Orlando Among Top-Ten Bargain Home Markets Says Forbes.com

In December 2008, Forbes.com published a list of the top ten cities where buyers can find a real estate bargain: Orlando was third on the list. While that may seem like a dubious honor for current Central Florida homeowners, author Matt Woolsey's comments were surprisingly positive.

Noting that "property sharks" are looking for the exact moment the real estate market bottoms out to grab the cheapest deal, Woolsey recommended looking for more than bargain prices. The smart move is to find an area where

• There are plenty of homes to choose from.
• The foreclosure rate is not too high.
• Projections for job growth are strong.

Orlando fills the bill for the smart home purchase. It stands out during this downturn because (a) it's adding new jobs at a much higher rate than many other Florida cities, and (b) it didn't experience the same highs during the real estate boom as other areas in the state and the country, so the market doesn't have as far to fall.

Woolsey said Orlando is one of three markets he considers "soft." The other two are Charlotte, North Carolina, and Jacksonville, Florida. None of these cities was hit as hard by bad loans as other areas of the U.S., and they're projected to have increases in employment which will help work through the inventory of homes for sale.

Choices for the top-ten list for bargain homes were based on statistics from the Bureau of Labor's 2006-2007 report on job growth, data on foreclosures from RealtyTrac, and vacancy rates from ZipRealty. While this data may seem outdated, it reflects what was happening prior to the escalation in home building with its related boom in employment and resulting overheated market. Woolsey also omitted cities who were losing jobs from the data he considered.

Fast jumps in payroll numbers and a high percentage of foreclosures are benchmarks of plummeting markets like Ft. Myers and Miami but are not representative of the Orlando area. Sellers in especially troubled markets in Florida tend to sell at below market prices driving prices down even further, but that doesn't mean they're steals. According to Woolsey, a buyer would be better served by shopping in an area which wasn't suffering from the earlier housing explosion and risky lending practices. For anyone yearning for the Florida lifestyle, Orlando is the perfect place to begin your search for a real value and a home you imagined owning only in your dreams.

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