Don't see why
 

Does anyone know why the homes in this area are built without basements ??

probably because they would be more appropriately referred to as swimming pools:1rotfl::1rotfl::1rotfl:

Florida has a layer of limestone. Limestone is very difficult to dig thru.

When we put in our pool, Broward County, we wanted it to be at least 7 feet deep so we could have a diving board.

The pool company explained to us that they hit a limestone ledge while attempting to dig the hole and made it to 5 1/2 feet.

They informed us it would cost big $$$ for them to dig thru the limestone, so we gave up the diving board and ended up with a 5.5 foot deep end.

I don't know of anywhere in Florida homes are built with basements. I had once lived in Pensacola about 100 yards from the airport, very near the left edge of this photo. Pensacola has very high cliffs along the bay and the airport even though it's just off the bay it has an elevation of 121' and no one had cellars, but we did have a pool with a diving board. For comparison the Ocala Airport elevation is 89'. I had even lived once about 40 miles north of Atlanta in Cumming, GA which has an elevation of over 1200' and no one had basements. Just guessing you would probably need to go to about Asheville, NC to find basements. Besides the problems with the soil, it's also just the way things have always been done. Like single story ranch homes, masonry block construction, basements not really.

http://www.cbre.us/o/orlando/AssetLi...aterBZ_600.jpg

Soil types...either sandy and/or limestone...and typically rather shallow water tables. Not good conditions for basements in most areas of Florida.

Basements
 

15 years ago or so, they were selling new homes with basements somewhere behind the Lake Square Mall in Leesburg.

Water Table
 

Water intrusion is the big reason. Near the extensive coastline, and around the thousands of lakes, the water table is very high. The hydraulic pressure is so great that there is even great risk in emptying a swimming pool for replastering the surface. The hydraulic pressure sometimes pops the pool out of the ground. This same pressure would act against the walls of a basement, causing leaks and destruction of anything in the basement.

I was in a basement several times in a house in the spiritual camp of Cassadaga .