Pelican Bay Increases Transfer Fee

On Monday, May 19th, the Board of the Pelican Bay Foundation increased the transfer fee on purchases in Pelican Bay from $3,500.00 to $5,000.00.  The increase will take place on any real estate sales contracts written prior to June 30, 2008.

Considering all the properties that are for sale currently in Pelican Bay, I am not too happy with this decision.  I personally wish that the Board had not invested over two million dollars in buying a building to house our service personnel.  I think we would have been better served helping our service personnel find rentals in Naples.  The rental market has an abundance of rentals due to all those investors who bought units thinking they were going to flip the units.  Rental prices have decreased because of the competition.

There is also "talk" that the Board is thinking about eliminating the exemption of the transfer fee for owners in Pelican Bay purchasing within Pelican Bay.  Should you have an opinion on this, you might want to share it with our Board.  You can log onto www.PelicanBay.org and e-mail your opinion.

Turtle season began May 1st.  You will notice that there are no lights shining down on the beach from the restaurants in Pelican Bay as of that date.  Be advised that should you see an area of the beach roped off in what looks like yellow crime scene tape, do not touch that spot!  That's a turtle's nest!

The 1st Quarter of 2008 Florida Sales report has been released along with the April 2008 Naples Area Board of Realtors figures.  To view these statistics, click on Real Estate Reports.

The Gulf water temperature was reported at 86 degrees in the paper this morning.  If you are in town, I hope you are enjoying the beach!

If you are riding the tram down to the Sandpiper, you'll notice that our screech owl is back in its tree knot hole.  The owl is small and blends into the tree but if you look hard, you'll see it.

I recently calculated the statistics for Pelican Bay from January 1, 2008 - April 30, 2008.  The figures are in for Pelican Bay:

Low Rises - Condos with 1-3 floors

Mid Rises - Condos with 4-7 floors

High Rises - Condos with 8+ floors

You'll note on each one of these reports, you will see tabs at the bottom of the page.  If you click on those tabs, you will be taken to different report formats with all sorts of information.

LOW RISES IN PELICAN BAY

Let's take a look at those Low Rise statistics.  When you look at the average sale price, for the Closed Sales, you'll see $645,587.00.  Comparing that figure to the 2007 YTD Closed Sale averages, it appears that we had an increase in Closed Sale prices from the YTD 2007 figures.  Averages can be deceiving.  There was one closed low rise sale in Cannes that sold for $1,900,000.00.  Removing that sale from the equation leaves us with an average closed sale price that mirrors the YTD 2007 closed sale average of $574,816.00.  It appears that this season flat lined for Low Rises.

The good news is that only 49% of all the Low Rises are failing to sell compared with the YTD 2007 figure of 71%. Where is the bulk of the active listings?  Of the 121 active listings that are on the market, 42 are priced between $450,000.00 - $549,900.00.  What's selling?  Of the 19 closed sales, 8 have sold between $320,000.00 - $450,000.00.  What's not selling?  Of the 32 units that failed to sell, 13 were priced between $450,000.00 - $549,900.00.  Don't those numbers look familiar?  We still have about a 25 month inventory of  Low Rises on the market.

Even more interesting to me was that of the 19 closed sales, there were NO closed sales between $600,000.00 - $699,999.00. 

If you click on and take a look at the MSR tab at the bottom of the report, you'll see average prices broken down by bedrooms.  It appears that the prices of the active listings are still even higher than the prices of the expired (failed to sell) listings.  Sellers for low rises might need a reality check.

MID RISES IN PELICAN BAY

Mid Rises also had a large closed sale of $1,800,000.00.  Only 18% of all Mid Rises are failing to sell.  Of the 9 closed sales, 3 of them were between $450,000.00 - $499,999.00.  The average market time for closed sales comes in at 193 days, while the average market time for active listings comes in at 236 days.  Please note that I did not include the condo hotel units in these figures.

HIGH RISES IN PELICAN BAY

High Rises are up from the 2007 YTD figures.  This market has a 22 month inventory at present.  While the number of units that failed to sell are up over YTD 2007 figures, the pending sale average prices are higher than the active listing prices.  The largest bulk of the closed sales are between $2,000,000.00 - $2,999,999.00.  The average time for active listings is 208 days compared to closed sales at 193 days.  The largest bulk of active listings are 2+Den units, while the largest bulk of sold listings are 3+Den units.

In my opinion the numbers seem to be suggesting that Low Rises may still come down a bit and I mean a bit not a ton in price.  If you are a seller that wants to sell their Low Rise unit in Pelican Bay, discuss your listing price with your Realtor.  If you are a buyer WAITING to purchase in Pelican Bay, JUST BUY IT. Stop waiting.  You have a dynamite selection of properties to choose from right now.  Should you wait, you might not be able to find your piece of paradise in Pelican Bay.

Here is sunset at the Sandpiper Restaurant in Pelican Bay. 

Today's open house at 400 Lambiance Cir #202 was pretty steady.  99% of the people coming through were working with a Realtor or have been looking at real estate in Pelican Bay for years.  I did meet a nice couple from Chicago land.  They had never seen Pelican Bay before and I enjoyed showing them the amenities that Pelican Bay has to offer.

Speaking of amenities.......yesterday my husband and I headed down to the Sandpiper Restaurant at the beach in Pelican Bay for a late lunch.  We just made it to the restaurant before they stopped serving.  It was a crystal clear day.

As we were eating our lunch, we spotted FOUR manatees out in the Gulf.  I wish I had a better camera with me than my cell phone. That would have made a great photo!

After lunch, the Gulf water was actually warm enough for us thin skinned Floridians to go in for a swim.  The photo below was taken with my cell phone but you can see how clear the water was yesterday.

As I sat in my open house today, my first question to all the people who came through was, "Are you familiar with Pelican Bay?"  Unless someone is familiar with all Pelican Bay has to offer, they may have a hard time justifying the prices of real estate.

Naples has many beautiful places to live.  If you are a "beach" person, you many want to consider the community of Pelican Bay.

Today, April 13th,  I will be holding an open house at 400 Lambiance CIR #202 in L'Ambiance in Pelican Bay.  This unit is a rarely available C-2 unit with marvelous lake and waterscape views from the grand salon and kitchen. The lovely unit has a great room floor plan that lends itself to carefree entertaining. Two sets of sliders off the grand salon lead to a spacious lanai with a Jenn Air grill.   There is 1967 sq. feet under air, 3 bedrooms, 2 baths and a 1 car attached garage.

If you owned this unit, you could be enjoying this view AND the beach at Pelican Bay!

If you are a Pelican Bay resident and have Comcast high speed Internet and/or Digital Plus services are eligible for a rebate.  There are only 7 days left to obtain your rebate.  Check out rebate information to find out how to obtain this rebate, sign in to www.PelicanBay.org, tune in channel 96 or call the Foundation at 239-596-6180.

The Naples area has FINALLY been receiving some rain.  After all the years I lived in Chicago, I never thought I'd be happy about a rainy day.  Even with this rain, we're still behind rain totals for last year.

Last night we had a lovely dinner at the Sandpiper with relatives of ours in from Colorado.  I have to say the Sandpiper was pretty busy for a Monday night in April.  Even though we did not see a spectacular sunset, the food was delicious and the company great.

It's now official!  The new Pelican Bay Foundation board members are Mike Coyne, Doug Esson and Robert Pendergrass.

According to an e-mail that was sent out to Foundation members by Gerhard Seliatnigg, there was a delay in the election results due to a discrepancy between the number of shares voted on three separate reports.  It was determined that the discrepancy was a presentation error not a tabulation error.  54% of the Foundation board members voted in this election.

I wish the best to our three new board members.

The Pelican Bay Foundation has recently sent out a survey to randomly selected property owners.  This survey asks questions on how owners use the amenities in Pelican Bay, how often they use these amenities, and which amenities they feel are most important to them.  It is a detailed survey that will take you a bit of time to fill out.  When you recieve this survery, please try to take the time to express your opinion.  It is important the Foundation understands how the amenities are being used and which amenities are important to our home owners.

Our Gulf water temperatures are finally starting to warm up.  Once the water finally hits 82 degrees, you will find me enjoying the water.  Living here full time has spoiled me.  I actually love the Gulf in the summer time!  There is nothing like taking a dip in the warm Gulf waters after a long day of showing houses.  Forget the saying "Calgon take me away"!  I like the saying "De-stress at the beach in Pelican Bay"!

Pelican Bay will be having it's annual meeting on April 7th, 2008 at 10:00 AM in the Community Center in Pelican Bay at 8960 Hammock Oak.  All Pelican Bay owners are encouraged to attend this meeting.

Recently an e-mail was sent from the Pelican Bay Foundation announcing the results of the vote for the new leadership of the Foundation.  This e-mail was sent in error.  According to the Foundation the new board members will be announced at the meeting on April 7th.  Apparently there was an error in the vote count.

Have you signed up to receive e-mail from the Foundation?  If you are not in residence year round, you may want to do so.  You can register your e-mail address by signing into www.PelcianBay.org  If you are confused as to how to register, owners can call the Foundation at 239-596-6180 the Foundation will walk you through the process.

Some of our Pelican Bay residents may be aware that our Collier County Commissioners are trying to build a pier at the Vanderbilt Beach access.  People have asked me my opinion is of the Vanderbilt Pier project.  I have to say that I am not in favor of building this Pier.  My main reason for being against it is that we already have parking problems in that area.  Where do the commissioners think people are going to park?  I would encourage you to e-mail everyone on the Board of Collier County Commissioners your opposition to this project.

Sunsets are occurring around 7:45 PM now.  There is not much that beats a sunset at the Sandpiper or Sandbar restaurants.

2007 YTD Pelican Bay Market Statistics

Have you been sitting on the sidelines waiting to buy that home in Pelican Bay?  Are you thinking of moving up in Pelican Bay but concened what you will receive for your home?  I have spent some time calculating the statistics for all the home styles in Pelican Bay, and here they are!

LOW RISES IN PELICAN BAY

Let’s just look at Low Rises for a moment. With 71% of all low rise listings failing to sell, that tells me that there are a lot of unmotivated sellers on the market. A buyer will have to find the 29% that “want to” sell. There were 20 Low Rise 3 bedroom units that sold in Pelican Bay last year with an average selling price of $589,840.00. If a buyer was to see a 3 bedroom unit priced at $549,900.00, they should recognize that it could be priced below market depending on size, view, condition etc. Should they want to see if the market will come down…………..NO!