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You otter live in Dunedin!

You probably know by now that I like Florida’s birds, and I can’t help taking pictures of birds of all types when I come across them in my travels throughout Pinellas County.

But birds aren’t the only wildlife you are apt to see when you drive through Palm Harbor, Oldsmar, Dunedin or other parts of Pinellas County.

This morning I was in a Dunedin neighborhood, and I noticed some loud splashing in a creek that ran behind some houses near the Dunedin Community Center. I walked over to investigate, and saw two otters frolicking in the water.

After I watched them for a few minutes, I realized there were more than just two — there were four in all, splashing in the creek and then chasing each other around one of the backyards.

There’s all kinds of wildlife in Pinellas County, and you usually don’t have to travel very far to find them.

Tags: Dunedin, Florida, otters, pinellas county, real estate, real estate for sale

Buy that Pinellas home with down payment dollars from the state

Florida's old state house

A few posts ago I discussed how some states were finding ways to provide that $8,000 federal home purchase tax credit BEFORE the sale of the home, so buyers could use the tax credit money as a down payment. I said that about 10 states had come up with programs to make that happen, most of them variations on bridge loans.

One state, Missouri, put several million dollars ina pot, and then advanced funds to homebuyers who qualified for the federal tax credit. The buyers could use the state’s money for the down payment, then pay it back when the tax credit check came in the mail. Other state programs were variations on that same theme.

At the end of the post, I asked if you thought the state of Florida should come up with a similar program and, if you did, that you might want to get in touch with your state legislator and say so.

Well, no sooner did I write that post but the Florida Legislature approved its own program.

The Legislature adjourned yesterday (Friday), but before it did it passed a bill providing $30.1 million that can be used for down payments by homeowners. The program goes into effect July 1, and the money will be distributed to qualifying homebuyers (that is, homebuyers who qualify for the federal $8,000 tax credit) by county housing housing administrators.

Details are still being worked out, and I’ll keep you up to speed as that process moves forward. But don’t let the lack of down payment money stand between you and the purchase of a Pinellas County home.

Tags: Add new tag, down payment, Florida, pinellas, tax credit

Florida may get high-speed rail system

Anyone who has been reading this blog in the past few weeks knows that I’m turning into a big fan of light rail transportation. I’ve always had some interest in the idea of light rail trains, but I got even more inspired when I saw stories about the new light rail train system in Phoenix.
A few weeks later, I was in Baltimore and found that I could travel from Baltimore-Washington Airport to downtown Baltimore on that city’s light rail system. It was fast, clean and really cheap. I loved it.
Now I see that the Obama Administration has unveiled plans for high-speed rail service in 10 different regions of the country. And guess what — Florida is one of them!
Now, what Obama envisions is a bit different than the light rail system I dream about for the Tampa Bay area. This plan would link more far-flung cities rather than local communities. But that’s okay with me — if we get a high-speed system in Florida, I think our chances would be really good for a link-up to a new light rail system that could encircle the Tampa Bay communities.
Obama says a high-speed rail system could help unsnarl airport traffic and lighten the loads on our highways. If you have ever tried to drive on I-4 between Tampa Bay and Orlando and then on to Florida’s East Coast, you quickly get the idea.
I can’t count the number of times I’ve had to sit on I-4 while wreckers and police worked to clean up the mess of serious highway accidents somewhere up ahead. I-4 is over-used and under-built in most areas, and speeding cars roaring along in thick packs run into each other with alarming regularity.
 Obama said the plan would use $8 billion in his stimulus package which would be spent over two years. The money would serve as a sort of down payment to get the rail projects started. Then $1 billion would be spent each year over the next five years to move the projects forward.
He says the U.S. Department of Transportation could start awarding funds as early as the end of summer. I think Florida has  a good chance of being an early recipient of those funds — the state has been involved in planning a high-speed rail system since 2001, so we may be a bit ahead of other states.

Tags: Florida, high speed rail, real estate

Homeowners’ insurance; relief is on the way?

Okay, first of all — sorry, sorry, sorry for being away so long. It seemed like the holidays were just too demanding of my time this year, and, between that and the usual work demands, there just didn’t seem to be any blogging time at all. Soooo, I took a bit of a hiatus. Hope you didn’t miss my chatterings too much. Anyway, I’m back…

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It looks as though we may be on the verge of getting some much-needed homeowners’ insurance relief. And it seems that we have our new governor, Charlie Crist, to thank for that.

When he was running for governor, Crist said that the insurance companies were profiteering and they needed to change their ways if they were going to keep doing business in Florida. This past month, Crist told the Legislature that they needed to get serious about reforming homeowners’ insurance, and it looks like lawmakers might have used a one-week special legislative session to good advantage. As of yesterday, it looked as though they might actually pass legislation that contains some teeth, telling the companies that they have to write homeowners’ coverage if they want to sell other types of insurance in Florida.

Basically, the packages that the legislature is considering shifts more hurricane risk to homeowners and to the state and away from the companies. Not ideal, but I imagine we’ll support anything that gets rates out of the stratosphere.

We’ll see what happens in the coming days…

Tags: Charlie Crist, Florida, insurance

Baby Boomers will still come to Florida

Florida’s real estate market may have slowed up, but it still has an undeniably rosy future. That according to Richard Hokenson, a former Wall Street economist who spoke last week in Tampa Bay.

Hokenson stated the obvious during his speech, saying that the huge tidal wave of Baby Boomers coming up on retirement will ensure a healthy real estate marketplace in Florida over the long term.

“There’s a baby boom tsunami and a fixed supply of coastal land,” Hokenson told his audience.

What’s the biggest threat to retiring baby boomers’s plans for the future? Hokenson says it’s their ability to get rid of what he called “NIKES” — No Income Kids with Education.

Tags: baby boomers, Florida

Tax rates likely to come down in Citrus County, too

Remember that post a few days ago that said increasing property values in Pasco County would probably result in a lowered tax rate? Well, now the same thing is happening a couple of counties north of Pasco, in Citrus County.

According to Citrus County Property Appraiser Melanie Hensley, this year’s total county property value, $10.46 billion, is 22 percent higher than last year’s value. So county commissioners will be looking at a lower tax rate, probably sometime in July.

No word yet from Pinellas County, but we will probably see a downward tax rate adjustment here, too, if the experiences in other nearby counties are any indication.

Tags: Add new tag, Florida, taxes