South Florida housing turns marginally more affordable, university real estate index shows

Housing across South Florida is becoming slightly more affordable, according to the latest housing affordability index from FIU and Florida Atlantic University (FAU). For the first quarter of 2019, the average mortgage payment in Miami-Dade accounted for 29.4 percent of average monthly income in the county, measuring an increase in affordability from last quarter’s score of 31.6 percent. The average property price traded at 6.07 times average annual income for the county, down from 6.23 for the previous quarter—another measure of increasingly affordable housing. More from FIU News.

Developer plans huge mixed-use apartment project in Brandon

The proposed Brandon Town Center will be less than a mile from the Westfield Brandon mall. An Atlanta company plans a 660-unit apartment community on one of the largest undeveloped parcels in fast-growing Brandon. Called Brandon Town Center, the project on 55 acres at the northeast corner of Brandon Parkway and South Lakewood Drive is to include three-story dwellings with one-to three-bedrooms and attached garages. It also will have 75,000 square feet of mixed-used buildings and stores. [Source: Tampa Bay Times]

New affordable housing opens in downtown Orlando

The development is the first to open in downtown’s larger Creative Village. Officials said that this will bring badly needed housing stock on the downtown market and lower overall rental rates in the area. The Creative Village is the site of the University of Central Florida downtown campus, which is set to open at the end of August. [Source: WOFL]

How a billion-dollar company could use a Florida law to force Tampa Bay seniors out of their condos

Condo owners in Palm Harbor's Lansbrook Village say they have been harassed and bullied in attempts to make them sell. When Deborah Berger and her husband, Barry, decided to downsize in 2007, they bought a condominium in Lansbrook Village that looks out on a nature preserve. Now in their 70s, the couple assumed that the condo would be their final home. But they and other owners — many of them seniors, some of them veterans — could be forced to sell because a billion-dollar company wants to convert all 774 Lansbrook units into lucrative rentals. [Source: Tampa Bay Timesl]

Southwest Florida REIA luncheon focuses on ‘ecology of real estate’

When you are looking for a house, location is key. One significant factor that draws people to move to Southwest Florida is the water. That is why real estate agents are monitoring any signs of blue-green algae or red tide. Coastal living is part of the appeal of Southwest Florida. But how our water looks and smells can either invite buyers or turn them away. [Source: WINK]

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Coral Gables investor Tony Blank sold his 8,700-square-foot, six-bedroom, seven-and-a-half bathroom waterfront home in the gated Journey’s End neighborhood for nearly $14 million.

› Brokerage firm rolling out Florida One program to boost collaboration amid $1.8B acquisition [Business Observer]
Even as it works on a corporate level to absorb former rival Holliday Fenoglio Fowler L.P. following a $1.8 billion acquisition earlier this month, commercial real estate brokerage firm Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. is rolling out a new initiative aimed at increasing collaboration between its Florida offices.

› Water Street Tampa starts work on 20-story office tower [Tampa Bay Times]
Water Street Tampa has started construction on downtown Tampa's first new "trophy" office tower in more than a quarter of a century, developers said Tuesday.