Live Your Dream! Lose Your Virginity!

 

 

Above photo taken October 24, 2014 across the street from Bourbon Street Pub. That's somebody's mother. It has nothing to do with real estate. Just wanted to post it in remembrance of that day.

I started today's blog on February 14, 2011 but did not post it. I found it while searching the word "auction" because today, October 28th, is the anniversary of the day I purchased my first property in Key West. Take a brief read. What I wrote then is playing again.

I hosted an Open House yesterday. Quite successful, in fact. I had 107 plus people.I got so busy I lost track while talking to potential buyers. I kept hearing similar remarks about how much the market has recovered and how much so many people want to buy a place here. There were, of course, the neighbors and lookie-loos who show up at any open house. I recognize many of them when they walk past the front door. Those folks are usually in and out in just a few minutes. They are semi-pros. They watch the mls and read blogs about Key West real estate (copycats all).  But the virgins, the people who have been to Key West once or many times who finally decide they think they want to buy a house, they are the people that get my attention. It's as if they are back in high school and ask their friend (me) to see if its safe to ask that certain someone if they liked the other person. Only in the case of real estate, is it okay to look, to touch, to buy? Will I fail? What if I fail? What if I pay too much? Will my life be better if I buy a place in Key West? Yes to the last question. As for the other questions, if you don't take the step and lose your virginity, you will never know the joy of sex, I mean the joy of living here. 

I have written several times that it took me nine years to finally buy a place here. I made many ill fated offers prior to that. My offers were usually too low in price or too harsh in terms of requiring the seller to warrant this or that or some other legal mumbo jumbo. I lost my virginity at a public auction with a bunch of others in a competitive bidding. I got the nerve to make the bold move to out bid the others and ended up getting the grand prize. Instead of bidding lowest, I bid highest. But I got the prize everybody else wanted. 

In Key West real estate most places are one-of-a-kind. The real estate market in Key West is really brisk right now. Town is full of people and many of those people go through the thought process of wondering if they could or should buy a place here. Some look at the signs on real estate company front porches or boxes attached to listing signs. Some contact an agent and go look at houses to see how much things cost. 

New: That's where I stopped. That blog never got published. Ten years have passed. The place I bought sold twice after i sold it. It is making a mint. All guest houses are. Real estate prices are beyond crazy. The thing that holds true is there is only one Key West. I have heard but never visited other coastal areas that have old towns kind of like Key West.  But they are not the same because they have old houses. The thing I don't like is also the thing I have become a part of - looking at real estate as being a cash register. I can't change that. Money in. More money out. That's the way it works. Virgins welcome.

 

615 Grinnell Street - Old Town - Key West

The very charming house tucked off the beaten path at 615 Grinnell Street (Rear) just got a lot more attractive. I have shown this property several times and I think it is poised for a quick sale. The reduced asking price is now $685,000 or $538 per sq ft. This is how the listing Realtor describes this home:

"Tucked away down a quiet Old Town lane is this lovely, renovated historic home. Three bedrooms plus a loft/office, high ceilings, quality finishes with an open floor plan for comfortable island living. Lush tropical lot, inviting pool and porches make this a Hidden Island Oasis in one of the best neighborhoods of Old Town Key West."

You can't see this house from the street. It is actually located at the tail end of the little lane mentioned above. The house has a wrap around porch on two sides. The pool and deck are on the third side. The north side abuts the adjacent lot. All three "public areas" are very neat and nicely landscaped. The owner recently added a gate to permit off street parking inside of the grounds. The lot is fairly large (approximately 50' x 60').

This is definitely a Key West house. You won't find one like this in the burbs, wherever you are. All of the rooms open to the outside. CLICK HERE to see the view from the kitchen looking toward outdoor dining and the pool. (There is even a small building that is just aching to become a poolside bar.) While none of the rooms are huge, they open onto each other and the vaulted ceilings and multitudes of French doors that open to the outside make the outside feel like it is part of the inside. CLICK HERE to read more detailed information on this listing and view several very good photos and even take a virtual tour. Speaking of tours: Grinnell Street dead ends on the Key West cemetery. You won't be seeing Conch Trains or Trolleys dragging tourists down the Grinnell Street. Most locals avoid it because they can get where they want more quickly. So if you are looking for peace and quiet, this street is one of the better addresses in Old Town.

This is not my listing. But don't let that stop you from calling me, Gary Thomas, 305-766-2642 or contact me by e-mail at kw1101v@aol.com. I am a full time Realtor at Preferred Properties Coastal Realty, Inc. in Key West, Florida. Our office is the exclusive Lower Florida Keys affiliate of Christie's Great Estates. It's Fantasy Fest Week in Key West. If you owned 615 Grinnell Street you could walk one block to join the People's Parade CLICK HERE on Friday. On Saturday you and your friends could walk four blocks to join in on the craziness on Duval Street. And on Sunday morning you could walk one half block to 5 Brothers CLICK HERE for a couple of shots of Cuban coffee and some Aspirin.

Don't Be a Cry Baby!

At the bottom of almost every blog post I leave a comment as to how to contact me either by phone or email. I actually do get emails and phone calls from prospective buyers. I respond and we sometimes meet in real life. Most of these potential buyers have a dream of owning a place in Key West (why else would they contact me!). And most of those potential buyers have developed their own perspective of the Key West real estate market.

The Key West Association mls website is open for anyone to use. CLICK HERE. It provides lots of easy to access information on all real estate listings. You might even become so proficient that you might think you don't even need a Realtor to help get the deal done. You would be wrong. Nothing is simple in life or real estate. And cute little Old Town Key West can be very complicated sometimes.

In just about one week the "population" of Key West will nearly double in size. Fantasy Fest will begin and thousands of wanna-be-Key-Westers will make their annual pilgrimage to pretend in paradise. And you can be your very last red nickle that a bunch of them are planning on looking at (and maybe buying) the dream home that eluded them before. Many have made plans to come down here and buy while the prices are low. They plan on waving cash in front of desperate sellers in hopes of snagging a trophy of a house be it big or small.

In the past week I have had two different people contact be about one particular house I wrote about some time back. I sent both the info they requested and we talked on the phone that property in particular. One person had a friend actually look at the house. Then we talked some more. The potential buyer advised a trip is coming up in early November and that he or she would look at the house then. And I said something like "Fantasy Fest is coming up in a week. This house will probably be bought. You need to tie it up now before someone else gets it." I don't try to pressure people, but I do encourage them to be realistic.

There are some incredible deals on really large houses. If you are a million dollar buyer you can get a lot of house for the money these days. There are some good deals on smaller houses. Most of those properties are livable but most would be good candidates for a remodel.

I could be terribly wrong on my prediction that we are going to have a lot of "real" buyers in town during the next two weeks. If I am right the "inventory" of unsold homes will drop dramatically and there will be a lot of cry babies boo-hooing over the fact that they missed the opportunity to buy into their dream.

CLICK HERE to search the real Key West mls website. This is the site owned by the Key West Association of Realtors. If you see a property that you like, please contact me, Gary Thomas, 305.766.2642 or by e-mail at kw1101v@aol.com. I am a full time Realtor at Preferred Properties Coastal Realty, Inc., an affiliate of Christie's Great Estates. We have some great estate properties in case that is what you are looking for. And there are still come very cute little cottages left. Some may need some fixing. Don't wait too long. Don't be a cry baby!

No Pretense Needed

I had a walk-in a couple of weeks ago who was interested in buying a large winter home for his family. He's a self-made man from the mid-west and has accumulated other houses and according to him quite a bit of money. But if you looked at the guy, you'd never guess it. He told me that he's just a "No pretense" guy. I told him "You picked the right place".

When I first started thinking seriously about living in Key West I thought it would be great to live in a gay town. I gotta confess I thought the idea of lots and lots of gay men would be fun, even though I was in a long term committed relationship. But I wanted to live where I could be open about being gay. Or so I thought.

There was a program on PBS last night that was part of a series called "In The Life". The episode included a piece on gays in Poland and how oppressed they are by the government. Polish society stigmatizes gays as needing help for the abomination that socieity deems as intentional but also curable. The government even prevented gays from holding peaceful parades seeking fare treatment by the government. One fellow talked about being so repressed that if he had not left his village and moved to Warsaw he knew he would have committed suicide because of the oppression. It made me re-evaluate my situation in Key West.

Generalizations are usually full of holes and probably unfounded but I'm going to make one: people in Key West don't care who you are or what you do in your private life. They may gossip about what you do, for sure. But most people are happy to let you be whoever you want to be and expect the same from you toward themselves.

There are a bunch of groups that make up the local population. The Conchs are natives that trace their family history by the number of generations they have lived on the island. Conchs can be white and black. There is a big military presence made up of Navy and Coast Guard men and women. Every person I've met that is in the service has been very polite, well groomed, and well spoken. They are in a class of their own for sure. The gay population is another community that is divided between people who moved here to either retire or open a business and people who moved here to experience life in Key West and who probably have at least two jobs to make ends meet. They may be servers in restaurants, bartenders, guest house employees, shop clerks, or maybe mates on a boat. There is an identical group of young straight guys and gals that have the exact same jobs and aspirations. And then there is this very large group of foreign born people who live here--many who have overstayed there 6 month visit to the US. There are many Czechs, Russians, Ukranians, Polish, and Nicaraguans in this community. Women in the groups probably work in hotels and most of the men work in construction.

As I watched the PBS program I wondered about how the local Polish population feel about Key West gays. I've had several Polish people work on my house during the past year. They knew I am gay and never said anything bad to me. But then I was paying them money. Lots of money. But it made me wonder. And then I thought about how everybody here is in the same boat so to speak. We are all on this little island out in the middle of the ocean. We're closer to Cuba than we are to Macy's or a Target store. We share the same weather (good and sometimes not so good). We live in an economy that's not doing so well right now. So everybody makes do. Then I intuitively knew that the Pols are just here living their lives and really don't care.

If you are looking for a place to escape the world where you have to pretend to be someone or something you are not, look no further. No pretense is required to live in Key West. Let me help you find your new home or business in Paradise. Of course if you want to pretend you can do that too. We have lots of pretenders in Paradise. They are just organized about it and hold a really big event every year where everybody gets to pretend to be somebody else. It is called Fantasy Fest. CLICK HERE to search the Key West Association of Realtors mls database. If you see something you like please call me, Gary Thomas, 305-766-2642, or e-mail me at kw1101V@aol.com.

Fantasy Fest in Key West

Last night was the People's Parade in Key West. Thousands of masked marchers paraded down Fleming Street then up Simonton Street and then came back down Duval Street to showoff their costumes (or lack thereof). This year's theme was Alice in Wonderland and many very crafty people came up with some great costumes in keeping with the theme. But I guess I will more than likely remember the oddball outfits or almost totally nude people more than the clever and expensive costumes. Year after year I am always amazed by the nerve so many people have in showing off their bodies in public. And most that do shouldn't!

As I was driving to the office this morning I had to make a quick stop. The car in front of me made a sharp veer to the left and I stopped to see what caused him to drive to erratically. There near the middle of the street was a turtle making his way across Von Phister Street near the Casa Marina Hotel. I got out of my car and picked up the turtle and put him at the side of the road so that someone less caustious wouldn't snuff him. The pic above is not the turtle in question, but they could be related.


I mention this because there is so much wildlife in Key West. We have chickens, cats and kittens, dogs, iguanas, birds of all feathers, rats (hate them), crabs, raccoons (I saw one in my yard), and all kinds of creatures great and small. And like the wildlife on the streets last night, the natural wildlife is part of the aura that makes Key West a place where a lot of people want to live.

I was in San Francisco a couple of weeks back and one of the places I looked forward to re-visiting was GUMPS. I used to go to San Francisco two or three times a year and I would go to GUMPS every trip. It is a store filled with over-price trinkets and high end art objects that you absolutely cannot live without. Or so I thought. In the old days I would see an item and think I would like to own it. I did buy things there and wanted more things from there. But now that I live in Key West my needs are much different. I have pretty much everything that I need. And if I think about it there really isn't all that much that I want anymore. Life in Key West has made me less acquisitive. We don't have that many national stores, but the Internet provides access to a world of merchandise that can be had in a few days time.

The people in San Francisco were much different than the people in Key West. The "locals" (ha, ha) are very trendy and very well dressed (or down dressed, but not undressed--unless you are in a leather bar). The tourists dress like tourists, but not like tourists dress in Key West. They have their clothes on and they tend to dress up, not down. It seems almost everybody dresses "down" in Key West.

The food prices in San Francisco actually were higher than Key West and I found this surprising. Key West tends to be very pricey, but I guess San Francisco is even more pricey. I did some real estate window shopping and found that housing prices are higher there than here. And the city by the bay beats Key West hands down when it comes to homeless people. I have never seen anything so bad. I have seen lots of beggars in Mexico and Paris, but they are everywhere in San Francisco--everywhere.

There are trade offs we make in life for living where we live and with whom we live. Key West is taking care of my needs at present. I find living with Key West wildlife and laid back atmosphere more pleasing than living in a big city like San Francisco with its' homeless population, high priced restaurants and high priced housing. We have our share of snobs, but thank God there aren't' that many of them. And they usually tend to hang together at any rate. If you stay off the snob guest list you can go far in life in Key West.

CLICK HERE to checkout all current Key West and Lower Florida Keys mls listings. Then give me a call at 305-766-2642 to set up a showing of your new home or business in Paradise.

If I lived here, I could be home now...

If I lived in Key West, I could be home now...
Ain't that the truth. The other day I wrote about the island running from the Gulf of Mexico to the Atlantic Ocean. So I decided to post a photo to prove it. The Gulf is at the top and the Atlantic is at the bottom of the pic. My office is located just to the top of the large white building in the middle next to the right side of the pic. That building is the old Gato Cigar Factory and is now part of Monroe County government offices.

The third photo is of the beach at the Casa Marina Resort. Locals go to the hotel for a variety of reasons including the annual 4th of July picnic and the Fantasy Fest Pet Parade. Both events are must dos if you live in Key West.

Key West is packed to the rim with lots of vacationers and attendees to the boat races. Our office (Dunaway McKenzie Realtors) is holding Open Houses tomorrow, from Noon -- 2:30 at the following locations: 612 and 616 Olivia, 1318 Duncan Street, and the Sea Isle Town Homes at 901 Windsor Lane. See photo at top right. The developer just reduced the price to $1,900,000 on these newly constructed and elegantly appointed 3 bedroom, 3 1/2 bath two-story town homes, each with its own private pool. Come see for yourself. If you lived here, you could be home now!