The first quarter of real estate numbers are finally out for Sarasota County, Florida, and the numbers are extremely positive. There have been several records that were broken and according to Marc Rasmussen from Dwell Real Estate the market is currently at the best that it has ever been.
Records of home sales for Sarasota County have been kept for the past 75 years and the numbers from this last quarter were by far the best they have ever been.
According to Marc Rasmussen who is a realtor, this is the clearest sign that we have seen to show the market has truly turned around. It is easy to see that more and more people are buying homes in this area. “As a whole the county has had the best quarter on record,” states Rasmussen.
Marc Rasmussen says that there were 3000 Suncoast homes that were sold in the first quarter of the year. This includes January through March of 2015.
“This number of sales in the first quarter is about a 6% increase over sales for last year and last year was a really good year for home sales as well,” he states. “While sales were a bit slow for the county during the months of January and February, they really started to pick up during the month of March. March was a really great month.”
Recent surveys have shown Suncoast as being at the top for one of the best places to live and this news has been drawing more and more people to the area. In almost every magazine Sarasota gets extremely high ratings for having the best beaches and for being one of the best places to retire. When planning a move and buying a home, people pay attention to these rankings.
One of the other factors that are affecting the Sarasota County real estate market in a positive way is that the foreclosure crisis is winding down. “People have been waiting to purchase homes and they are knowledgeable enough to be able to get back into the housing market after a three year break,” says Rasmussen. “Even if you went through a foreclosure it is still possible to now get back into the real estate market. The foreclosure is off of your record after just seven years, which means that many of the people who lost their homes during the years 2007 and 2008 are now ready to purchase a new home.” This is great news for buyers, sellers, and real estate agents.
Since this first quarter has been so great, what can be expected for the next quarter? Will home sales continue to rise?
“The month of April should be a very good month for the real estate market. May should be a great month as well. The reason for this is because the sales are based on contracts that have been written either a month or two months ahead of time. Some of the contracts may have been written in either the month of February or in March,” says Rasmussen. Overall, things are looking very good for the real estate market of the county.
There is one problem with the high number of homes being sold in the county and that is that there may not be enough houses on the market. This is something the county is definitely not used to. According to Rasmussen, currently in Sarasota County if the sales continue at the rate they are going, there is about a 3 month supply of homes available.
While running out of homes in not necessarily the best situation, it is a much better situation to be in than having many homes sitting empty. Realtors for the area are extremely happy with the way the market has improved and they expect to have continued improvement for the market during the coming months. After all, Sarasota County is a great place to live and has a lot to offer. Anyone that is in the market for a home or investment property should definitely be considering this area as one of their number one locations.
