October « 2009 « Smith and Associates Blog

The Fresh Market Comes To St Petersburg October 16, 2009
By Amy Seeks

On March 5, 1982, Ray and Beverly Berry opened the first Fresh Market in Greensboro, North Carolina. The fulfillment of a dream, The Fresh Market was founded with one simple goal in mind: to bring friends, family and neighbors high-quality perishable products in a warm and friendly atmosphere with a high level of customer service. They have acheived that goal…in a big, big way. Now St. Petersburg will experience the same opportunity to enjoy their quality and service.

freshm

Beginning in October, the Cocoanut Grove shopping center on 4th Street will be raised and the preparations will begin for construction of the new store. Smith’s Commercial Division, headed by Jim Williams and Tom Young brought the parties together to build this dream store for St. Petersburg. Williams says “having the right set of circumstances come together at the right time has made this possible.” Young and Williams have worked with local construction firm Hostetter Construction and architech Randy Wedding to fine tune the details. The Fresh Market could not be more pleased. “We are excited about both our continued expansion in Florida and our entry into St. Petersburg,” said Randy Kelley, senior vice president of real estate and development for The Fresh Market. “We have been interested in the St. Petersburg area for a long time and appreciate the positive response we have received from the city and from its residents.

Smith will be hosting a Welcome Party on October 19th and will keep the status updates on their Fresh Market page of their website. If you can’t make the party, watch for the store to open. We’re sure it will make for a great neighborhood gathering place.

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USF’s Small Business Development Center Adds Pasco Presence October 7, 2009
By Smith & Associates

The Small Business Development Center at the University of South Florida has established a Pasco County presence.

Small Business Development Center

The SBDC is part of the Florida SBDC Network, a statewide service network of 35 centers. It is funded in part through a cooperative agreement with the U.S. Small Business Administration and accredited through the national Association of SBDCs.

The new SBDC office in Pasco will be staffed by Jerry Karp, a certified business analyst, according to a release. Karp will be providing one-on-one counseling to new and existing business owners in the area, among other services.

Karp’s expertise in business, especially marketing and sales, is a great asset to the organization, said Eileen Rodriguez, Small Business Development Center regional manager, in the release.

For 13 years, Karp owned a business that specialized in selling business to business. When it was sold to a large corporation, he remained at the company for seven years as manager, the release said.

The SBDC office in Pasco will be housed in the county’s Economic Development Corporation building at 16506 Pointe Village Drive, Suite 101, Lutz.

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Preparing Your Home For Sale
By David B Moyer

Preparing Your Home

Exterior: The condition of your home’s exterior is most important when it comes to buyer appeal.

It is always a great idea to get your home ready to sell or prepared for a showing or an open house. The curb appeal is one of the most important features as this will be the reason someone will pick up a phone and call, or the reason they look to a different home.

Preparing Your Home For Sale

•   House number should be easy to read
•   Lights on timers to ensure house is lit up after sunset
•   Eaves troughs, and down spouts in good repair
•   Garage/car port clean and tidy
•   Litter picked up
•   Cracked or broken window panes replaced
•   Doorbell and door hardware in good repair
•   Touch up trim paint on doors, window frames, fascia, etc.
•   Mow, edge and weed the lawn frequently until the home is sold
•   Overgrown shrubbery should be cut back to show as much of the exterior as possible
•   A low-cost investment in seasonal flowers or ground cover will add a personal touch
•   Inspect the roof for necessary repairs and any visible broken shingles or tiles
•   Stucco water stains can be repaired using a mild bleaching agent
•   Fences should be mended and painted
•   Wash all windows inside and outside

Interior: Warm and welcoming!

The interior of the home is the heart. The space, layout, and condition will all be determining factors for a new buyer. Can they see themselves in this home? Buyers want to know that this home has been loved, cared for, and ready for a new owner that will not have to worry about future pitfalls.

Preparing Your Home For Sale

•   Lights should be on and drapes should be left open during daylight
•   Heat set at a comfortable temperature
•   Fresh flowers/plants in various rooms
•   Chipped plaster and paint touched up and repaired
•   Doors and cupboards properly closed
•   Leaky taps and toilets repaired
•   Burned out light bulbs replaced
•   Squeaky doors oiled
•   Mirrors, fixtures, and taps cleaned and polished
•   Seals around tubs and basins in good repair
•   Floors cleaned, garbage containers emptied
•   Inside of closets and cupboards neat and tidy
•   Valuable property, out of reach, out of sight, or locked away
•   Pets absent, where possible, or contained during showings
•   All torn screens should be repaired or replaced
•   Avoid repainting the entire house unless current colors are very loud or offbeat
•   White or light pastels are the easiest to work with and they make your rooms look larger
•   Fireplace lit in cooler weather
•   Air conditioner turned on in warm weather
•   Countertops neat and polished
•   Appliances cleaned
•   Inside of closets and cupboards neat and tidy

Need help repairing your home, check out our preferred vendors

Want to know what your home is worth?

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Opportunities On The Horizon In 2010 October 6, 2009
By Dave Traynor

New Construction Condominium Development Opportunities On The Horizon In 2010

As we watch the market towards the end of 2009 we are beginning to see that lenders and developers are working together nation wide to re-energize sales and marketing programs for new construction condominiums.

In fact, last week a group of investors led by Barry Sternlicht’s Starwood Capital Group are emerging as the winner of an auction by the government of the failed Corus Bank’s condominium -development loans. If Starwood is successful, it will be the latest sign that the firm is emerging as a major force in the purchase of ailing condominiums. (Wall Street Journal 10-3-09 by Lingling Wei) Many of these acquired loans were in condominium developments in Florida and also locally within the Tampa Bay market.

New Construction Tampa Bay

Locally in Tampa Bay we have also seen progression with developers and lenders together to put together pricing of new condominiums to more realistic pricing to what the market will bear in 2009 / 2010. We at Smith & Associates will continue to have an active watch on these new opportunities within Tampa Bay and provide details on progress of the best opportunities in real estate in Clearwater, St Petersburg and Tampa in new condominium developments.

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Florida officially in running for federal high-speed rail funding
By Smith & Associates

Competition for just $8 billion in federal stimulus funding slated for major transportation projects is expected to be intense, but Gov. Charlie Crist officially put Florida in the hunt Friday.

Crist submitted an application to U.S. Department of Transportation secretary Ray LaHood as well as Federal Railroad Administration chief Joseph Szabo highlighting plans for a high-speed rail program that would link Tampa, Orlando and eventually Miami.

“Florida is the state that can turn imagination into reality for world-class high speed rail in the United States faster than anywhere else in the nation,” Crist said in a letter to LaHood and Szabo. “We are confident that based on Florida’s long history of planning for high-speed rail in our state, and the diligent work done to prepare this application, we offer the best opportunity to deliver results as quickly as possible.”

Crist is seeking as much as $2.5 billion through the Florida Department of Transportation, which would allow for contracting of the system’s Tampa-Orlando segment as early as next year. Miami could be added by 2017 if all goes as planned.

President Obama is expected to announce in December his selections to receive stimulus funding out of 10 corridors eligible.

The time saved commuting between Tampa and Orlando would be minimal because of the number of stops, but it’s the Miami-Orlando route that could be a big draw down the road because of the time it would save traveling there, Edward Mierzejewski, director of the Center for Urban Transportation at the University of South Florida told the Tampa Bay Business Journal in August.

“We have an unprecedented opportunity to provide a transportation alternative that is widely available in other developed countries around the world,” Crist said in his letter. “There has never been a better time than now, and there is no better place to invest in high-speed rail than in Florida.”

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Port of Tampa-Puerto Rico shipping service launches
By Smith & Associates

The arrival of Horizon Discovery Sunday at the Port of Tampa marked the launch of a direct container service between Tampa and San Juan, Puerto Rico, by Horizon Lines.

Horizon Lines is one of the nation’s largest domestic ocean shipping and integrated logistics companies. The 1,402 container, or TEU unit, capacity Horizon Discovery now serves Tampa as part of Horizon Lines’ Gulf Express Service with a fixed-day, bi-weekly schedule, the port said in a release.

The Tampa Port Authority is expanding the port’s container terminal facilities from 25 to 40 acres to be completed later this year. Working with terminal operator partner Ports America, the plan is to expand the terminal to more than 160 acres within the next few years.

port authority

The Tampa Executive Shippers’ Council has been “a major thrust behind the Port’s container initiative” and the attraction of the new direct service to Puerto Rico, the port said.

The council is an organization representing the major containerized exporters and importers in the Tampa area that are keen to support ocean carriers that chose to call the Port of Tampa.

A direct service from the Port of Tampa to Puerto Rico is a huge boost for Amalie Oil as well as for other shippers in this area, Dennis Madden, senior vice president of sales and marketing for the company and a founding members of the Executive Shippers’ Council, said in the release.

No longer does his company have to account for the cost and inconvenience of having to truck its containers all the way to the east coast. Now, it can load them directly at the Port of Tampa, the release said.

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Captains promote Florida fishing, state films waterfronts
By Smith & Associates

Fishing boat captains from the Discovery Channel’s reality series “Deadliest Catch” will participate in a multimedia campaign to draw attention to Florida’s fishing industry in late 2009.

Sig Hansen of the Northwestern and Johnathan Hillstrand and Andy Hillstrand of the Time Bandit will appear in print and Web-based media as well as statewide TV public service announcements airing in December.

The captains also will help Florida mark National Seafood Month in October.

Cheap seafood imports, rising fuel prices and the hurricanes of recent years have impeded the fishing industry, Florida Agriculture Commissioner Charles Bronson said in a release. The captains will help raise public awareness about the contributions of Florida’s fishermen, Bronson said.

In addition to promotions featuring the celebrity captains, the agriculture department is producing a series of documentaries about Florida’s working waterfronts in extended-length high-definition video format.

The first documentary, which features Sebastian, will be released in October. Documentaries featuring Cortez, Tarpon Springs, Jacksonville, Destin and Apalachicola, and Miami and the Keys will follow, the release said.

Florida’s commercial fishermen harvest more than 83 million pounds of seafood and fishery products with a dockside value of more than $168 million each year, the release said. Florida is home to roughly 500 seafood processing businesses and 800 businesses that buy and sell seafood as dockside fish buyers, wholesale brokers, importers or exporters.

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Poll: Florida ranks No. 2 for wannabe residents
By Smith & Associates

High unemployment and housing crisis be darned: Florida is still among the most popular states when it comes to where people want to live.

Only California is more popular, taking the No. 1 spot for the sixth year in a row in the Harris poll by Harris Interactive as the place Americans would like to live if they didn’t live in the state they now live. Hawaii came in third.

“The most popular states and cities where large numbers of people would like to live tend to attract tourists and business,” according to a Harris media release. “They are places where people like to take vacations and where companies like to have their offices and factories.”

Oddly enough, however, no Florida cities were among the top destinations for resident wannabes.

New York City topped the list of cities people would most like to live in or near, followed by Denver and San Francisco.

The other most popular states were:

Texas (No. 4), Colorado (No. 5). Three states tied for sixth place: Arizona, North Carolina and Washington state.

The other cities on the top 10 are San Diego (No. 4), Seattle (No. 5), Chicago (No. 6), Boston (No. 7), Las Vegas (No. 8), Washington, D.C. (No. 9), and Dallas (No. 10).

The poll of 2,498 U.S. adults took place Aug. 10-18.

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Tampa experiencing slow home price gains October 1, 2009
By Smith & Associates

Home prices in the Tampa metropolitan area were up between June and July by as much as 1.4 percent but are still tracking more than 18 percent lower than they did a year ago.

The latest study of 20 markets by Standard & Poor’s for its S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices shows substantial improvements in home prices over the last few months in the Greater Tampa area. The rate of growth between May and June was just 0.4 percent, according to the study.

Among the 20 markets tracked by S&P/Case-Shiller, Tampa’s price growth rate is in line with other areas such as Cleveland, Denver and Miami, and well ahead of the growth in Charlotte, N.C.; Las Vegas, New York and Seattle. In fact, Las Vegas and Seattle reported price declines between June and July, although Las Vegas’ decline was half of what it was between May and June, according to the report.

Home prices across the board remain sharply lower than they were the year before with Phoenix reporting the worst decline at 28.5 percent despite growing 1.8 percent between June and July. Home prices in Miami, the only other Florida metro area tracked by S&P/Case-Shiller, were off by 21.2 percent.

Cleveland and Dallas showed the smallest declines year-over-year at 1.3 and 1.6 percent, respectively.

“The rate of annual decline in home price values continues to decelerate, and we now seem to be witnessing some sustained monthly increases across many of the markets,” said David M. Blitzer, chairman of S&P’s Index committee in a release. “The [10-city and 20-city] composites and all metro areas are showing an improvement in the annual rates of return, as seen through a moderation in their annual declines.”

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FHA grant funds study for ferry linking Tampa and St. Petersburg
By Smith & Associates

A ferry boat project has received $475,000 in grant money from the Federal Highway Administration.

The Hillsborough County Waterborne Transportation Feasibility Study and Demonstration Project, which is sponsored by Rep. Kathy Castor, D-Tampa, and Rep. Gus Bilirakis, R-Palm Harbor, aims to assess the feasibility of design and construction of ferry boats and terminal facilities linking the waterfronts of downtown Tampa and downtown St. Petersburg.

The funding is part of more than $42 million in grants from the FHA’s Ferry Boat program. This includes 35 grants to build and improve ferry docks and facilities in 15 states and Puerto Rico.

Congress authorized the Ferry Boat Program to fund projects in areas with high passenger demand and limited means of transportation. Program funds can be applied to capital improvements for existing ferry operations to increase the number of riders, relieve congestion or address environmental or operational concerns, a release said.

Other than the Hillsborough project, the only other such grant in Florida was $712,500 toward the rehabilitation of the Mayport Ferry and Dock Ramp in Jacksonville.

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