7 Housing Markets Buyers Are Eyeing Online

Sunbelt cities are garnering most of the attention online from potential home buyers, possibly being lured by bargain housing prices.

Several Florida and California metro areas were found to have the highest proportion of home searches from people outside the area, according to Trulia.com, which tracked about 100 million searches on its site from July 1 through Sept. 30.

“Part of the long term trend is Baby Boomers moving toward retirement, and some of those that put off their searches while home prices were skyrocketing in the Sun Belt, are now looking again because prices have fallen so much,” Jed Kolko, chief economist and head of analytics at Trulia, told Forbes.

Overall, the Florida market is showing big improvements recently. For example, the West Palm Beach-Boca Raton metropolitan statistical area (MSA) saw sales jump 34 percent in September compared to the same month last year, while Fort Lauderdale MSA saw an 11 percent increase in sales, Florida REALTORS® reports.

Here are some of the cities that topped the list for most online searches on Trulia, according to Forbes.

North Port-Bradenton-Sarasota, Fla.
Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, Calif.
Charleston, S.C.
Fort Lauderdale-Pompano Beach, Fla.
Cape Coral-Fort Myers, Fla.
West Palm Beach-Boca Raton, Fla.
Fort Worth, Texas
Find out what other cities topped the list.

Source: “Buyers Have Eyes on These Real Estate Markets,” Forbes (Dec. 1, 2011)