Scott appointments could reshape Florida | Herald-Tribune
Posted by Joe in Real Estate Updates on January 7, 2011
Scott, who has promised to rid the state of “job-killing” regulations, named Billy Buzzett, a land-use lawyer who has worked for one of the largest developers in Florida, to lead the state Department of Community Affairs, the state’s top agency for regulating developers.
Scott has also indicated his support for diminishing the role of the DCA by merging it into several other agencies, including the Department of Transportation.
At the Department of Environmental Protection, the state’s top environmental agency, involved in issues including restoration of the Everglades and oil drilling, Scott tapped Herschel Vinyard, a lawyer and executive with a Jacksonville ship-building company. Vinyard has previously represented businesses in environmental cases.
The appointments, which drew praise from some business groups like the Florida Chamber of Commerce, are an indication that the new administration may be ready to significantly scale back growth-management and environmental regulations, such as laws requiring developers to pay for new roads or requiring major developments to go through a regional-impact review.
Growth control advocate Dan Lobeck calls Buzzett’s pick to lead DCA a “radical” choice, arguing that a developer should not be in charge of development regulations.
“If there every was a case of the fox guarding the hen house, this is it,” Lobeck said. “This is a full-scale abandonment of growth management in Florida.”
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Commercial real estate treading water | Herald-Tribune
Posted by Joe in Real Estate Updates on January 5, 2011
Through the first 10 months of the year, the owners of commercial property took in $452 million in lease payments, a shade above the $450 million they collected during the same period in 2009.
That may not sound exciting, but consider that landlord revenues during the same period were down in most Florida counties, including 9 percent in Manatee, 13 percent in Collier, 5 percent in Charlotte, 2 percent in Pinellas, 4 percent in Palm Beach and 2 percent each in Broward, Orange and Lee.
Statewide, landlord revenues fell 1 percent through October to $23.8 billion.
The struggles of landlords are turning into bargains for tenants, said Stan Rutstein, a commercial real estate agent for Re/Max Alliance Group in Bradenton.
The increase in landlord revenues in Sarasota County was recorded despite falling rental rates, suggesting that landlords are accepting what they can get rather than have their property stand vacant.
“I tell all my landlords, I say to them it’s very simple, I don’t have a lot of customers on the bus,” Rutstein said. “If we don’t take this customer, I don’t know when the next is coming.”
The only major counties where landlords reported increased revenue were Brevard, 5 percent; Volusia, 2 percent; Miami-Dade, 2 percent; and Hillsborough and Duval, 1 percent each.
While reporting dismal results for the first two quarters of 2010, Manatee County landlords scored their first improved quarter in two years. Landlord revenues were down 16 percent in the first quarter and 11 percent in the second quarter, but rose 1 percent in the third quarter.
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Latest county numbers show 13% fall in 2009, compared with a decrease in residential properties of only 9% | HeraldTribune.com
Posted by Joe in In the News, Real Estate Updates on June 7, 2010
THE DISCONCERTING PART OF recent real estate statistics is that the value of commercial property is now falling more rapidly than that of residential property.
After dropping by more than 20 percent in 2008, residential property fared much b etter, losing 9 percent of its value last year, according to preliminary figures from Sarasota County Property Appraiser Bill Furst’s office.
But the value of commercial, retail, office and industrial property, which had held steady earlier in the recession, fell by 13 percent in 2009. Vacant industrial land fell by 24 percent last year, rivaling the longtime market leader in bad investments, vacant residential land.
The turn in the numbers is worrisome to Sean Snaith, a University of Central Florida economist.
“It’s like a dismal relay race as the baton gets passed from one sagging sector to the next,” Snaith said. Partly because of the downturn in commercial, Snaith says the real estate recovery may not manifest itself until after 2011.
The figures also bring to mind the oft-quoted findings of a February report by the Congressional Oversight Panel, a group of academics, accountants and former regulators formed to oversee the federal government’s $700 billion bank bailout effort in late 2008.
The panel points out that $1.4 trillion in commercial loans are due to reset over the next four years, and half of them are under water. The foundering of the unwise investments made at the height of the boom is not what worries the panel — it is that a prolonged, deep recession may put sound commercial deals at risk as well.
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Manatee real estate falls by 13 percent | HeraldTribune.com
Posted by Joe in In the News, Real Estate Updates on June 2, 2010
First time county’s values declined more than its neighbors
Property values took a dive in Manatee County, pushing the local tax base down 13 percent, according to figures released Tuesday by the county Property Appraiser’s Office.
It marked the first time since the recession began that Manatee County saw a faster pace of erosion to its tax base than was experienced by its neighbors to the south.
In each of the last two years, Manatee posted annual losses of less than 10 percent to the taxable value of its property, while Sarasota County declines reached 15 percent and Charlotte County’s fell as much as 20 percent in a single year.
But the new numbers show the two southern counties lost less than 10 percent of their taxable values while Manatee is projected to lose 13 percent.
The biggest decline came in Palmetto, where County Property Appraiser Charles Hackney estimates a 19 percent decline took place. Meanwhile, Anna Maria Island saw just a 4 percent drop in values.
Hackney said Anna Maria was spared from large property value declines because of its lack of condominiums and the fact that the island was basically built out before the market explosion that took place from 2004 to 2006.
“I would say Palmetto had several large condominium developments that all hit at the same time three or four years ago,” Hackney said. “In the marketplace those units have taken the biggest hit,” he added, noting that there are condos in Palmetto selling for less than half of what they were valued when built.
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