Is Florida housing tanking or holding steady? Comparing myths vs. facts

• Despite some national reports of a housing crisis, Florida's market saw a rise in home sales and a near-record median price in March.
• While foreclosure filings have increased year-over-year, they remain a small fraction of the levels seen during the 2010 housing crash.
• Experts argue that claims of plummeting demand are misleading, as the state's housing inventory and population have grown at a similar rate.
• Price reductions on some listings are often corrections from unrealistic asking prices set during the unsustainable COVID-era housing boom.

Some national reports depict Florida as a housing market in deep trouble with dire headlines declaring "Foreclosure filings jump," "Prices 'dropping hard,'" and "Florida (among) the biggest losers."

But the latest statewide home sales numbers released by the Florida Realtors association paint a much different picture: a housing market that saw sales of single-family homes rise 5.9% year-over-year in March with the fourth-highest ever median sale price of $420,000. The median means half sold for more and half for less.

"There are a lot of doom and gloomers out there who constantly post negative stories about Florida's housing market without context," said Brad O'Connor, chief economist for the Florida Realtors association. "While there are challenges in our housing market, plummeting demand is not currently one of them."

What is Florida's current housing market?

On April 16, ATTOM, the Irvine, California-based national property data website, reported that Florida had the nation's third-highest foreclosure rate, with an estimated 1 in every 2,124 housing units in some state of foreclosure in March, up 28% from a year ago.

South Carolina was No. 1 (1 in 1,996), followed by Indiana (1 in 2,122).

ATTOM defines foreclosure activity has properties where either a default notice has been issued, a foreclosure auction scheduled or where a bank repossessions has taken place.

"The rankings aren't wrong in saying that foreclosures in some parts of Florida are higher than in other parts of the country," said O'Connor, "but context matters. We're nowhere close to where things were in 2010."

The ATTOM report noted that Florida had a total of 4,929 foreclosure filings in March out of more than 10.25 million housing units. That works out to less than half of one percent.

According to a Duke University study, when Florida's housing market crash hit rock bottom in early 2010, foreclosures in the Sunshine State accounted for one in every five homes.

"It's a small fraction of the number of distressed sales we saw back then," O'Connor said of the number of foreclosures in Florida this past March compared with 16 years ago, even with the latest year-over-year increase.

Does Florida have an oversupply of housing?

Fortune magazine published an article on April 21 with the headline: "The tables have turned: Florida and Texas are the biggest losers in the housing market as Ohio emerges a surprise winner."

The article went on to state: "Every major Florida and Texas metro (that real estate website) Redfin tracks is now a buyer's market."

It backed up that assertion by quoting Lance Lambert, founder of the Cincinnati, Ohio-based property data analytics firm ResiClub, who said: "In Texas, Florida and Colorado, active inventory solidly exceeds pre-pandemic 2019 levels. ... That means home prices will decrease or remain flat."

Does the increase in active listings in Florida, compared with 2019, mean there's an oversupply of available homes?

Consider the facts: The number of single-family homes, townhouses and condominium units on the market statewide in March 2019 totaled 156,204, according to historical data provided by the Florida Realtors association.

In March 2025, the total number of active listings on the market statewide was 171,045, a 9.5% increase over the past six years.

How much has Florida's population grown in recent years?

The Sunshine State's population during that same time period grew from 21.49 million in 2019 to 23.46 million in 2025 (a 9.1% increase from 2019). Florida's population is projected to grow to 23.76 million this year, based on the forecast made at the Florida Demographic Estimating Conference in December.

If that prediction holds true, the state's population will have grown by 9.5% over the past six years.

Another way of evaluating whether Florida has a glut of homes on the market is to look at the state's overall housing market vacancy rate. During the Great Recession, which coincided with a housing market crash in Florida, the housing vacancy rate for the state peaked at 5.1% in 2007, according to historical U.S. Census Bureau data found on the website for the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED).

In 2019, the housing vacancy rate for Florida was 1.8%. In 2025, it was 2.2%, equal to what it was in 2018.

"Florida's inventory levels are actually on the decline," said O'Connor, noting that the number of single family homes and townhouses/condos on the market in March of this year was down 10.8% from the 191,754 active listings the same month last year. "This directly contradicts claims that Florida's housing market is in a freefall.

"If we look back at 2008, when Florida home prices did begin to see substantial declines, Florida's inventory level was north of 385,000 active listings. That's more than double (125%) compared to where inventory levels are at right now."

Are Florida home prices really 'dropping hard'?

Newsweek.com published a story on April 18 with the headline: "Florida Homes Selling at $100K Discount as Prices 'Dropping Hard.'"

The article based its claim on recent reductions in asking prices for a number of homes on the market throughout Florida. "As of Friday morning (April 17), there were 57,569 properties for sale on Zillow that had their listing price slashed by sellers."

The example it used was a luxury home on the market "in Spring Hill, Pasco County" (Spring Hill is actually in Hernando County) that was currently listed on Zillow with an asking price of $1,995,000. The article noted that it was originally listed in May 2025 with an asking price of $2.75 million. According to Zillow, the listing has had four price reductions that add up to a total decrease of $755,000 from its original asking price.

"Prices are dropping hard in Florida," the article quoted "real estate expert" Nick Gerli as saying.

Gerli is the founder of Reventure App, a Nashville, Tennessee-based website that describes itself as "a data-driven real estate platform focused on analyzing where the U.S. housing market is actually heading." Gerli in the article went on to say, "There is no improvement in buyer demand in Florida from the downturn that started in 2024. ... Buyer demand in Florida, especially in metros like Tampa and Orlando, is still in the basement."

Again, context matters, according to Brenden Rendo, an Orlando area Realtor with NextHome Neighborhood Realty, who was also quoted in the Newsweek article.

"It all depends on what you're measuring it against," he told USA TODAY NETWORK-FLORIDA, when asked if he agreed with the claim that Florida home prices are "dropping hard."

"I bought my house for $275,000 in 2018," the Altamonte Springs Realtor said. "I could have sold it for $500,000 on paper in 2022-2023. Right now, I could probably sell it for $450,000. Am I upset? No. I'm so far ahead in the game, why would I be upset?"

There was a Covid housing boom in Florida

The problem, Rendo said, is some people still expect the super-charged housing market conditions that Florida experienced from mid-2020 through late 2022 when median sale prices of single-family homes rose by double-digit percentage increases for 28 consecutive months. Those price gains culminated with a 27.3% year-over-year spike in July 2021.

That so-called "COVID housing boom" was fueled by a surge in newcomers moving to Florida, in part to escape more stringent lockdown conditions in other states, particularly the Northeast and California, during the pandemic.

Home sales also spiked during that period, culminating with a 59.6% year-over-year increase in May 2021 when 30,932 homes changed hands. The 34,165 closed sales of single-family homes recorded the next month, while only up 23.6% year-over-year, remains the all-time record for the state, according to Florida Realtors association data.

"I had one house that received 35 offers in one hour," said Rendo in recalling how "stupid" hot the Florida housing market got during the COVID boom.

While that's no longer the case, "houses are still going quickly if they're clean and priced right," said Rendo, who co-hosts a weekly podcast called "The Orlando Real Estate Buzz" with Joseph Dionne of Appli Home Loans in Orlando. "The problem is that some sellers are pricing homes as if it's still 2022, not 2026."

Rendo said some would-be sellers have unrealistic expectations when setting asking prices that are much higher than comparable neighboring homes. "They say, 'Let's bump it up $10,000 and let's see.' I have to tell them, No, we're not going to 'just see.'"

Jennifer Waldo, a Realtor with eXp Realty in New Smyrna Beach, said the popularity of reality television shows about house flippers and house hunters have also contributed to creating unrealistic expectations on the part of both buyers and sellers.

"I tell them (sellers), 'You can list it for whatever you want, but if it's not in line with their comps (what comparable homes in the area are selling for), it's just going to sit there," she said, adding, "It's a hard argument to have."

As for prospective buyers, Waldo said, "I get a lot of calls from people interested in flipping homes in the $100,000 range. I have to tell them, 'That is not even a thing right now.'" Property flipping is where a house is purchased to be quickly resold for a profit.

While the Florida real estate market has definitely cooled from the red-hot state it was in during the pandemic, it is also nowhere close to cratering, said Rendo and other Realtors who spoke with USA TODAY NETWORK-FLORIDA.

Waldo held an open house the weekend of April 25-26 for a new listing she put on the market the previous week in Port Orange: a three-bed, two-bath housing built in 2003 with 1,922-square-feet of living space and a pool that was added in 2023.

The current owners bought it in 2018 for $259,900, according to property records. Their asking price is $430,000.

"Saturday was very busy," she said. "I got there at 11:30 (a.m.) for a noon to 2 (p.m.) showing. There were already four families waiting to see it. Total I probably had seven to 10 families. All local. Two were first-time homebuyers, two were secondary buyers and a couple were looking for homes with a pool."

Even though some sellers are having to reduce their asking prices, "they're definitely not selling at a loss unless they purchased their home at too high a price during the COVID boom," said Waldo.

There's a big difference between now and the early 2000s 'bubble years'

One of the big differences between current Florida housing market conditions and what it was like during the so-called real estate bubble years in the early 2000s that led to the Great Recession is that there were a lot of subprime loans and people buying homes with adjustable rate mortgages back then, according to O'Connor. That is no longer the case as most homeowners today have fixed-rate mortgages.

"I'm not out here trying to say that the golden days are just around the corner," he said. "What we are seeing is an adjustment from what was an unusual period (the COVID housing market boom). And even though foreclosures may be up year-over-year, our foreclosure rate in a historical context remains tiny. Regarding reports insinuating that Florida's housing market is going to crash, there's nothing in any of the data that would indicate that."

Chuck Bonfiglio, the Florida Realtors association's 2026 board president, is the broker-owner of AAA Realty Group in South Florida.

"A lot of the talk about price drops ignores where we came from," said Bonfiglio. "After years of rapid appreciation during the pandemic, some price moderation is both expected and healthy. When we look at Florida as a whole, we're seeing prices start to level out, rather than swing wildly in either direction. That's what we want to see.

"And while buyer activity isn't at the fever pitch of a few years ago, which frankly wasn't sustainable, demand has been consistently rebuilding. Today's buyers have the time and space to make informed decisions, not rushed ones."

Clayton Park is a journalist for the USA TODAY NETWORK FLORIDA. He covers everything from insurance, utilities and home prices to groceries, gas and auto prices as the Florida consumer pocketbook reporter. If you have news tips, please send them to [email protected]. You can get all of Florida's best content directly in your inbox each weekday by signing up for the free newsletter, Florida TODAY, at https://news-journalonline.com/newsletters.