Analysts are predicting Florida’s condo collapse will “drag the rest of the state into recession. Other experts scoff at that notion. But nearly all agree grim times lie ahead” for the future. Many have bought in the idea of making easy money flipping condos. Reality is “Orlando has 4,440 condos listed for sale; Miami has 23,000.”

A couple in South Florida is grappling with the decision to “walk away from the $117,000 deposit they plunked down on another investment condo” or “close on the one-bedroom unit, which is similar to others now on the marked for less than $585,000 they agreed to pay.” This after the couple flipped a South Florida condo three years ago.

“Just how many other speculators face the same dilemma in the nation’s most glutted condo market will become clear during the next two years. That is when 25,000 new condo units, most of them rising in or near Miami’s downtown, will flood an area already saturated with 23,000 condos listed for sale. An additional 40,000 units have been approved, but analysts doubt the majority will break ground.

Orlando and other Florida cities — Naples, Fort Myers, Tampa and Sarasota among them — also have huge condo gluts. With 4,440 condos listed for sale, Orlando has an unprecedented 29-month supply, and last month sales plummeted 64 percent lower than a year ago.”

“”Miami is the poster child for the condo bust,” said Jack McCabe, CEO of McCabe Research & Consulting, a real-estate market-analysis firm located in Deerfield Beach. “There are probably only two cities in the world with more construction: Shanghai and Dubai. Unfortunately, there is going to be a lot of foreclosures . . ., and developers, lenders, title companies and real-estate companies will go under.””

You can read the full article at:
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/orl-condobust2707aug27,0,2001796.story

Michelle