Southwest Florida housing market recalibrates as prices rise

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Southwest Florida faces a housing market that is still in recalibration mode after the COVID-19 pandemic, according to Florida Gulf Coast University’s September Regional Economic Indicators report.

Residential active listings were down 21% in July compared to the previous year. Between April to June of 2026, residential active listings fell by nearly 15%.

The shrinking housing availability was paired with a 3 to 11% rise in single-family median prices across three coastal counties. Home prices varied with the median price ranging from $355,000 in Charlotte County to $800,000 in Collier County.

The region has seen a rise in single-family building permits, which grew 9% over the year, the report said. But while Southwest Florida issued 8,276 single-family building permits in the first seven months of the year, that’s less than the number of permits it issued during the same period in 2025.

At the same time, sales for single-family homes increased by 13%. Sales peaked at 2,678 in April, which was the highest level of existing single-family home sales since 2022, the report found.

“Affordability remains a central challenge for Floridians, with heightened mortgage rates, insurance costs, and HOA fees stacking up,” the authors wrote. “Florida lawmakers are taking note, proposing a property tax reform that Florida residents will have the opportunity to vote on in November.”

The proposed tax reform dangles the possibility of increasing the non-school homestead tax exemption to $250,000, which has generated pushback from multiple local government officials and first responder associations, but polling shows high levels of support from voters.

While the housing market presents its challenges, other economic indicators like job growth show promise. Southwest Florida added 6,000 jobs from July 2025 to July 2026, up 1.1%. The Education and Health Services sectors saw the largest gains in employment.

The region’s unemployment rate declined slightly from 5.6% to 5% between April and June, though that’s still higher than the previous year.

Indicators related to tourism were mixed, with passenger airport traffic down 0.4% but improved seasonally adjusted real tourist tax revenues which reached $9.2 million in April, an improvement of 14%, the report said.

Florida’s Consumer Sentiment Index fell by 1.9 points in August. Tighter purse strings for consumers were evidenced by a decrease in seasonally adjusted taxable sales, which was down by 13%.

“Soft data available suggests that consumers and business owners continue to feel financial pressures,” the authors said. “National consumer sentiment was 49.5 in June 2026, down 11.2 points from June 2025 as elevated prices remain a source of frustration for consumers.”