International buyers spent $23.7 billion on single-unit residential real estate this year but largely bypassed Jacksonville.
The National Association of Realtors released a report that shows the Jacksonville-St. Augustine market with just 2 percent the sales from foreign buyers — a decrease from 3 percent in the previous 12 month period. The study gathered data starting in July 2014 and ending June 2015.
Foreign buyers bought 44,000 homes in Florida during that time period, spending on average $538,000 on each property. There were 880 homes bought by international buyers in the local area.
The number of homes sold in Florida to foreign buyers totaled 12 percent with 24 percent of all money spent on residential real estate by those buyers.
Other metro areas outperformed the Jacksonville-St. Augustine market.
Miami home sales had 36 percent of purchases, Fort Lauderdale had 14 percent, Orlando-Kissimmee had 8 percent and Tampa-St. Petersburg had 6 percent.
The data also demonstrated a shift in the international buyers as Canada’s purchases plummeted from 32 percent in 2014 to 11 percent in 2015.
Canada had been the International buyer of Florida residential real estate since 2008.
Latin America residential real estate transactions skyrocketed accounting for 56 percent of the purchases. Venezuela lead the way with 18 percent surpassing Canada for the top spot for International real estate purchases.
