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Source: BY WAYNE T. PRICE, FLORIDA TODAY
Brevard County's skyrocketing home prices ranked the county as the sixth-hottest housing market in the country during the past year, the National Association of Realtors reported Tuesday.
The Washington, D.C.-based Realtors' organization said Brevard's median home resale price rose 33.6 percent from $159,300 in the third quarter of 2004 to $212,800 in the third quarter of 2005. Six Florida metropolitan areas made the top eight of the 147 communities in the survey. The other two are in Arizona, including the Phoenix area, ranked No. 1, with a 55.2 percent gain.
The median price is the point at which half the homes sell for more and half for less.
A hot real estate market has been one of the biggest financial stories this year, with home values escalating to the point at which many people have earned tens of thousands of dollars -- on paper, at least -- because of rising prices.
The rising prices also have kept many would-be first-time homebuyers out of the market.
Although there are some indications the real estate market is slowing, many Realtors and property owners don't appear worried about declining values.
"I think the value is still there and still appreciating," said Steve Neville, a broker/owner of AAmerican Properties Management, based in Indialantic.
Neville said rising new-home prices -- based in part on land and materials costs -- help prop up prices in the existing-home market.
Also, buyers from outside the state coming to Brevard continue to play a role in growth, said Neville, who conceded the current existing-home market is flat.
However, Neville said, "It would appear that we have established a really good trend for growth."
Anthony Romero, who is selling a home in Palm Bay, also is confident in the local real estate market, although he recently dropped the asking price on a 1,600-square-foot home he is selling from $295,900 to $279,900.
"The market has slowed down just a bit, just because we're coming to the end of the year, and also mortgage rates are starting to creep up a bit," Romero said.
Brevard home-resale prices rose a respectable 4.3 percent from the second quarter to the third quarter, according to the National Association of Realtors report. But that's down from increases of more than 10 percent in each of the two previous quarters.
The Florida Association of Realtors, which also issued a third-quarter report, put Brevard's median selling price at $237,800, a 35.3 percent increase from third-quarter 2004 price of $175,800.
The variance in price statistics from the national and state Realtor groups stems from differences in the sales data samples used by the two organizations.
The cost of housing on the Space Coast has soared, with the median selling price of an existing home rising from $186,700 in September 2004 to $225,300 last month -- and that's down from $248,700 in August, according to the Florida Association of Realtors.
There were 2,243 single-family homes sold in Brevard in the third quarter, up 11.6 percent from 2,010 in the third quarter of 2004.
Some economists have expressed concern that demand for housing in some parts of the country is being driven by a speculative frenzy that could burst the price bubble as mortgage rates climb.
Freddie Mac's nationwide survey showed that the 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage hit 6.36 percent last week, the highest level in more than two years.
"The good news is that inventory levels are improving and housing supply will come closer to buyer demand in 2006," said David Lereah, the National Association of Realtors' chief economist. "We expect a healthy and more balanced market next year."
The organization's latest survey showed that 69 metropolitan areas -- almost half of the 147 areas surveyed -- experienced double-digit percentage price gains in the July-September quarter, compared with a year earlier.
There were six metropolitan areas where price declined since last year, led by Elmira, N.Y., where prices dropped 5.4 percent to a median price of $77,100, compared with $81,500 a year ago.
The nationwide median price rose by 14.7 percent in the July -- September quarter to $215,900, compared with a median price of $188,200 a year ago.
| Brevard County ranked sixth in the country among 147 U.S. metropolitan areas for the increase in the median home prices from the third quarter of 2004 to the third quarter of 2005. | ||
| Metro Areas | % Increase | |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, Ariz. | 55.2 |
| 2. | Orlando area | 44.8 |
| 3. | Cape Coral/Fort Myers | 42.5 |
| 4. | Tucson, Ariz. | 34.7 |
| 5. | Daytona Beach-Deltona-Ormond Beach | 33.8 |
| 6. | Brevard County | 33.6 |
| 7. | Ocala | 31.9 |
| 8. | Pensacola area | 31.2 |
| 9. | Honolulu, Hawaii | 31.1 |
| 10. | Hagerstown, Md./Martinsburg, W. Va., | 29.5 |
Where has Brevard's Real Estate Market ranked historically?
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