Ray Seaman

The intensity of Florida's post-pandemic housing boom correction is easing Softness—and even outright weakness—remains across parts of Florida’s housing market. However, the intensity of the downturn in Florida has eased over the past 6 months

The "fix everything now" button in housing is why I won't fund local planning capacity ideas Want more housing? Delete all R1-R4 zones, making R5 your base resi zone. Map C6-12 downtown + 0.25mi of rail. Oh wait you don't wanna do that? Oh bc it'd instantly end the shortage?

Honestly I feel like Lennar would actually do this.

When you're drinking in the south and someone pulls out an unlabeled Mason jar

Too real. If I wasn’t chasing my 16 month old around, I’d probably be planting blueberries.

@steveschale My version of this had a skylight in the loft space so it quite literally *cooked* all day. Utterly uninhabitable until about 10pm. Good times nonetheless!

Looks almost like my starter home in my 20s. Same exact layout.

Most Tallahassee housing stock inside Capital Circle (see also: Killearn).

You’re gonna ask me to personally guarantee this construction loan? On stolen land?

my wife and I are trying polyphasic sleep to keep our newborn alive 24/7

@steveschale @senpizzo Absolutely incredible merch

Rules question for ⁦@senpizzo⁩ - Assuming this is now ok to wear into the Capitol?

The battery lasted about 20 minutes but it was a glorious time.

There are huge tracts of FL where the median age is 60+. There are entire cities built more or less solely for the elderly, the jobs in those areas revolve around servicing them (healthcare, assisted living, recreation, transportation). In some ways, a glimpse into the future.

Good thing Congress isn't alive to see this.

One of the greatest charts I have ever seen

What’s especially disappointing is we’ve designed variations of simple box shaped homes forever that are also aesthetically pleasing while being economical. It doesn’t have to be this way.

It's time to restore @Amtrak service from Jacksonville to Mobile (via Tallahassee and Pensacola).

Year-over-year shift in home prices, by ZIP Code Map via @ResidentialClub

You could literally: - Open Wyoming LLC - Put house in LLC - Rent to yourself - Never pay taxes again for life - Get free room and board in federal prison Why aren't people doing this?

Your state capitol doesn’t have an alligator? Wouldn’t understand

This form is effectively blocked at every turn in the U.S. Let’s ignore zoning, code for now and just talk about development finance. For most projects that is 2 conversations - the construction loan that gets you to a filled building & “perm” debt that gets you to an acceptable yield. Construction loans are riskier. So the interest rate (and fees) reflect that. Meanwhile many lenders have a niche in what they mostly lend one. This one does a lot of medical. That one multifamily. This one strip centers. And so on. Know what niche no construction lenders like? Small mixed use buildings. Not one. So the only option for this type is a local oriented bank. Which means your list of possible lenders has shrunk to (maybe) 3 that will actually look at this kind of deal with any real interest. And since it’s an “atypical product” expect especially conservative underwriting and a heftier than normal amount of equity (cash) being required. What this means practically is you need a unicorn property that shows positive cash flow after getting the rent assumption beaten to death. Or to throw an obscene amount of equity into the project. Probably both. And of course if you’re doing small development it’s because you have tons of capital, right? Now - let’s say you find a unicorn lender. The next obstacle is the permanent financing. Because you won’t really make any money (or get some of that obscene equity amount back) until you can get out of that construction loan via refinance. Except there is no product for long amortization loans on something like this. If it’s multifamily you have a robust capital market via the GSEs offering low rate, 30 year loans. Often with long interest only periods, attractive debt ratio requirements, and all non-recourse. So we’re back to a short list of area banks with 20 year amortizations, higher debt coverage requirements, less of your own money back plus a personal guaranty that puts your home & all your assets on the hook. Once you understand how this works in practice it’s no wonder these don’t get built. You basically need to be a non-pragmatic wealthy person doing this as a vanity project with some potential upside. Far easier to just go build garden apartments wherever the land becomes cheap enough while still being a viable commute. They’ll lend you money on those easy.