Want to Live Downtown For Under $350,000?

by: Allison Werner

Downtown Sarasota is a very desirable place to call home.  Residents are in the center of the city’s activity and can easily take advantage of Sarasota’s wide array of restaurants, the weekend farmer’s market, and cultural attractions like the opera – right outside their front doors! 

Over the past few months there has been a definite decrease in the number of available homes throughout Sarasota, and the number of downtown condos priced below about $350,000 (see the graph below) has gone down even more dramatically.  In buildings like 1350 Main, which three months ago had at least three or four 2-bedroom condo listings for under $400,000, the least expensive 2-bedroom is listed for $479,000.  This is the same as other buildings just down the street like Alinari – there was previously a selection of nice 2-bedroom condos listed for under $300,000 and now they start at $320,000 in that building.

The moral of the story is this: if you are a buyer who is set on downtown and has a budget of less than $400,000, don’t wait any longer since the selection is going down (and when this happens, prices going up is the inevitable after-effect).