Why are so many first-time homebuyers fleeing California? It’s not just the insane tax burden that is causing Californians to flee to Florida. Is it the politics or the mudslides? These may play a role, but they’re just the tip of the iceberg. Today, I’ll be addressing why SOOO many first-time home buyers are leaving California in favor of Florida, and I’ll be sharing the top 5 cities they’re moving to.

It’s true that soaring prices and high interest rates have slowed the purchases of many first-time home buyers, but a recent builderonline.com article helps to clarify the best and worst cities for them. They used a WalletHub study that compared all sorts of factors to determine the best places in America to live for first time home buyers.

First-time home buyers tend to be different than the overall real estate market as they tend to purchase more AFFORDABLE homes, which just isn’t what California does. So, if you can afford a several million-dollar mansion, then California might be the place for you, but it’s not for most first-time home buyers. I read that since 2020, California’s population has shrunk by over 500,000 people. With, like 1,200 people moving to Florida every day, Florida must be doing something right.

WalletHub’s study looked at things like home prices compared to local income and home insurance for affordability, rent-to-price ratio, days on market, foreclosure rates and, building activity for the real estate market, and they considered the weather, schools, job market, crime rates, and all sorts of things dealing with quality of life. Of course, things like overall affordability and quality of life aren’t just for first-time home buyers, but they play a role when a large portion, maybe a quarter, of all real estate sales are theirs.

So, where are these Californians moving to? Well, 5 of the top 10 cities are right here in Florida. Palm Bay, Cape Coral, Tampa, Port St. Lucie, and Orlando are the top 5 cities. The other five are in Arizona, Idaho, Virginia and Nevada. On the flip side, 9 of the top 10 WORST cities to live in are in California. I’ve been to California numerous times, and it’s beautiful there, but it’s expensive and they’ve apparently got some issues to deal with.

Orlando is the most inland of these top-5 cities in Florida. The good news for Orlando is that Orlando doesn’t have any beach-front properties, which are simply unavailable to most first-time buyers due to the high cost of beach-front real estate. As such, Orlando has plenty of options for first-time buyers, especially when considering that Orlando has a median sale price of well under $400,000 at the time of this video. Yes, that’s still a lot of dough to many of us, but that’s one reason so many Californians are coming to Florida.

Orlando’s suburbs have housing that is much more affordable than Orlando proper, and you can be under an hour from Disney, Universal and all the Orlando attractions, and still be just 30-45 minutes from the beach. Deltona, just 30 miles up I-4 has a median sale price that’s $50k or $60k LESS than Orlando.

If you’re considering a move to Florida from anywhere, give me a call or an email and I’d be happy to help.

Published on October 03. 2023 / Tags: Central Florida Real estate, florida, Florida Home Searches, Moving to Florida / no comments.