While Everyone Is Watching Tampa, the Numbers Actually Moved in Another Metro

Tampa is getting all the attention right now. It’s one of the most motivated seller markets in the country, and the coverage matches. But on the two measures that matter most if you’re a homeowner in trouble, Jacksonville looks worse than Tampa does.

I want to be careful about what that means, because it’s easy to read a number like this the wrong way.

What the Numbers Actually Measure

Parcl Labs publishes something called the Motivated Seller Index. It’s their own index, not a government dataset, and it tracks one thing: how sellers are behaving once they list. Are they cutting the price? Are they asking less than they paid for the house? That’s the whole idea. It does not measure whether anyone is behind on a mortgage.

Here’s the Jacksonville metro read as of this morning, July 27. There are 12,465 active listings. Forty-eight percent of them have cut the price at least once. Fifteen percent are asking less than the owner paid for the house. And 23% are owned by investors.

Tampa, same source, same morning: 27,497 listings, 51% cutting, 12% asking below purchase price, 18% investor-owned.

So Tampa cuts prices a little more often. But a bigger share of Jacksonville sellers are asking less than they paid, and a bigger slice of what’s for sale here belongs to investors.

Florida statewide sits at 45.2% cutting and 10.6% asking below purchase, across 214,602 active listings. The national index is lower than Florida’s. Jacksonville is running above the state average on both of the numbers I care about.

Why “Below Purchase Price” Is the One to Watch

Roughly one in seven Jacksonville listings is asking less than the owner paid.

Read that carefully. It does not mean one in seven Jacksonville homeowners is underwater. Most homeowners aren’t selling anything right now, and this only counts homes that are actively for sale. It’s a snapshot of sellers, not of owners.

But it’s still the closest early signal I know of for the conversation I have every week. That asking price is before you subtract the loan balance. Before closing costs. Before the commission. If somebody bought recently with a small down payment and they’re already asking less than they paid, the gap between what the house brings and what the bank is owed is bigger than that number looks. That’s me reasoning from how a closing statement works, not a published figure.

The Investor Number Is the Other Half

Nearly a quarter of the active listings in this metro are investor-owned.

Investors price to exit. They don’t have a kid’s height marked on the door frame. If the spreadsheet says take the loss and move on, they take the loss and move on, usually faster than a family can decide anything.

If you have to sell, that’s who you’re competing against on price. Worth knowing before you set your number.

Baker County Showed Up, and That’s a Flag

Baker County landed in Florida’s five most motivated counties this week, with the highest share of below-purchase listings of anything in that top five. Baker is one of NEFAR’s six counties, so that’s our backyard.

I’d hold that one loosely. Baker has about 124 active listings total. A county that small can swing on a couple of unusual houses. Treat it as a flag worth watching, not proof of anything.

Where I Was Partly Wrong Twelve Days Ago

On July 15, I wrote about NEFAR’s June numbers. Six-county median single-family price of $420,000, up from May and up close to 8% from a year earlier. My read was that rising prices in Northeast Florida meant a regular sale probably beats a short sale for most owners who’ve fallen behind.

I still think that’s right for a lot of people. But the seller behavior data says the ground is softer than that median price suggests, and I’d rather say so out loud than quietly let it slide.

These two sources measure different things and shouldn’t be mixed together. NEFAR measures what closed, and at what price. Parcl measures what sellers are currently asking compared to what they paid. A rising median and a rising motivated seller reading are the front and the back of the same market.

What to Do With This

If you’re current on your mortgage and you’re not selling, none of this changes your life today. File it away.

If you’re planning to list, price it against what’s actually happening, not against what your neighbor got three years ago. Almost half the market has already cut once.

And if you’re behind, or you can see behind from where you’re standing, the useful thing to know is that you have more than one option. Reinstatement, forbearance, a loan modification, a regular sale, a short sale. Which one fits depends entirely on your actual numbers: what you owe, what the house is worth today, and how much time you have. The worst version of this is waiting until the only option left is the one you didn’t want.

If you’ve got questions about any of it, my email is JimArmstrong904@gmail.com and my number is (904) 671-4161. No charge for a conversation.

Jim Armstrong, REALTOR, Momentum Realty. SFR (Short Sales and Foreclosure Resource) certified. This is general information, not legal, tax, or financial advice.