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Even as the lower end of the real estate market remains stuck in limbo, there’s never been a better time to broker real estate deals in the glitzy world of Miami luxury.
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And for agents of the rich and famous, the future may look even brighter along the Florida coastline, a real estate analytics expert argued this week.
Sales in certain classes of high-end, single-family homes in prime Miami locations were up from the first quarter of last year, reaching an all-time high that was seven times their pre-pandemic transaction counts, Analytics Miami founder Ana Bozovic told Inman On Tour conference attendees Tuesday. Newly constructed luxury condo sales were also booming.
“There’s just a whole ’nother reality happening at the very high end,” Bozovic said, “and it’s separated itself from the rest of the market.”
Analytics Miami founder Ana Bozovic briefs Inman On Tour attendees on the Miami luxury market. (Photo by Mike Nyffeler with AJ Canaria Creative Services)
And Bozovic sees this dynamic continuing indefinitely.
An increasingly disparate interstate tax environment is expected to drive even more wealth from high-tax strongholds like New York and California into the waiting arms of Florida and Texas, Bozovic said.
“Nothing is forever,” she said. “New York was the capital of the 20th century world; before that it was London; before that it was Amsterdam. There’s always an inevitable shift in focus.”
On top of that economic shift to places like Florida and Texas, she said that general wealth-creation trends nationwide will ensure a steady pool of new buyers for the top luxury markets.
Advancements in technology, she said, may only serve to widen the wealth gap — further supporting top-dollar transactions in today’s hottest luxury markets.
Bozovic is particularly focused on the role that AI tools might play in propelling early adopters into the wealthy class, even as many workers on the lower rungs are displaced by the new technology.
“Yes, it’s wealth moving to Miami, but on top of that, … it’s a wealth gap in action that’s growing,” she said.
Bozovic rejected the notion that the luxury market in Miami is in a bubble that might burst anytime soon.
She pointed out how more than 80 percent of deals are conducted entirely with cash in the highest-rung portions of the Miami market.
“Bubbles are built on debt,” Bozovic said. “We have cash — heavy, heavy cash — that is buoying up the highest parts of our market, and I don’t see this changing either.”
