Never been to florida, but saw some very beautiful florida pictures where houses are surrounded by waterways (not sea) similar to those in the gold coast Aus. Can you pls provide some addresses where I can find them?
You can find those intracoastal communities in South Florida on both coasts. Ft. Lauderdale on the East Coast and Naples (and surrounding communities) on the Gulf side.
Where I live in Central Florida we have a pretty extensive chain of lakes for boating, and there's some pretty bad ass scenery. Here's a pic took from the boat the other day...
Aren't there crocodiles and snakes in the waters? Also, given the badass hurricanes etc, the insurance and maintenance costs quite high?
It's horrible in florida. You all come down here, you'll be eaten by crocs and your house will be blown away by a hurricane, stay away. Stupid people aren't allowed in florida, there are too many already...
I see those houses in florida are similar to goldcoast (waterways, sunshine, beaches), but we can SUP in the waterways/rivers no worry and the water is cleaner. Those in florida look muddy
Most of the Gators and snakes hang out closer to the shores. I've been wakeboarding a thousand times and have never personally seen any reptiles in the deep waters. My house is concrete block with a clay tile roof, so it has held up through the hurricanes really well. Maintenance wise, the biggest expense is just the constant landscape pruning. Everything grows like a weed here, especially during the spring and summer.
Condo HOA charges are something like $600 a month, plus property taxes and insurance, annual holding cost for a nice but not spectacular condo amounts to $15-20k. Even able to rent it out, the yield is gonna be low single-digit, add the depreciation and occupancy risk, the buy-to-let game doesn't seem to make much sense.
I was recently in Kisimee davenport area they advertise buy now and rent it to vacationers till you are ready to move full time.We rented a 4 bedroom house for 1200 for the week and spoke with a few of the home owners about 30% of the homes in the area are vacation rentals .I don't know if this helps .
If your condo is near a tourist area, you'll able to rent it out for significantly more money than you would otherwise. People will pay top dollar for a week in a condo in a desirable area, and by that I mean you could get an entire month's worth of expenses covered just by renting it one week a month.