{"id":135631,"date":"2026-01-28T23:33:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-28T23:33:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/135631\/"},"modified":"2026-01-28T23:33:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T23:33:09","slug":"this-local-city-is-5th-highest-in-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/135631\/","title":{"rendered":"This local city is 5th highest in US"},"content":{"rendered":"

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. \u2014 For years, homeowners across Florida have voiced concerns about rising homeowners association fees, and new data shows those worries are well-founded.<\/p>\n

With everyday items costing more at the store, HOA fees are putting additional strain on household budgets. A recent analysis by Realtor.com<\/a> found that Florida home and condo owners face the heaviest HOA fee burden in the country.<\/p>\n

WATCH BELOW: Port St. Lucie ranked 5th highest for HOA fees in US, report says<\/p>\n

Port St. Lucie ranked 5th highest for HOA fees in US, report says<\/p>\n

The study looked at 300 metros in the U.S., calculating what percentage of the monthly principal and interest of median home listings that the typical HOA fee represents.<\/p>\n

Seven of the top 10 metro areas are in Florida<\/a>, and Port St. Lucie came in at fifth behind Miami, Panama City, Naples and Cape Coral. Sebastian\/Vero Beach was No. 9.<\/p>\n

WPTV spoke with homeowners in Port St. Lucie on Wednesday about their monthly HOA costs.<\/p>\n

“$450 a month,” one homeowner said they are paying.<\/p>\n

Another resident told us they pay even more due to multiple HOA fees.<\/p>\n

“I actually pay two, I pay one to my community and one to Tradition, so between the two it comes out to around $500 to $600 a month, so it’s a lot, it’s pretty steep,” said Kathy LaGrange, who moved to Port St. Lucie four years ago.<\/p>\n

Joel Berner, senior economist at Realtor.com, said the high fees weren’t initially expected when they began their analysis.<\/p>\n

“We just kind of randomly ran these numbers agnostically, but it turned into a Florida story pretty quickly when we looked at how high those HOA fees are,” Berner said.<\/p>\n

Berner attributes the steep costs to reforms following the Surfside condo collapse<\/a>, focusing on repairs and reserve funds. In Port St. Lucie, just under 19% of monthly mortgage payments go toward HOA fees.<\/p>\n

“I think people are doing the math, looking at what it would cost to buy a home in a new development and seeing those HOA fees really stacking up and that monthly cost,” Berner said.<\/p>\n

This year, state lawmakers have introduced several bills aimed at reining in or dissolving HOAs.<\/p>\n

Despite the costs, some homeowners see value in the services provided.<\/p>\n

“I can’t complain because I like not having to maintain yards, and common areas and that kind of thing, but if I didn’t have one I wouldn’t miss I could take care of the other stuff,” one resident said.<\/p>\n

Rising HOA fees, combined with increasing property taxes and insurance costs, continue to make living in Florida more expensive for homeowners.<\/p>\n

This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.<\/p>\n

Matt Sczesny is determined every day to help you find solutions in Florida’s coverage collapse. If you have a question or comment on homeowners insurance, you can reach out to him any time.<\/p>\n

\"Contact<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. \u2014 For years, homeowners across Florida have voiced concerns about rising homeowners association fees,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":135632,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[66446,65599,171,173,172,874,875,1402,876],"class_list":["post-135631","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-port-st-lucie","tag-highest-hoa-fees-in-florida","tag-hoa-fees","tag-port-st-lucie","tag-port-st-lucie-headlines","tag-port-st-lucie-news","tag-priced-out-of-paradise","tag-south-florida-real-estate","tag-st-lucie-county","tag-wptv-real-estate-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135631","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=135631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135631\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/135632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=135631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=135631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=135631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}