You laugh, but clouwho makes a valid point.
When looking at the increase in price of resales, what is often overlooked is the cost of upgrades. When the houses were originally sold, they were "bare-bones", at least most of them. Minimal landscaping, no plantation shutters, no crown molding. Carpeting throughout.
Many people invested 10s of thousands of dollars on various upgrades, along with paying off 20K or so of bonds.
Yes, the market has gone up, but when you add in those other costs, it negates a considerable amount of that "profit".

Here are some facts. We bought in 2012 for $190K. Just a few weeks ago, a neighbor with the same model as ours sold for $387.5, nearly double our purchase price. Their house was sold turnkey, but had no upgrades other than a screen porch where the lanai was. Ours has a full Florida Room (under air, a complete room) where the lanai was, and has upgrades in flooring, countertops, and appliances, so I think ours is more than comparable to the one that sold. Too bad we have no intention of moving!

That is one persons opinion, I have no idea who he is. Not that I totally disagree. But here is the thing you are missing - 2/3 of buyers in TV are CASH buyers - no mortgage. they don't care. Many times they are moving from areas where they got a lot of money for their house. That said, interest rates WILL have an effect as housing price escalation abates in the north and west. However, DEMAND is not going down anytime soon, especially in Florida with 10000 people retiring a day, and more and more remote workers wanting to live in income tax free Florida.

We are all paying for the fact we have underbuilt for over 10 years so demand is way higher than supply, and we are in an inflationary environment that we all know the cause of (elections have consequences).

However, I think interest rates are going WAY higher, like mortgages over 7% a year from now, they will have to be to slow down inflation. So the housing will slow down but there is no bubble.

My prediction? No drop in prices, but only 5% a year price inflation in TV. Kind of more back to normal.

I agree on all your points. Plus, this market is nothing like what was going on in 2008. It's strictly too much demand and not enough supply.
It's like this all over the country. But Florida is even more extreme since there's so many boomers retiring and wanting to move to warmer weather. And as you said, more poeple than ever are retiring early.

We're trying to downsize here in Indiana since we'll be in TV for 5 or 6 months a year. We have people wanting our house now but we're struggling to find a smaller place. Very few on the market.

Higher interest rates will have some effect and I think prices may cool off some, but not a lot. In my opinion.