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Archive for the 'Clearwater' Category

Clearwater’s Pier 60: The place for sunsets

I spent a very enjoyable day yesterday with a client from out of town, someone who has really fallen in love with Dunedin. I think we’ve found her and her family the perfect townhouse. In fact, they spent so much time on the Internet that they had a pretty good idea what property they wanted before they ever came to Pinellas County and got down to some serious looking.

Anyway, once we got done with our real estate business, she went off on her own to do some more exploring of the area. She ended up forgoing dinner, opting instead for some ice cream and a visit to Clearwater Beach to watch the sunset. This picture is one she took of Pier 60, the pier at Clearwater Beach where locals and tourists gather to watch the sunset. It’s a tradition that has been going on for the past 10 or 12 years, and it’s loosely based on the nightly sunset salute that’s been taking place at Key West for years.

As you can see by the picture, the sunsets are spectacular. But you will also enjoy the local musicians, the buskers (street performers) as well as the food vendors that set up every night. There’s plenty to do and see around here, and the Pier 60 sunsets are up at the top of the list.

Tags: Clearwater, Pier 60, sunset, things to do

Federal government offers mortgage help

Okay, so you’ve been living in your home in Pinellas County and faithfully making your mortgage payments, but your home’s value has been steadily slipping and now you owe more than the place is worth. You keep reading about new government programs that are supposed to help, but you need to find out more.

Fear not – there’s a place you can go to find the help you need.

That place is www.MakingHomeAffordable.gov. It’s a website designed to describe the benefits of a federal program called, well, Making Home Affordable. It offers homeowners a number of opportunities to either refinance their mortgages, or modify the mortgages they already have.

The Making Home Affordable program is financed with $75 billion for loan servicers and borrowers. Its designers say that it should be able to offer mortgage help to four million homeowners who need to modify their loans to make them more affordable, or who need to negotiate short sales of their properties with their mortgage providers.

Officials say that the money will allow Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to refinance up to five million loans they own (or guarantee). Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have set up web sites and toll-free hotlines for borrowers who need to determine if their mortgages fall under Fannie or Freddie. Fannie Mae’s is www.fanniemae.com/homeaffordable (phone number (800) 732-6643); Freddie Mac’s is www.freddiemac.com/avoidforeclosure (phone number (800) 373-3343).

Some borrowers might prefer to get information first from their own mortgage servicer. To do that, go to www.HopeNow.com and fill out an application. That web site is operated by an alliance of mortgage servicers and nonprofit counselors. You can talk to them on the phone at (888) 995-4673.

No matter where you live in North Pinellas County – Tarpon Springs, Palm Harbor, Dunedin, Clearwater, Safety Harbor, or anywhere else, for that matter – the information offered applies to you.

Tags: Add new tag, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Mortgage, North Pinellas County

The newsboys are coming

Now, who is this motley collection of youngsters, and what are they doing on my blog, which is (mostly) about real estate?
I can’t tell you. Not yet, anyway.
But I CAN tell you that these guys are newspaper boys from sometime around 1900 or 1910.
This picture came from the Library of Congress. I found a number of other really good pictures of young paper boys there, too.
These newspaper boys hark back to a time when the latest, freshest and most accurate news was found on the pages of the local newspaper. If you wanted to know what was going on in the world, or in your own community, or if you simply wanted the latest baseball scores, you went outside, looked up and down any city street, and you hailed the closest newsboy. There was probably more than one out there at any given moment, especially if it was close to presstime.
The newspaper boys are gone now, but their spirit still carries the latest news.
And that’s all I can tell you. But watch this space.

Tags: blog, newsboys, pinellas county

The light rail saga continued

Since I got all fired up recently about the new light rail system in Phoenix, and how nice such a system would be in Tampa Bay, I thought I’d share our recent experience with light rail transportation in Baltimore.

Light rail in Baltimore

This past week, we spent a few days with family in Connecticut, and then went on to Baltimore for two more days. If you’ve ever flow into Baltimore, you know that the Baltimore-Washington Airport is not very close to the downtown area – it’s located at a central point between Baltimore and Washington, DC.

When I was making arrangements for the trip, I found a shuttle service that could take us from the airport to downtown Baltimore. I don’t remember the cost exactly, but it was around $15 per person each way, or around $60 for the two of us round-trip.

A little later, we discovered that Baltimore has a light rail system that runs from Hunt Valley, north of the city, then right through downtown Baltimore and then on to Glen Burnie in Anne Arundel County. One leg of the rail line down near the Glen Burnie end shoots off and goes directly to the airport.

So that’s what we did.

There was a little bit of a walk through the airport terminal to get to the train boarding area, but once through the terminal doors the train was sitting right there waiting for us. The fare was a measly $1.60 per person (and it could have been just $.55 if I had read down a little further and found the special 55-plus fare). Once on board, the train made about 10 stops before delivering us to the Baltimore Convention Center right downtown.

We had decided to stay in the colorful Fells Point area, and that was still a fair distance away, so we flagged down a cab for the last leg of the trip.

Here are the best parts of the light rail train ride; it was really cheap as well as hugely convenient, and it only took 30 minutes to get from the airport to the heart of downtown Baltimore. It also made us feel like we were doing the right thing, environmentally speaking.

Here was the worst part: On the return trip from downtown to the airport, we just missed the Airport train and had to wait 30 minutes for the next one. That wouldn’t have been so bad, but it was cold. No, actually, it was worse than just cold. It was REALLY cold, around 24 degrees, and we had to stand outside for a half-hour. For thin-blooded Floridians, it was torture.

Still, we loved it. One of the light rail stops is Camden Yards, and we’re thinking about flying up there next summer for a Tampa Bay Rays – Baltimore Orioles game. I’m still dreaming about a Pinellas County light rail system, something that could serve Tarpon Springs, Palm Harbor, Dunedin, Clearwater and other North Pinellas communities as well as St. Petersburg and Tampa.

If you want to learn more about Baltimore’s light rail system, go to www.mtamaryland.com/

Tags: baltimore, light rail, pinellas

Don’t pack your bags just yet

Looking at those shiny new light rail cars in the previous post, you may be thinking that a move to that part of the world wouldn’t be such a bad idea. But before you start packing, consider this little tidbit.
Standard & Poor’s puts out a monthly report on home values through its Case/Shiller Home Price Indices, a fancy term for something that S&P calls “the leading measure of U.S. home prices.” It looks at home values in 20 different markets around the nation.
So guess which market has lost the most value during the past year? That’s right, Phoenix. Home prices in that area have slipped more than 32 per cent, more than anywhere else in the country.
Where is Tampa Bay in all of that? Homes in this area have dropped a little under 20 per cent — a good-sized drop, but well below the crash-and-burn experience in Phoenix. Or, for that matter, in Las Vegas, which was second on the S&P list at 31.7 per cent; or Miami, which lost 29 per cent of its real estate value (and led the Florida lost-value sweepstakes).
There’s more, if you’d like to look it over. Just visit www.standardandpoors.com/indices.

Tags: home values

Phoenix’s new light rail system would look good here

Phoenix's light rail: A model for Tampa Bay?

Good question. Let me answer that question with another question: What is the single most obvious lack in the Tampa Bay region, which is the 19th largest metro area in the U.S.?

ANSWER: Light rail transportation.

There are lots of wonderful things to talk about when it comes to Tampa Bay – the beaches, the great airport, the Bucs and the Rays and the Lightning, to name just a few.

But one thing we don’t like to talk about very much is transportation. Getting around here can be tough – the roads are clogged with traffic, especially during the winter “Snow Bird” season. There are just three bridges (well, two bridges and a causeway) that connect the Pinellas side of the bay with the Tampa side.

What we need is some sort of light rail system. It will no doubt happen some day, but so far we have lacked the political will (and the financing) to get it done.

And that brings me to Phoenix.

Just like Tampa, Phoenix used to have street cars, but they went away sometime around 1950. Since then it has been cars, cars and more cars on the region’s streets. Like Tampa Bay, Phoenix has undergone huge growth in the past 50 or 60 years, and local transportation has failed to keep up with the demand.

Until now.

On Saturday (that’s Dec. 27, 2008) Phoenix unveiled its new light rail system with a big party that included everything from free train rides to live music (by, among others, Grand Funk Railroad). Nearly 100,000 residents turned out for the region-wide shindig.

The new system cost $1.4 billion and, for now, only runs the 20 miles between central Phoenix and Mesa. But the system will expand and grow to include many other areas in the coming years.

It took about 15 years to plan the system, and then another four years to build it. Financing it was tricky, just as it will be here if light rail ever comes to Tampa Bay. Still, the Phoenixites (Phoenixers? Phoenicians?) got it done with a special transportation tax along with federal grants and sales taxes.

Planners in Phoenix say the system should have a huge positive effect on downtown business, should lighten auto traffic significantly, and should encourage housing near the rail line and discourage sprawl. In other words, it will be more than just a transportation system; it should also change the face of the overall Phoenix community for the better.

Fares are $1.25 per ride, or you can get an all-day pass for $2.50.

If you compare the new Phoenix system with what could take place here in Tampa Bay, keep in mind the 20-mile range of the Phoenix light rail system; that’s about that same distance as downtown St. Petersburg to downtown Tampa. That image may disappoint those of us who live in North Pinellas County. But if they built a St. Pete-to-Tampa track and started service there, it would be only a matter of time before the service reached north into our part of the county.

Imagine a big circular route from St. Pete over to Tampa, out through New Tampa and then west to North Pinellas or even South Pasco, then down to South Pinellas again. Wouldn’t that be great?

If you want to learn more about the Phoenix system, go to http://www.raillife.com/.

Tags: light rail, phoenix

November home sales in Tampa Bay

According to the Florida Association of Realtors, homes sales in the Tampa Bay area during November totaled 1,701. The number in November 2007 was 1,644. Pretty darn close to one another.
You might take that as an indication that things are leveling off sales-wise in this part of the world, but that might be a premature assumption. The wild card is home sale prices — the median price of a home in Tampa Bay during November was just $149,800, the first time median prices have dropped into the 140s since the second quarter of 2004. Foreclosed properties selling at rock-bottom prices account for the big price drop.
What the statewide figures show is that foreclosures-equal-lower-prices-equal-more sales. No big surprise there.
Nationwide, home values dropped 13 percent from November 2007 to November 2008. That’s the biggerst one-year price decline in 40 years. Compared to the national figures, Tampa Bay is looking comparatively good.

Tags: home sale prices, pinellas county

One more story from the Palm Harbor arts show…

 John Mascoll is a native of Barbados and a trained engineer, but what he really loves is turning wood. And his wood working is so beautiful that it takes your breath away. It’s so good, in fact, that he won Best in Show at the recent Palm Harbor arts show.

We don’t really know John, but we have a connection to him — my husband Bill works with John’s wife, Jannice, at St. Petersburg College. Bill spotted John as we walked through the arts show last weekend, and he managed to get a couple of pictures, which I’ve posted here.

John, who lives in Safety Harbor, does very precise wood turnings, producing vases and vessels of all kinds as well as smaller works. He likes to use exotic woods that offer gorgeous grains and shades.

Jannice says that John’s father worked in wood back in Barbados. Once he moved to the U.S. and settled in Georgia, he started going to meetings of woodworkers and learned the craft.

John Mascoll exhibits his work at a lot of arts shows around the area. If you see him, stop by for a minute and take a look.

Tags: art show, Palm Harbor

Dunedin’s old-fashioned Christmas

The town of Dunedin has been spending a lot of time planning its Old Fashioned Christmas celebration, and it came together tonight with lots of music, decorations, magic tricks, food, hayrides powered by real Belgian draft horses and even real snow floating down from overhead traffic lights.
It was a great time, and hundreds of people turned out to take part.
We were going to try to take in the boat parade, but we never made it as far as the pier. We spent several hours walking around, taking in the sights, visiting the well-decorated shops and having a

light meal at Sea Sea Rider’s Restaurant.

Dunedin doesn’t mind blocking off the main street in the downtown area, and that’s what they did. They set up an area for face-painting for kids and another area for other crafts for kids. They had

a little gasoline-powered train that the kids seemed to love, and most of the downtown stores were open and highly decorated.

Of course, Santa Claus was there, too. When we went by he seemed to be having a little beard problem that required the assistance of Mrs. Claus.

All in all, a great night. It’s one of the many events that takes place during the year, and really makes Dunedin a wonderful place to live.

Tags: christmas, Dunedin

Growth in the future?

How can you predict where the most active real estate growth is likely to take place in the future?

In a down market like this one, it’s not exactly a science. But the Wall Street Journal recently wrote about that subject. And one of their sources was William Frey, who studies demographics at the Brookings Institution in Washington, DC.

Frey says Florida is a good bet for a real estate rebound, because immigrants and young people are likely to move to areas that have lower housing costs and good employment prospects. Using that yardstick, Frey likes Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas, Tennessee, Virginia, Nevada, Arizona and some interior sections of California.

He DOESN’T like Michigan, Ohio, the Dakotas, Iowa, western Pennsylvania and upstate New York.

Tags: growth