the second consecutive year that condo resales were down from the recent peak of the 2021-22 Winter Buying Season when more than 26,320 units traded.
It is worth noting, the last time so few condos traded during a South Florida Winter Buying Season was the 2008-09 season when about 9,940 units transacted.
Many industry watchers consider the September 2008 bankruptcy filing of the former Wall Street investment bank Lehman Brothers as the “climax of the subprime mortgage crisis” and the resulting Great Recession, according to Wikipedia.
For context, some 15,684 condos transacted during the 2009-10 South Florida Winter Buying Season. A year later in the 2010-11 season, some 19,660 condos traded as prices were slashed.
This is an about-face from the pandemic years when a plethora of work-from-home employees relocated to South Florida from places such as California, Illinois and New York.
The influx of transplants to South Florida bought up or leased out much of the available housing supply, which increased prices and triggered new development.
Rising property values from strong demand, skyrocketing insurance prices following the Surfside condo collapse disaster and high interest rates from a series of hikes by the Federal Reserve brought the South Florida housing market to a standstill in the second half of 2023.
Added to this, Florida unit owners are beginning to experience the headwinds - spiking special assessments and falling prices from sellers trying to unload their properties - from the 2025 condo association financial cliff.
In response to the Surfside condo collapse in 2021, Florida is set to require associations that govern older condo projects to study the structural integrity of all buildings on their properties and begin to fund the necessary work in January 2025.
Industry watchers are at odds as to the direction of the South Florida housing market in 2024. Bullish investors are predicting housing demand will reignite once interest rates begin to fall. Bearish investors contend that home prices are too high and likely to collapse in the months ahead.