I work with so many out-of-town buyersand. I know what a struggle it isto figure out where you want to livewhen, you don’t know the tampa bay areain. This episode, i’m hoping to helpyou guys out with that little problem: hey everybody, Melanie Atkinson, here, realtor with Smith & Associates in beautiful, tampa bayflorida for those of you moving here or thinkingabout moving here it can be super overwhelming when. You don’t know much about the area and youdon’t have a lot of time to visit the main goalof this channel is to help you guys with thatchallenge, but today i wanted to break it. Downand talk about a lot of different neighborhoodsin, one episode, giving advice as to where to livecan be very tricky for me as a realtor, we haveprofessional and ethical guidelines in place, todiscourage us from steering our clients to certainareas, but i have people ask me all the time. Whereare the good neighborhoods. Well, i really can’tanswer that question directly, not only becauseof those ethical guidelines, but because i don’tknow what you consider a good neighborhood whatyou and i consider good neighborhoods might bevery different. So what i thought might be helpfulis to talk to you guys about where my buyers havechosen to move to since the beginning of 2020.
Alot of those buyers have come from out of state so they’ve already done their online researchand in-person research. Maybe you can learn abit from them. Let’S get started. The number onearea that my buyers have chosen to move to sincethe start of 2020 is wesley chapel out of the 12buyers that have chosen to move there. 11Of them were from out of state and 10 ofthem chose to buy new construction homes. I do alot of new construction and wesley chapel has alot of opportunities to build. So that’s reallynot, a big surprise. The prices in wesley chapelare reasonable too, since the start of 2020 theprices have gone up a bit, but the price rangesof. My clients who have bought there have rangedfrom the low 300s to over 900 000.. Recently i gotsome buyers into a new construction home for rightaround 400. 000. That’S about the lowest that i canfind right now. There are several neighborhoods toconsider in wesley chapel out of those 12 buyersfive of them chose to move to epperson the lagoonis, a big reason that they chose epperson but alsoavailability. There are several builders activelybuilding in there now, so you have choices. Ina bunch of different price ranges: schools arerated highly there as well, and there are severalcommercial projects in the works that make thewhole area very exciting. I had two buyers: buildnew construction homes in union park, which is alittle farther south in wesley chapel off of stateroad 56 beautiful neighborhood, one buyer purchaseda super cute, david weekley home in persimmon. Parkwhich, is a smaller neighborhood than a lotof. The other communities in wesley chapeli have one buyer currently building in estanciawhich is right. Next to persimmon park and anotherone building with gl homes in winding ridge oneof. My most memorable sales of the past year, isa beautiful resale home that took place in sevenoaks. Seven oaks has been one of the most popularneighborhoods in the wesley chapel area for along time now it’s an established neighborhoodvery centrally located if you’re looking formore information on wesley chapel check out theepisode that i did a while back the second mostpopular area that my buyers chose To move to wassouth tampa south tampa is pretty much theopposite of wesley chapel when it comes to pricingsouth. Tampa is one of our most expensive areasof. My 10 buyers, who chose to move to south tampafour of them chose new construction options. Andsix of them chose resale homes, prices range froma, townhouse, just under 500, 000 to a multi-milliondollar new, build most of the prices that my buyerspaid were in between one and two million, which isa fairly standard price point for a single familyhome in south tampa. So why do people choose tolive in south tampa? I have an episode that deepdives into that, but to sum it up south Tampais super close to downtown tampa, so you haveeasy access to all that the city offers it hashighly rated public schools, custom houses, thataren’t in cookie cutter, neighborhoods and isclose to some of our largest Professional workareas, like the west shore business district indowntown, i personally live in south tampa mostlybecause. I feel like i’m in the middle of all theaction. I love having such easy access to all theareas within tampa bay. South tampa also has a longhistory and much more of a local vibe than otherareas in tampa. The third most popular area thatmy buyers have chosen to move to in the past. 20Months is odessa. We are headed back up to pascocounty for this one west of wesley, chapel and alittle bit closer to the coast. Odessa is home, tosome really lovely new construction, communitiesincluding starkey ranch. I’Ve had seven buyersbuild in starkey ranch, five with taylor morrisonone with homes by west bay and one with mi homesthe popularity of starkey ranch as a neighborhoodis, partially due to the fact that they opened anew k-8 school for the beginning of the 2021-2022school year and having a K-8 school is a big drawfor, a lot of families. Starkey ranch also has aton of great community amenities, lots and lots. Ofbiking, walking running trails and community sportsparks check out an episode. I did a while backthat includes starkey ranch called four new homecommunities. I also had another buyer buy a resalehouse in long lake ranch, which is another greatcommunity in odessa. One of the reasons that peoplelike odessa so much is because of the proximityto, the veterans expressway suncoast, parkway whichbrings, you directly to the airport, the west shorebusiness district and other major highways whichbring you everywhere else in the tampa bay areathe commute can be a little bit easier From odessadepending on where you’re going to work and it’salso closer to the beach, if you want to be nearthe coast, the next area that my buyers chose island, o’lakes, situated right in between wesleychapel and odessa. Are you guys seeing a patternhere pasco county has a lot of new constructionand, really lovely subdivided neighborhoods one ofthe most popular neighborhoods in land o’ lakesis bexley bexley feels like it’s in odessa buttechnically. It is land o lakes and one of thethings. I like best about the neighborhood isits access to the veterans, expressway bexley hasan elementary school within the community, itselflots of great community amenities and the housesrange in price, from about 400 to over a millionland o lakes technically covers a very largearea, so you have neighborhoods like bexleywhich. Are close to main highways and then you haveneighborhoods to the north that have a much morerural feel to them. You can find decent values onhomes in land o lakes, especially as you get tothe more northern parts, but like every other areaprices are going up quickly. The next on the listis, the westchase citrus park area, i was actuallyreally surprised whenever i was doing this – that ididn’t have more buyers in this area. It’S beenone of my specialty areas for a very long timebut in the past 20 months. The inventory in thewestchase area has been very low and because ofthe high demand, the prices have gone up. A lotwestchase is the anchor neighborhood and issurrounded by a lot of other popular neighborhoodslike waterchase highland park, westwood lakes, justto name a few. The schools are highly rated and theneighborhoods are established and very very prettyfor. Those looking for new construction there isn’tmuch in this area, most of the homes in westchaseand the surrounding area, were built in the 1990sand early 2000s. It’S such a popular area, becauseof its location, it’s very centrally, located it haseasy access to the veterans expressway, which getsyou to the west shore area and the airport andeverything else that we’ve already talked aboutand it’s about 15 minutes, south of odessa, so ifyou have to commute south West chase is closeri personally lived in the westchase areafor about 14 years, and i can tell you itwas a lovely place to call home. Finally, over topinellas county in clearwater is next on the listi. Had one lucky, buyer find a new constructionopportunity in clearwater, which is really hardto, find clearwater has been established for avery long time and pinellas county itself, isvery small in terms of area, so there’s not a lotof land for builders to build new homes. Clearwaterhas long been a destination for people moving tothe area because they know about clearwater beachand. They know that pinellas county has someof the most beautiful beaches in the countrythe city extends through the whole central partof pinellas county. So there are a lot of differentareas within clearwater itself. I had one luckybuyer find a great resale home in the countrysidearea of clearwater and another one find agreat pool home down closer to the beach forjust under 400.
The next area is dunedin. I hadtwo buyers choose to move to dunedin this yearand. I have to tell you it’s one of my favoriteareas in all of tampa bay. I just did an episodeabout dunedin and safety harbor checkthat, one out people, love dunedin, becauseof, its wonderful downtown, local restaurantsaccess to the pinellas trail and honeymoonisland, and also all of its local restaurantssituated on the coast in central pinellas. Countydunedin can be a bit of a tedious commute. Ifyou have to travel to either of the citiesfrequently st pete or downtown tampa, but it’sa great place. If you want a lot of local flavorand, you want to be near a beach, but not on a beachand speaking of beaches. That brings me to my nextarea again. I was a bit surprised when i was doingthis that i didn’t have more beach buyers in thelast 20 months, but it was such a strange time. Thati understand why a lot of beach buyers tend to besecond home buyers, investment, home buyers or outof the country buyers. Because of limited access, totravel, we haven’t seen as many people come. Fromout of the country, as we have in previous yearswe’ve, also had very limited inventory on thebeaches and again just like everywhere. Ourprices jumped significantly so some people gotpriced out when talking about beach, buying it’sa very different discussion than all the otherneighborhoods, because a lot of it is condo livingor, single-family homes that were built in themid-1900s. We have to talk about flood insurancerentals, all sorts of things and conveniently ihave a video about beach buying and if you needmore information about beach mine or want to havea conversation with me, you can always text or callnow back over to hillsborough county for therest of the Areas that my buyers chose to move toin the last 20 months, i had two buyers: movedto, Lutz
It’S Lutz, not luts, and they were both local buyers who bought resale homes, lutz isa, really charming area in the northern part of hillsborough county, where the lot sizes tend to be bigger than in other areas, and it definitely has more of a rural feel to it with winding roads. Lots of established neighborhoods, it almost feels like up north. I also had two buyers choose to move tor iverview and apollo beach in that southeastern region of hillsborough county, both of them were out of state buyers. One bought a new construction home in apollo beach, the other one bought a resalehome in riverview. There are some great valuesin, the riverview apollo beach, gibsonton ruskinarea, which tends to be what draws people therethere is a decent amount of new constructiongoing on there as well. The farther south youget, the better the prices get. I had one localbuyer buy a gorgeous resale house in new tampawhich again is in hillsborough county, just southof wesley chapel, the new tampa wesley chapel areaare, almost merging together. There are a lot ofreally beautiful, established communities in newtampa. A lot of golf course communities there, aswell and last, but certainly not least, i had onelocal buyer move from saint pete to thonotosassai love Thonotosassa. Not only is it fun tosay, but it has great access to downtown. Tampaand is perfect, for people who want acreageit does feel like you’re out in thecountry, because you are out in the countrybut. That area is growing very quickly, becauseof the demand that is coming from people whowant more space and you can zoom over to downtowntampa in no time at all. I get from south tampa tothonotosassa in about 20 minutes using the selmonexpressway. This episode was super fun. For me. Towrite, because i got to look back at the last 20months and all the fun places that i got to gowith buyers. I was definitely surprised at someof the areas that were missing from my list someof my favorite areas like downtown st pete, andsafety harbor. I feel, like i show houses thereall the time, i’m not quite sure why there haven’tactually been any buyers that chose to move theremaybe 2022.
I hope that by knowing where my buyerschose to move after doing their extensive researchit helps you kind of narrow down where you thinkthat, you might want to look the tampa bay area isvery large. I tell everybody that it does takesome time to get to know the area as always ifyou’re looking to buy or sell in the tampa bayarea. Please give me a call or send me a text i’dbe happy to help you. It has been a whirlwind of amarket. The past 20 months – and i don’t really seeany reason that that’s not going to continueinto 2022 but stay tuned for some upcomingepisodes that address that take care. Everybodyand. Thank you for watching with love melanie
