Everything about Ocala Florida real estate
Unlike other parts of the country Ocala has no selling season. Up north home sales are slow in the winter. We don’t have a winter in Ocala. People don’t buy homes with the idea that they have to close before September so their kids can get into their school. Sales are a little slow during the holidays. For me personally most of my sales are between January and June. Sellers don’t list their homes during any one season.
This is a follow up to my ongoing series about my building a new house in Del Webb Stone Creek. When you build new you should be prepared to live with construction noise and dust for 6 to 12 months.
The weather in November was unseasonably cool with little precipitation. December is a dry month with temperatures in the 70’s. The winter in Ocala is a series of cold fronts. Days in the 70’s followed by a cold front which drops the day time temps to the 60’s or even high 50’s for a few days. Then back in the 70’s until the next front comes rolling through.
Garden Series home in Stone Creek
View from your Lanai
It’s all about the view. This is a 2018 Garden Series home for sale in Del Webb Stone Creek. The Garden Series feature lawn mowing and trimming, fertilizing and lawn insect control, shrub care and lawn water included in the $318- month HOA fee. This home has tile floors in the main living area, a great upgraded kitchen with stainless appliances and granite. It is 2 bedrooms and an office with 1447 sqft under air. Perfect if you want to down size or be a snowbird. Sellers were planning on a snowbird lifestyle but love Stone Creek so much they plan to make it their full time residence and want to build a larger home on a lot with the same view. Homes in Stone Creek or any 55+ with a view like this are hard to find. $224,560.00 Great Deal. Available for immediate occupancy. SOLD
More pictures…. Read more
October was a really warm month. Many days being 10 degrees above normal and the humidity persisted on and off until the end of the month. That’s too bad because I look forward to the cooler drier weather of our fall.
November is supposed to be in the high 70’s with no humidity. Let’s hope that’s the case this year. I like those months where I’m not paying the AC bill or needing heat.
| CLOSED SALES | 558 |
|---|---|
| MEDIAN SOLD PRICE | $170,000 |
| AVERAGE SOLD PRICE | $201,976 |
| MEDIAN % ORIGINAL LIST PRICE | 96.6 % |
| MEDIAN TIME TO CONTRACT | 39 days |
| MEDIAN TIME TO SALE | 84 days |
| NEW PENDING SALES | 614 |
| NEW LISTINGS | 667 |
| ACTIVE LISTINGS | 2275 |
| MONTHS SUPPLY OF INVENTORY | 3.9 months |
September was a good month for home sales here in the Ocala and the Marion County area. As I say every month we are in a sellers market. Prices keep edging up. Nice homes in move in condition sell quickly. We are still not seeing a lot of multiple offer situations. There is a good selection of home available at least in the 55+ communities I mostly work in. Prices here in Ocala still look cheap compared to most of the country.
If you’re not looking forward to another winter call me, email me or use my Ocala Dream Home finder and I will find you a nice house and you have my guarantee that you will never have to shovel snow here in Ocala.
This post is about new verses resale homes based on my recent personal experience building a new house in Del Webb Stone Creek.
New houses are new. They have a new roof, AC, kitchen ect ect. They are not flawless. New homes always need things fixed that the sub contractors missed during construction. New houses may also need additional things such as a fenced yard, additional lighting or fans, garage storage, more landscaping, closet storage and the list goes on.
Newer resales especially 55+ resales often show as good as new. A lot of the things like landscaping, storage and fencing are not improvements where you recover 100% of your cost. Some just make a house more sellable. You can often find a nice lot in a resale that would cost a big premium on a new house.
Older resales often need some renovating. You would expect to pay less for the same size house vs new. I’m selling a 1997 home with a hard to find pool looking out at the golf course in Ocala Palms for only $215K. You couldn’t be any where near that price in a new home.
September was a very odd month here in Ocala. It was the height of hurricane season and traditionally a very rainy month but this September was dry as a bone. That’s not a good thing except for no hurricanes of course. We are supposed to get a lot of rain to replenish the aquifer before going into the winter and spring dry season.
October is a transition month. By the 3rd week of October the humidity goes away and we enter the dry season. This is a great time of year. Warm. Dry. Sunny all the time.
If you don’t look forward to the winter months then move to Ocala ! Call me. Email me. Or use my Dream Home Finder. I’l find you a house.
| CLOSED SALES | 716 |
|---|---|
| MEDIAN SOLD PRICE | $171,400 |
| AVERAGE SOLD PRICE | $197,926 |
| MEDIAN % ORIGINAL LIST PRICE | 97.1 % |
| MEDIAN TIME TO CONTRACT | 34 days |
| MEDIAN TIME TO SALE | 83 days |
| NEW PENDING SALES | 700 |
| NEW LISTINGS | 827 |
| ACTIVE LISTINGS | 2362 |
| MONTHS SUPPLY OF INVENTORY | 4.1 months |
August sales are based on contracts signed in late June and July. The summer is typically our slow period in Ocala real estate sales but we had over 700 closings in August which is tremendous. We are in a sellers market and prices are going up. There is still a good selection of homes and prices here look great compared to other parts of the country.
September is the peak of hurricane season in Florida. Hurricane Dorian missed Ocala and went up the coast. Here in SW Ocala all I got was a light shower and a slight breeze. Ocala is probably one of the safest cities in Florida for hurricanes but watching the news for a week in advance not knowing the exact path is stressful. One thing I have learned about hurricanes is that no one knows where they will go until the last 24 hours or so. Dorian was a very slow mover. That gave a huge Bermuda high pressure zone time to move east creating a path up the coast. Hurricanes naturally move north unless they are blocked by another weather system. Let’s hope all the hurricanes miss Florida this year.