Posted on 11/29/2010 7:22:44 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
The McMansion, the mass-produced, super-sized home that saw its heyday earlier this decade, is poised to resurrect itself from the ashes of the real estate collapse.
A few months ago, real estate site Trulia declared, "The McMansion Era is Over."
Just 9 percent of the people surveyed by the site said their ideal home was more than 3,200 square feet. That news came on top of data from the National Home Builders Association that the median size of new homes dropped from 2,268 square feet in 2006 to 2,100 square feet in 2009.
The implication is that the recession has caused us all to abide by a new mantra that less is more.
That may be true when it comes to cars and over-the-top spending — the Hummer and Christmas shopping budgets that end in three zeros are long gone.
But when it comes to our homes, there's already evidence to suggest Floridians will still take as much square footage as they can get.
Meritage Homes is marketing an eight-bedroom, 5,100-square-foot model in several Central Florida developments that is proving to be a top seller.
The home, known as the Del Rio, perhaps best illustrates the new McMansion. Its architecture is uncomplicated, making it less expensive to produce at a more affordable price. It also provides ample space that is energy efficient for today's families that find themselves taking in an older relative or adult child....
(Excerpt) Read more at articles.orlandosentinel.com ...
Buying a house in Orlando MSA at this point is a decision based more upon oil prices, currency inflation, and relative strength/weakness of the US dollar compared to currencies of foreign tourists.
If someone was looking to buy into Orlando nowin the 400k+ range, you can buy into Wekiva Springs, Dr. Phillips, Butler chain of lakes or Winter Park for prices not seen in 10 years. Newer stuff like Baldwin Park and large condos downtown can be had for the cheap also.
The thing is without tourism Orlando is sunk, the loss of Cape Canaveral will slow long term growth in the aerospace and technology sector, the bankrupting of so many local banks will slowdown longterm growth in the FIRE economy, and the region has a foreclosure backlog that is about to hit like a wave onto the market.
If oil makes air travel prohibitively expensive, if the Euro implodes pushing the value of the Dollar up, or if the local economy doesn’t find a new impetus of growth.... Orlando is looking at a decade of stagnation.
For retirees, Orlando is probably inflation adjusted as cheap as it was in the early 1980’s... which means if you come down with some money, you can live well.
Something about that floorplan says modular to me, looks like boxcars lined up side by side with a few angular jogs to hide it.
Yeah “cheap to build” = little to no architectural character.
Nope....All those rooms, for the most part, are now filled with unemployed family members, that were all forced to come back to the roost, or which ever family member is left with a home.
If it were actually all stick built onsite, “cheap” doesn’t necessarily mean linear runs of interior walls front to back.
That house actually has a litte effort expended on the front at least, not like the radically bland things I was talking about. If you’ve ever heard of Jim Walter Homes, these make JW look charming by comparison.
We’re in agreement on the national statistics.
I spent half of 2009 in Orlando dealing with residential real estate for a family member.
The banks in Orlando have a huge supply of homes in inventory. I got more comps in the hidden inventory than I did on the Orlando MLS in August 2009. Situation has mostly gotten worse for McMansions except in the few zip codes I mentioned above.
Houses worth exactly 400k in August 2009 are now sitting on market for 100+ days at 335k.
Average length of ownership for owners of 400K houses in Orlando is between 5.5 and 5.9 years.
The Case Shiller 20 city index does not include Orlando, but it does have Tampa, Miami and Atlanta... you can use those as proxies.
MIXR South Florida metropolitan area Miami–Fort Lauderdale–Pompano Beach, FL
TPXR Tampa Bay Area Tampa–St. Petersburg–Clearwater, FL
ATXR Atlanta metropolitan area Atlanta–Sandy Springs–Marietta, GA
I’m sure the McMansion inventory in Orlando will clear within a decade. There is still a wave of baby boomers to retire... but there has to be economic justification to move to Orlando... without some sort of economic stabilization and job growth Orlando is going to be stagnate for a while.
regards,
I read this and I think to the scene in Dr Zhivago when Dr Zhivago returns to Moscow only to discover the Bolsheviks have moved 13 families into his parent’s house.
I’d hope they would be CBS, stick built structures don’t last long in Florida.
The front of the home is the only place they tried giving character to. The inside would be utterly bland, interior designers may enjoy the clean slate though.
I’d move the first floor master upstairs and put a 25’x30’ great room next to the kitchen and add a fireplace.
Older people don’t like the idea of dealing with stairs constantly, so MOM, master on main. Chops up the flow of the public spaces on the ground floor, but they want it so there it is.
One of the Del Rio model is for sale near completion in Wekiva Springs
Price Monthly Payment* Bed Bath Living Garage Stories Sq. Ft.
$338,990 $1,675 8.0 4.0 3.0 2.0 5,107
$339k base + closing costs etc... come out to $360k at closing... neighbor same model sold for 350k in January.
$70.50/sqft
Actually a nice location if you enjoy river kayaking. Downside is the constant gator/snake presence.
2908 Falconhill Drive
Apopka, FL 32712
Funny! Too bad it’s not a joke!
No. I'm the other Grim.
What do you mean by ‘shadow inventory’? I’ve never heard the term before- are you talking about properties under contract?
I’d say it was more a matter of ‘want’ than ‘need’ and a sneer at the taste of the nouveau upper-middle class.
LOL
LOL
FromLori posted a link to Corelogic, they track shadow inventory for a living. I would only add “discouraged sellers who would if they could immediately put their residential real estate on the market if the market showed signs of life” as another sector of shadow inventory.
Shadow Inventory
CoreLogic estimates shadow inventory, sometimes called pending supply, by calculating the number of properties that are seriously delinquent (90 days or more), in foreclosure and real estate owned (REO) by lenders and that are not currently listed on multiple listing services (MLSs). Shadow inventory is typically not included in the official metrics of unsold inventory.
According to CoreLogic, the visible supply of unsold inventory was 4.2 million units in August 2010, the same as the previous year. The visible inventory measures the unsold inventory of new and existing homes that were on the market. The visible months’ supply increased to 15 months in August, up from 11 months a year earlier due to the decline in sales during the last few months.
The total visible and shadow inventory was 6.3 million units in August, up from 6.1 million a year ago. The total months’ supply of unsold homes was 23 months in August, up from 17 months a year ago. Although it can vary and it depends on the market and real estate cycle, typically a reading of six to seven months is considered normal so the current total months’ supply is roughly three times the normal rate.
Check out this monstrosity! I think our kids would get lonely in such a huge place. Good thing it’s out of our price range, eh?
Thank you for the link JH.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.