Winners, Losers and Players - Winter/Spring 2007

Government was clearly the hands down winner in this last real estate cycle.  Each of the past six years Sarasota governments received an annual ad valorem revenue windfall of 13%.  The City and County coffers should be bursting with this unexpected and unbudgeted gift from the real estate market!  Winners in the owners private sector were owners of real estate who heard all the hype that the market would never stop going up, but relied on confident discipline and sold for a profit and the short term “investors” who got in and out quickly with a profit.  Losers are the unfortunate  who just hung around too long refusing to sell because “someone will always offer more” and the gamblers who purchased or contracted properties that they could not afford to purchase with the sole intent of “flipping” for a profit that  never materialized.  It is always hind site that recognizes winners and losers and no one wins all the time, and to all the participants it was an exciting cycle.  The players are all the participants in Sarasota real estate who enjoyed the wild ride.  Participants are a little wiser and hopefully wealthier after a time that will be remembered as the great boom of 2000.