Florida condo owners are stuck in a 'train wreck' as prices drop and mounting insurance rates scare away buyers
Rising insurance costs and HOA fees related to extreme weather events are driving up ownership costs of Florida condos. Owners want to sell, but buyers are scared off.
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Florida condo owners are stuck in a 'train wreck' as prices drop and mounting insurance rates scare away buyers
Dan LatuMar 10, 2024, 5:47 AM EDT
Florida, Miami Beach, aerial of Icon South Beach Luxury Condos. Jeff Greenberg/Universal Images Group / Getty
- Rising insurance costs and HOA fees are forcing some Florida condo owners to sell.
- Buyers are wary of the same costs, however, causing home prices to slide in major cities.
- It's a symptom of the insurance crisis and affordability problems plaguing Florida homeowners.
The Florida condo market is caught in a storm.
Owners are trying to unload units in the face of the skyrocketing costs of maintaining an apartment in Florida. At the same time, prospective buyers are driven away by those same fees.
"It's definitely been a slow-motion train wreck," said Joe Humphfner, who owns a condo in Jupiter, near West Palm Beach.
Listings have soared as prices fall in major Florida cities, according to a new report from real-estate listings site Redfin. The number of listings in February jumped nearly 30% in markets like Jacksonville and Miami compared to the same time last year. Meanwhile, prices dropped by as much as 7% in Jacksonville, to $254,000, and 3% in Miami, to $385,000. By contrast, median condo prices nationally rose 8% over the same period, to around $340,000.
It's a symptom of the increasing cost of property ownership in the Sunshine State, where the rusk of flooding and worsening weather have scrambled the homeowners' insurance market. Florida homeownership has become increasingly expensive in general as home prices continue to rise, mortgage rates remain frustratingly high, and property taxes keep climbing.
"A lot of us have known that this is on the horizon," Holly Meyer Lucas, a real-estate agent with Compass in Jupiter, told Business Insider. "It's a long road ahead for us to get insurance even remotely affordable for people."
A deepening insurance crisis for Florida homeowners
The rising cost of insurance has been a long-simmering problem in Florida.The climate crisis and corresponding increase in extreme weather events like hurricanes have prompted major companies, including Farmers Insurance and Bankers Insurance, to cut back coverage offered in the state or pull out entirely.
For those who can still get insurance, it's more expensive than ever.
Homeowners insurance in Florida costs three times the national average, according to Redfin, and is escalating at a rapid pace. In Cape Coral, on Florida's west coast, flood insurance more than doubled in a year, from nearly $1,800 to $4,800, according to federal data cited by the Wall Street Journal.
Homeowners' association fees are rising as older buildings make needed upgrades.
The Surfside tragedy of 2021, when a 12-story condo building in Miami collapsed and claimed 98 lives, has caused many Florida buildings to initiate major renovation and safety projects. Fees called assessments are being levied on condo owners to pay for these updates to infrastructure, which can include redoing concrete, revising balcony safety, and other measures.
These assessments can add thousands to the annual cost of ownership.
"People don't just have $10,000 or $30,000 lying around," Meyer Lucas told Business Insider.
Condo buyers and sellers alike are losing interest
Anthony Forina, 43, has been investing in South Florida for over 20 years. Recently, he walked away from buying a $300,000 condo in North Palm Beach that would have come with a $4,500 annual insurance bill.Just a year ago, he estimated, that insurance bill would have been around $2,900, and worries it will only climb higher in the coming years.
Forina compared the rent he could charge per month with how much it would cost to own the apartment and determined it would no longer be a sound investment.
"We've hit a point where the numbers just don't make sense," he told Business Insider.
On his own single-family home in Palm Beach Gardens, Forina added, his annual insurance premium, which was $2,600 in 2017, jumped to $8,200 in 2024.
Humphfner, the other Jupiter condo owner, bought his pad for $140,000 in 2020. Rising costs have made him consider selling already, he said.
HOA fees on his one-bedroom unit have jumped from $200 a month to $500 a month. Much of the increase, Humphfner said, has come from the increased cost of the building's annual insurance payments, which have ballooned from $30,000 per year in 2020 to $100,000 this year.
Humphfner, 25, predicted that many owners like him will be forced to sell their units because of increases like these. Many of South Florida's older buildings, he added, will be scooped up by investors and turned into new ultra-expensive luxury buildings as condo owners sell their properties at discounted rates to escape the rising costs.
"Unless there's a miracle in the insurance market," Humphfner said, "I don't see it being sustainable."
