South Florida home costs roar back
The cost of South Florida single-family homes soared in November after an October slide, bolstering claims that hurricanes caused the dip.
By MATTHEW HAGGMAN
South Florida home prices jumped sharply in November, appearing to quell speculation the red-hot housing market is cooling off.
The median price of an existing single-family home climbed 6 percent from October to November to $391,100 in Broward and 4 percent to $381,600 in Miami-Dade, according to the Florida Association of Realtors.
The price gains come after October median homes prices in South Florida had dropped to $368,900 in Broward and $366,300 in Miami-Dade. Prices in Broward had fallen for two consecutive months before November.
Those slumps -- coupled with the relentless increases in interest rates and the fact mortgage rates have creeped higher -- have sparked concern the long-predicted slowdown of the torrid housing market was finally here.
But others attributed the October dip to disruptions from hurricanes -- particularly Wilma -- which battered South Florida and closed businesses for days.
To be sure, the housing market's resilience remains a double-edged sword, because rising prices continue to put homes ever more out of reach for middle-income earners. Increasingly, county and city political leaders are being forced to consider remedies to the problem.
''Out-of-state buyers have kept the pace going,'' Noel A. Edwards of Sabrina Realty in Fort Lauderdale said when asked about the galloping market. ``But we don't have anywhere for the working people to buy.''
And many contend the surging market will continue, with the median price of a single-family home in South Florida soon eclipsing the $400,000 mark.
The median is the point at which half the homes are sold above and half sold below.
''I don't see any end in sight,'' said Patrick Butler, president of Home Financing Center Realty, which does business in Broward and Miami-Dade. ``We have an ever-increasing source of buyers from so many different places -- folks coming down from the Northeast, international buyers, baby boomers -- that we will not be impacted by any single economic change.''
Butler said, for instance, that if mortgage rates go up, there will still be buyers from Latin America or Europe willing to pay cash for homes in South Florida.
SALES ARE FLAT
Meanwhile, the number of homes sold in South Florida remained down in Miami-Dade and Broward counties, although sales have been consistently down throughout the year. In November, homes sales volume fell 25 percent in Miami-Dade and 21 percent in Broward, compared to the year-ago period.
The latest data on existing-home prices came on the heels of the U.S. Commerce Department report Friday that sales of new homes -- in contrast to the existing-home sales measured by the Realtor group -- declined on a national basis, as did new-home sales prices.
Some consider the new U.S. housing data one more indication of a cooling national market. But in South Florida prices for existing single-family homes not only rose from the previous month, but also jumped sharply on a year-to-year basis.
In Miami-Dade, November prices were up 31 percent from November 2004 when a median-priced home could be bought for $290,800. In Broward, the price of a single-family home in November was up 29 percent compared to a November price of $303,300 a year ago.
Real estate experts note the hurricanes likely continue to skew results: Just as the storms stalled sales and contributed to October's price drop, those delayed transactions are now being completed and bolstering current sales numbers.
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