Florida A Safe Haven During Pandemic

At Advantage Realty #1, our company has noticed many market changes within our business as COVID-19 hit last year. As it struck the northern states, like New York and New Jersey, we saw a stampede of people coming to COVID-friendly safe haven states like Florida. In fact, Florida Trend magazine reported that more people are moving to Florida, especially during the pandemic. These people rushed to the safe havens of Florida, which caused the coastal markets to explode. 

People moved because they feared that businesses would shut down, but just the opposite happened. The businesses that relied on real estate started to boom.  That got all of us in the real estate industry excited about what we could do to find more properties and how we could get on the cutting edge of helping these new residents.

Although real estate has been booming, people and businesses faced challenging new restrictions, so they developed innovations to adapt to COVID barriers.   In real estate, we went from selling properties by traditional physical showings to Zillow 3D virtual walk-throughs on cell phones.  This technique helped my firm, Advantage Realty #1, start out the 2021 year with top sales in real estate in Highlands County. One prime example is the sale of a stunning Lake June Pointe home seen below with 10,000 square feet that had been previously listed by another broker—but with no showings. Once we listed this property at the beginning of the pandemic, I immediately sold it with multiple buyers offering bids for this slice of premium real estate. 

Zillow 3D virtual walk-throughs and many other cutting-edge techniques have helped Advantage Realty#1 to sell properties at the best possible prices in the shortest market times.  Now that the real estate supply has been drastically depleted, our agents are regularly receiving multiple offers on properties. We help clients evaluate their options—whether buying an existing home or constructing a new one. In addition, we have aligned ourselves with developers to handle the future housing supply needs.  Needless to say, construction and real estate is running at full force with rapid building cost increases creating higher prices and values for existing homes and new construction.

Florida has now become a known “safe haven” to our new northern friends.  We used to think it would take an interstate to make our local market take off and develop; however, to protect their safety, individuals have relocated to our area, and they are helping our market to thrive. 

Since the pandemic forced many people to work online and educate their children online, living in metropolitan areas is not as important. Plus, people can live in Highlands County and have products delivered to their doorsteps—whether through online shopping or delivery services offered through local businesses. Our online world has created many options of where people can live.

The safety and quality of life that we offer in Highlands County has taken precedent to the jobs offered in larger cities, especially with the ease of working and meeting online. This global change has created a new evolution of how business is conducted. It has also created new investment priorities, supply challenges, production shortages, inflation concerns, and potentially higher taxes in the next few years. 

The influx of our northern friends has created increased sales prices, and many people are deciding to sell. With our extensive knowledge of real estate and the new trends in technology, let us help you with your residential or commercial needs—whether you are buying or selling. We have 33 agents who can assist you, and our record speaks for itself—63 million dollars in sales in 2020.

You can call our firm Advantage Realty #1 for a free consultation.  

Office: 863-386-0303/ Email: GregAdvantageRealty@gmail.com

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