Well, the house is now officially on the market, and for far less than we paid for it at the end of 2005. The real estate industry did us all a massive disservice by standing by and cheering on the real estate bubble. Realtors were getting rich quick and no one cared to step back and wonder what would happen in the future. Even Miami real estate, which is generally a hot market in the state, is tanking.

On top of all the losses people are taking, what about the young, new families who just want to buy their first starter home? SOL and all that, I suppose.

And so now the countdown begins. Will our house sit on the market a year and a half, or will it sell quickly. Put up some prayers for us, will you?

This post serves mostly as a venting session for me. The real estate market is so amazingly frustrating. I know we bought this house at the absolute tip top of the market high. It could not be helped. We were transferred here when we were transferred. And, my ex would not consider renting for a bit. So, here we are in a situation where we will not even be able to ASK close to what we paid for this monster. It’s beyond irritating. It is disheartening. I resent all the factors that gave that whole false inflation in the real estate market. We all knew what was happening, but we let the powers that be push it until it was at an almost mythical crescendo. Insane.

I want to represent another aspect of real estate in Florida and how it is doing as an investment. Florida is an incredible vacation destination. I happen to live near Tampa, but not close enough to the water to consider using our home as a vacation rental.

I have a couple of friends, though, who live in the Orlando area. They work at Disney, in fact. They obviously live in a location where people from all over the world are looking for a typical Florida rental vacation home with a pool and the luxury of staying in a place that doesn’t feel like a hotel. They have been able to pick up a couple of homes in the past couple of years in the pre-building stage and have turned them into very successful vacation properties. They can demand high fees, because they are near the parks and cater mostly to Europeans who book lengthy stays. So, not all aspects of the market are dead in the water.

The news about putting our house on the market is not looking good. The housing market is not doing well anywhere, but the luxury home market is suffering even more and this house is definitely in that category. When we bought the house, I thought we were going to live here long enough that appreciation would be a simple truth. But, with the divorce we have to sell. The plan was for me to stay here this past year while I was back in school. We though the market might correct enough in that time that we would be able to get what we needed out of the house. But, here it is a year later and things are absolutely not any better.

So, a broker is coming through to look at things tomorrow and I really want to try and put this all out of my mind and let me ex deal with it. I know it isn’t the best idea to allow myself to call this whole thing a loss, but with all the struggles I have been through in the past year and half, I just want my worries to go away. I know we will end up taking a loss. I also know that the longer this house is on the market is just more time I am still financially connected to my ex. And, that is just not comfortable.

The fantasy that all real estate is a good investment is just so utterly false. We did great on our past two homes, because we hit the market at just the right times. It enabled us to buy this huge house in this amazing neighborhood. But, the need to sell now is going to put both of us financially back where we were before we ever bought our first home together.