As the Tampa Bay area marks another hurricane season, it’s a reminder of how the storms of 2024 reshaped the character of entire neighborhoods across the South Tampa area, making an already tight market even less affordable.
“The one-story ranch houses that I used to go in so much and sold to different people when I was in real estate are now all leveled, and we have a lot of vacant lots,” Penny Dewell of South Tampa said. “We have a lot of construction, a lot of trucks in the neighborhood, traffic jams. And yes, it has definitely changed the neighborhood.”
Dewell has lived in the Beach Park neighborhood of South Tampa for more than 60 years and said she’s seen a lot of changes. One of the biggest was the near destruction of her longtime home after the hurricanes Helene and Milton, which both hit in 2024. After she got about four inches of water in her home from Helene, her family acted quickly to get her belongings out ahead of Milton, which arrived less than two weeks later.
“When Milton came in that night, I got 20 inches, and it went above the electrical outlets. So, that was difficult,” she said. “We got a contractor, and they had to rebuild my house, and I had to move someplace for a year.”
In that time, others just like Dewell were making big decisions about their property – whether to stay or sell – in a market that was already seeing rapid change.
“South Tampa is very desirable because of the schools, because of proximity to downtown…” said Cristan Fadal, broker for Fidelio Company Real Estate. “And so, we’re getting more people coming from out of state as well. And so that’s driving that demand here.”
The demand accelerated after the 2024 hurricanes, turning an already desirable area into one increasingly more expensive. This continued a trend of older, more affordable homes being sold, demolished and rebuilt into newer, more expensive ones.
For example, a new construction home in the 500 block of W. Davis on Davis Islands that recently sold for $2.5 million was previously a one-story ranch-style home worth about $800,000, Fidal said.
Data from the Hillsborough County Property Appraiser shows that between October 2024, just after Helene and Milton hit, through December of last year, owners sold more than 1,300 homesteaded properties, making room for more shifts in the market.
“I sold real estate for 20 years. So, I have been into a lot of the houses in this neighborhood that now have been torn down, and that is sad,” Dewell said. “But they got flooded, and there were a lot of people that lost their houses, and they didn’t have a choice, and they had to move somewhere else. So, I’ve seen a lot.”
Real estate experts say not all the homes being rebuilt are being sold for millions of dollars, and there are still pockets of relative affordability in the area. However, as Tampa continues its pattern of redevelopment, the price of city living is expected to keep rising.
Emerald Morrow is an investigative reporter with 10 Tampa Bay News. Like her on Facebook and follow her on X. You can also email her at emorrow@10tampabay.com.