Sarasota Livin'

I agree with the editorial in Friday's SHT wishing William Russell good luck. He starts next week as the new director of public housing for Sarasota. If public housing stays in "our faces" and doesn't go away and hide somewhere (where ever Janie Poe is...(I really know .. do you?) I am optimistic that we will come up with a reasonable solution.

Sarasota is a rich community blessed / cursed with "hyper-inflation" in housing prices as reported by the national media. Is it bad being second to Bradenton?? If you dig deep in the numbers you may find that the mix of sales that makes the "median" price go up so much include lots of new construction that is very high end. But I think it is the headline news that makes the low and middle ends go up faster than they should.

Sarasota's bigger problem is affordable / workforce housing. On the same editorial page there was a letter to the editor telling us that "in-law" housing is a solution to affordable housing. This solution like most things has good and bad. If it is built truly as in-law housing - built by a resident homeowner rented to a "low" income person (family member of not) it would be a good thing. If it is used to jack up the price of current houses because "speculators" can now buy a house - upgrade it a little and add a cheaply built "free-from zoning hassle" apartment and then double their money by selling to another "investor" that then rents "two units" --- neighborhoods lose because we just have more renters not interested in building up the neighborhood...

Who would have thought being popular could be such a problem...