Hot city: in most sarasota neighborhoods, real estate is booming ilene denton reports on the action.

Recent real estate headlines read like they were ripped from the glossy Bravo TV series, Million Dollar Listing.

Two Casey Key waterfront mansions were snapped up this summer for $8 million and $6.5 million, both cash deals. A six-bedroom Gulf-front home on Longboat Key sold for $5.75 million, also cash, making it the highest-priced single-family residence on that tony island in 2014. An ultra-contemporary new bayfront home on the tip of Siesta Key’s Point Crisp Road sold for $5,675,000 just 18 days after going on the market, only to be topped by another Siesta Key manse at $10.25 million. The $11.45 million sale of a residential compound with 538 feet of Gulf of Mexico frontage in Siesta Key’s exdusive Sanderling Club, albeit discounted considerably from its original $22 million price, was the fifth-highest ever residential sale in the history of Sarasota County. And just as on Million Dollar Listing, a celebrity buyer spiced up the region’s real estate story — in this case, it was designer-to-the-stars Michael Kors, who paid $6 million for two adjacent vacant Gulf-front lots on Longboat Key. Rumor has it he’s bringing in a New York architect to design his getaway digs.

Our luxury market is soaring, fueled by local move-up buyers, Northeasterners looking for second (or third, or fourth) homes, and some international buyers, primarily from England and France, says Sue Wolverton, regional senior vice president at Coldwell Banker. (Canadians are buying, too, but at more varied price points, she says.) In fact, Coldwell Banker Previews this fall released a report ranking Sarasota №15 on the list of U.S. cities with the highest number — ours was 365 — of active $1-million-and-up luxury home listings.

But what about the rest of the market? It’s still going strong, says Peter Crowley, broker and co-owner at Re/Max Alliance Group and immediate past president of the Sarasota Association of Realtors, although he and other real estate pros predict prices will go up more slowly than during the past couple of years. “It was a very healthy first three quarters of 2014; he said in November. “Last year [2013] was the second-busiest year on record from a transaction standpoint, and we’re right on pace with that.”

The big stumbling block is a dearth of for-sale signs, with only about four months of inventory on the MLS. (Six months typically represents a balanced market.) Coldwell Banker’s Wolverton says that lack of inventory has created “a bit of a roller coaster, up and down and up and down. A lot of pent-up demand has been lost because [potential] buyers can’t find what they want.” And too many sellers are overly starry-eyed, she says. “They’re reading about low inventory and think prices are escalating. We are seeing appreciation, but not so dramatic.” Properties that are appropriately priced, both she and Crowley note, are attracting multiple offers nearly every time.

People aren’t selling partly because so many who bought in the boom-boom-boom times are still underwater on their mortgages. “They’re waiting for those values to come back,” says Crowley. And some people aren’t buying because of the restrictive lending environment. “Many people don’t want to go through the hassle of qualifying for a mortgage,” he says. But he sees hope there. “Those guidelines are still very strict,” he says, “but we’re starting to see signs of loosening.”

That leads to what is perhaps the most interesting aspect of our current market. All-cash deals make up some 60 percent of all local real estate transactions right now, versus the national average of 25 to 35 percent. “It amazes me,” says Crowley. “And it’s not just investors or the lower end of the housing market. People migrate to our market and pour funds from the sales of their homes up North into their purchases here. That’s pretty unique to our market” Or, as Coldwell Banker’s Roger Pettingell, listing agent for that $5.75 million Longboat Key home that sold in November — who that same week listed a condo in the Sanctuary for $2.2 million and sold it one day later — says, “You might sweat out a closing on a million-dollar house. But on these [mega] deals, the cash is wired a week in advance. You sell 50,000 of your Apple shares, and there you go.”

The lean recession years, he adds, are becoming a distant memory. “The last seven years, we’ve trained ourselves to wake up every morning and make sure the world hasn’t fallen apart,” he says. “That’s fading a bit. We’re feeling a little bit wealthier again and not unhappy to say it.”

We all know that real estate is all about location, location, location. So let’s take a look at the top transactions and trends this year in each of our major geographic areas.

Longboat, Lido and Siesta Keys

Last year’s eight-figure sales — almost all of them on the beach — grabbed the headlines, but on Longboat, Lido and Siesta keys, “You have to give it to multifamily bayfront [condos] all day because there are more of them,” says Pettingell.

In 2014, he reports, Siesta Key won the volume war, outpacing Longboat and Lido because there were simply more condos for sale there. (Pettingell is referring to properties under $1 million.) Longboat Key, with a greater number of high-end condos (think large floor plans and high ceilings) built since the 1990s than Siesta or Lido, is suffering from the inventory drought. Pettingell cites Longboat’s Seaplace, one of the first beachfront condominium communities, built in the 1970s. “Out of 450 units, I always can remember 30 or 40 for sale at any one time he says. “This summer we had two. It’s crazy,” (The only people leaving Sea-place, he says delicately, are “moving on up” — as in to heaven.)

No matter which key they’re located on, Pettingell says, renovated properties “are far outpacing the ones that [buyers] have to do work on.”

What is noteworthy on Longboat — and something to watch for future resales — is the wave of single-family homes under construction. “People are willing to build again.” Pettingell says. “They all want that same Gulf-front experience, just what was existing wasn’t good enough.” Who’s building? “Almost always it’s a second or a third or more home,” he says. “That most recent sale [the $5.75 million one] was a fourth home, sold to a buyer from the Midwest.

“You have to consider how undervalued we are to other areas,” he adds. “When these people are shopping in Naples, double our price; Palm Beach, double and triple; in the big cities — New York, Toronto — quadruple. We’re so low down on the pricing food chain, the smart money sees the value that’s here.”

Regardless of the price point, buyers on all three keys tend to be in their late 40s to early 60s, Pettingell says. “They sold a company or inherited money, they are very successful in their careers, they like the tax opportunities that Florida offers them, they don’t like to be cold in the winter — but that’s a trend that never changes.”

Downtown Sarasota

The energy in downtown Sarasota is palpable, with 13 residential projects either under way or on the drawing boards and four construction cranes dotting the skyline. That’s a good thing, says Perry Corneau of Premier Sotheby’s International Realty, because demand among boomers for downtown condos is sizzling and supply is sparse.

One hundred thirty-two units were listed in MLS in mid-November; that’s 6.6 months of inventory. But only about 20 of those were unsold condos under construction, Corneau explains, “and for those 20 you have to wait two years” until they’re completed. “That doesn’t leave a whole lot,” he says.

Importantly, Corneau notes, of the 247 closed condo sales by Nov. 1, 72 percent were cash sales. “That’s the real story,” he says. “That’s not speculation; this is the end user, whether it is a full-time or secondary home. You won’t see a drop in value at the end of the cycle because they won’t be dumping them.”

Most in demand: larger units. “If it’s a 2,000-square-foot unit it’s going in days, and it’s going for millions, and you might have just eight of them to look at,” he says. “Customers get frustrated because there’s nothing to show them!’ In September, Corneau sold a 2,200-plus-square-foot unit at 1350 Main, a foreclosure that came on the market for $920,000, for $1,035,000. “It had nine bidders,” he says. He sold an identical unit on a lower floor in the same building a month later for $1.2 million. “It was just nine or 10 days to contract,” he says.

Corneau, who in late 2014 launched the marketing for the ultra-luxury 33 South Palm (each unit there will have its own car elevator), says, “The existing supply is just not ready to meet the demographics yet. [In the booming mid-2000s] all of the product was being sold to speculators. Today people are coming on down, they want the larger units and nothing’s been built for them. I don’t see any chance of overdevelopment; we’re just talking about a couple hundred new units!’

West of Trail

Perennially popular West of Trail — we’re defining it here as Mound Street south to Siesta Drive — is seeing a flurry of tear-downs and new construction, especially in the “flower” streets surrounding Southside Village (see “A Village Grows Up,” page 92). Susan McLeod of Michael Saunders & Company cites the recent $1,802,000 sale of a big, newish home set lot-line to lot-line at the corner of Osprey and Datura. “It blows my mind that somebody will spend almost $2 million off the water on South Osprey Avenue she says. “There’s a bit of a change in the demand going on.”

But luckily for those who treasure them, there is still a market for the eclectic mix of older homes that has long categorized West of Trail neighborhoods like Bungalow Hill and McClellan Park, she says. McLeod cites her listing of a 1916 Dutch Colonial at the corner of South Orange Avenue and Alta Vista that went under contract in mid-November. The buyer was a single woman who doesn’t plan to tear it down. “She loves it,” McLeod says. An important part of its draw was its detached guesthouse. “There was a real flurry of demand for this property,” she says. “That’s a testament to its uniqueness and the detached guesthouse; there just aren’t many of those on the market.”

And the neighborhood’s walkability to downtown and the bayfront and its proximity to popular Southside School will never change. “I’ve lived west of the trail for 16 years, and I don’t even think about leaving, because where would you go?” says McLeod. “The essence of real estate is location, location, location, and we’ve got it. We’re right in the middle of it all.”

Lakewood Ranch

The 9,000-home-and-growing juggernaut that is Lakewood Ranch slowed in 2014 for one reason, says vice president of sales Jimmy Stewart: a lack of moderately priced product. Through Oct. 31, 392 new homes sold, down 126 from the same time last year. (Stewart defines moderate as $200,000 to $400,000; the average sale price through Oct. 31, 2014, was $505,000.) “Last year I had Central Park, with 826 units, but that development is winding down, and Belle Isle in Country Club East, with 177 units, was actively selling last year but now it’s done Stewart says.

In the moderately priced pipeline is Mattamy Homes’ new Harmony development, with townhomes and villas starting in the $180,000s and single-family homes from the low $200,000s. Models are expected to open sometime in early 2015. And Neal Communities is working on a Central Park replacement called Indigo. Three models starting in the $200,000s should open in March, says Stewart. “It’s great to get into that more attainable pricing, for students, for teachers, etc: he says. And moderately priced properties also appeal to “people who want to try out Florida before they make it permanent,” he says; 69 percent of visitors to the Lakewood Ranch info center and builder models in 2014 came from outside of Florida.

At the higher end, Taylor Morrison’s new Esplanade Golf & Country Club sold 134 units by Oct. 31, three more than the same time in 2013, Stewart says. And at the top of the market, The Lake Club’s year-to-date average sales price grazed $2 million, he says. “They had a couple of really big sales, one for $6 million-plus and a couple for $3 million-plus.”

Stewart says it’s too early to tell how the new Mall at University Town Center is affecting real estate sales at Lakewood Ranch; but, he adds, “We only view it as a positive, drawing traffic — I have to be careful how I say it — not traffic traffic, traffic to our models.”

Palmer Ranch

The other mega master-planned community of Palmer Ranch in central Sarasota County is facing its own issue, says Joel Schemmel of Premier Sotheby’s International Realty: It’s nearly built out.

With 23 developments ranging from executive single-family homes on the golf course to apartment conversions and everything in between, there were only 175 active listings as of mid-November, says Schemmel. “Lakewood Ranch draws its own orb around it; they’re the one place where there’s new product left and right,” he says. “In Palmer Ranch, our inventory is at an absolute minimum. We don’t have as many sales because we don’t have as much to sell.”

Despite the lack of inventory, there were almost 600 closed sales in 2014, Schemmel says, to a diverse group of buyers, from families attracted to the A-rated schools and nearby Pine View School for the Gifted to retirees new to the region. Several Palmer Ranch developments date from the late 1980s and early 1990s, and interior updates are in order, but that is not deterring buyers, he says, “Families are coming in, investing in the older homes in Deer Creek and Prestancia and renovating them: he says. All the property values support it.”

A couple of new communities are coming to the Ranch. Taylor Morrison is building single-family homes in Arbor Lakes on Palmer Ranch off Honore Avenue, and will soon launch Cobblestone on McIntosh and Sawyer Loop roads. And DiVosta is building the single-family Sandhill Preserve off Central Sarasota Parkway.

Venice

With its myriad small-town charms, the Venice market “is stronger than it’s ever been,” says Cindy Esselburn, the newly installed president of the Venice Area Board of Realtors and a sales associate with Medway Realty. “We’ve been on an upswing the entire year of 2014, and we see no signs of slowing down. Depending on the neighborhood, we’ve seen values increase 15 to 20 percent.”

Most in demand? Amenity-rich gated communities, she says. “Let’s face it, Venice is a senior community, and a lot of these neighborhoods cater to them. They don’t have to mow their grass or maintain landscaping, and they have wonderful activities with a ready-made group of friends.”

Esselburn cites Del Webb’s newish 55-and-older “active adult” community Venetian Falls, about 15 minutes east of U.S. 41 off Center Road, as particularly strong. “Talk about values increasing,” she says. “Single-family homes there are reaching the high $300,000s, up a hundred thousand in one year. I have buyers dying to get in, but there just aren’t many listings.”

Off South Tarniami Trail, three new mega-communities that went dormant in the Great Recession — WCI Communities’ Sarasota National, Lennar’s Gran Paradiso and DiVosta’s Island Walk (the latter two have Venice addresses but are actually are in the city of North Port) — are “flourishing again,” she says. “New construction is alive and well in Venice.”

And the Island of Venice, a quick stroll from both beaches and the lively downtown Venice restaurant, boutique and arts scene? “It is and always will be the most desirable location when our snowbirds come to town,” she says, “but there’s not a lot to sell there. The first thing they do is look at properties on or near the beach. Then they find out they can’t afford them, and look elsewhere.”

North Port

“North Port is coming to life,” says Bruce Henry of Keller Williams Realty, a longtime North Port resident and board member of the Punta Gorda/Port Charlotte/ North Port Board of Realtors. In 2014, year-over-year closed sales were up 13.5 percent, he says, and prices have gone up, too — as of Sept. 30, the average sale price was $135,901, and properties were selling at an average 97 percent of asking price.

Demand is strongest, he says, in Island Walk and Gran Paradiso, located in the city limits even though they have Venice addresses. New construction like that is good, he says, because the city desperately needs inventory. “Four or five years ago, we carried about 1,600 listings,” he says. “Right now we’re a little over 400 single-family homes for sale.”

Don’t forget, he says: “North Port is 104 square miles and it’s only 25 percent built out. With the widening of Sumter Boulevard about to be finished, we’re going to see huge growth.”

“FAMILIES ARE COMING IN, INVESTING IN THE OLDER HOMES AND RENOVATING THEM.”

Originally published at https://www.thefreelibrary.com.