Thursday, October 05, 2006

Downtown Condo Livin'

A story in the latest Sarasota Magazine reports on occupied condos in downtown.

At the Plaza on Main, 15 out of 49 are lived in by owners that take the homestead exemption. Apparently the others are speculators or they are "vacation residences."

Up the street at 100 Central, property records reveal that only 25 of 97 owners take the homestead exemption.

"What we found at the Plaza may be indicative of what to expect as seven downtown projects with 769 condominiums near completion this year and another 1,400 condos are teetering on the drawing boards," says Kim Hackett of the Sarasota Magazine.

Not exactly a rousing start to the movement to downtown living. It will be interesting to see the stats for 1350 Main when that building becomes occupied.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

My guess that the actual number of year round occupants is even less than that. Many people "reside" in Florida for tax purposes. Drive around downtown on any given night to see just how dark these new buildings are. I would say that perhaps one in ten units is actually occupied.