Florida Housing Market Sees Record Home Listings

The number of homes for sale in Florida reached a record high last month, according to a new report by Redfin, which found that at the end of January there were 172,209 properties listed on the market.

Inventory was also up 22.7 percent compared to January 2024 and was the highest of any months in records dating back to 2012, the real estate brokerage found.

Why It Matters

Parts of the Florida housing market is experiencing a much-awaited cooldown after years of booming during the COVID-19 pandemic, as inventory grows and stubbornly high mortgage rates discourage demand. A majority of experts expect certain areas of the Sunshine State to report price declines by the end of the year, especially the most overvalued markets and the ones where growing, unsold inventory is starting to pile up.

For buyers, this is good news. More supply means more options and more negotiating power. However, many buyers might struggle to feel lucky as home prices are still rising at the state level and remain historically high.

What to Know

Florida, together with Texas, have been building more homes than any other state over the past few years.

Active listings, which refer to the number of houses that are currently for sale in Florida's market, are also near record high and back to pre-pandemic levels, according to Redfin, having risen 19.4 percent year-over-year in January to 212,437. Active listings are currently at a record high in eight out of 31 metropolitan areas in Florida, including Cape Coral, Deltona-Daytona Beach, Homosassa Springs, Lakeland, North Port-Sarasota, Ocala, Port St. Lucie, and The Villages.

The highest increases in active listings year-over-year were reported in Palatka (34.3 percent), Wauchula (32.8 percent), Naples (28.6 percent), The Villages (26,6 percent), and Homosassa Springs (25.8 percent).

While active listings were higher in every Florida metro analyzed by Redfin, in some metros in the state the rises were below 5 percent, showing that inventory is not soaring everywhere. These included Tallahassee (up 3.7 percent year-over-year), Sebring (4.5 percent), Panama City (3.9 percent), and Okeechobee (1.2 percent).

Why Are Inventory Levels Rising?

One reason why inventory levels are growing is that Florida has been building more homes to meet the influx of newcomers arriving from out of state during the pandemic. But demand for homes across the state has since slowed down, as the end of the health emergency forced some of these new residents to return to their home states and many Floridians are now leaving because of rising homeowner insurance costs and more frequent natural disasters.

While Florida regulators have celebrated the approval of new insurers into the state's market this year as a sign that the troubled property insurance market is stabilizing, premiums remain among the highest in the nation and experts are skeptical about any alleged improvement. Sunshine State homeowners pay an average of $2,625 a year for $300,000 worth of dwelling coverage, more than the national average of $1,915, according to NerdWallet's latest data.

The situation is slightly different, and even more dramatic, in South Florida, where condo owners are trying to sell their properties en masse despite little interest for their properties as a result of new building-safety regulations. New laws passed after the tragic collapse of a condo in Surfside in June 2021 now require most aging condos in the state to undergo regular inspections and force homeowner associations to reserve enough funds to conduct necessary maintenance and repair work.

According to the recent data, a majority of homeowner associations have not yet conducted the first crucial inspection that aging condos had to undergo by December 31, 2024. Redfin data shows that condo inventory was at an all-time high in January in Florida.

What People Are Saying

Bryan Carnaggio, a Redfin Premier real estate agent in Jacksonville, said in a statement accompanying the report: "Bidding wars are very rare these days. With this many houses for sale, a home basically needs to look like it's out of a magazine—and be priced fairly—to get multiple offers."

What Happens Next?

While inventory is still climbing across Florida, real estate analyst Mike Simonsen, founder of Altos Research, found that the pace of supply growth has "kind of plateaued" now while it is picking up in other parts of the country.