House flipping profits flopped across the U.S. last year, but not in South Florida.
Driving the news: Single-family homes and condos flipped in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach area last year made profits over $100,000 on average, according to a new report from real estate data firm ATTOM.
- That’s up from the year prior, when the average home-flipping profit in our metro was $87,000.
The big picture: South Florida bucks the trend. Home flipping was popular across the U.S. last year, reaching its highest peak since at least 2005, per ATTOM. But while the number of flips was up, profits from flipping were down in most markets.
- Nationally, typical gross profit margin on home flips sank to $67,900, its lowest level since 2008.
What they’re saying: Mike Pappas, CEO of South Florida brokerage The Keyes Company, attributed home flippers’ success in South Florida to the market’s abundant old housing stock — homes that are now 40 or 50 years old and ripe for being renovated and flipped.
- He also noted that South Florida’s data might be skewed because of the strong market for luxury homes.
- “They’re buying million, million-a-half dollar homes, and then they’re reselling them for two-and-a-half million, so that may pull our average up.”
Zoom in: One waterfront lot on Pine Tree Drive in Miami Beach traded for $7 million in January 2021 and resold for $20 million 15 months later, the Real Deal reported.
State of play: Nearly 9,500 single-family homes and condos were flipped in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach metro area in 2022, comprising 7.6% of all home sales here.
- Only Atlanta, Dallas, New York, Los Angeles and Phoenix had more.
- Flips made up 8.4% of all home sales nationally, per the report.
By the numbers: Home flippers in South Florida bought properties for a median price of $315,000 and sold them for a median price of $416,000, securing a typical gross profit of $101,000 per flip.
- The most lucrative market? That was Salisbury, Maryland. The typical profit there was $254,750.
- Meanwhile, the lowest grossing profits were in Kansas City, Missouri ($26,963).
Of note: ATTOM analyzed sales deed data, defining single-family home or condo flips as “any arms-length transaction that occurred in the quarter where a previous arms-length transaction on the same property had occurred within the last 12 months.”
Context: The number of flips in South Florida was up 63.7% from 2021 but down almost 7% from a decade ago.
- Back during the real estate boom of 2005, South Florida led the nation in house flipping.
Between the lines: Pappas told Axios that the demise of iBuyers — companies that used algorithms to buy and resell homes online — was a big indication that flipping was challenging.
House flipping is still hot in South Florida
