Posted on Wednesday, October 12, 2011
It is good to see trailing 12 month prices up 15%+ and supply decreasing in the Naples Real Estate Market – but what about the economy around us? Are we a good house in a bad neighborhood as investors might say, or is our “neighborhood” on the rise?
According to Jeff Harrington’s column in the St Petersburg Times, the Florida economy is to grow slowly, but still outperform the national average. Harrison reports “Wells Fargo released its Economic Outlook for Florida yesterday, and the news was positive, though not by much. The company says the state is recovering more quickly than the nation in general, but part of the reason is that the state fell so far during the crash.”
Harrison goes on to report Vitner (at Wells Fargo) says Florida’s recovery seems to have some legs as it expands beyond the tourism and health areas. The report points to an upswing of jobs, albeit small, in retail and trade, as well as professional and business jobs.
Nan and I, both REALTORS, live full time here in Naples and can add some local knowledge to all of this. Our discussions with local merchants – restaurants, art gallery owners, and let’s not forget the barbershop – the vast majority say 2011 is running ahead of 2010 and is going to finish ahead of 2010. Traffic is certainly picking up and we see the boat trailers and car carriers of the snowbirds (welcome back!) dotting the traffic.
It is still too early to tell how the 2011-2012 season, and economy, will fair here but the news report above and local observation seem to say we are in reasonably good shape. The next big test will be the price and inventory reports due out at month end.
Stay tuned and tell us what you think.
