This property has been sold. 
There are more homes just like this for sale near Sherwood Forest in Sarasota.

John Woodward announces his newest listing in Sarasota at 4410 Little John Trail in Sherwood Forest.

JUST REDUCED to $214,900!

This is a 1,952 square foot impeccably maintained three bedroom two full bath split plan home.  Oversized neutral tile has been laid on the diagonal in every room except the bedrooms where newer neutral carpet can be found.  All of the bright bedrooms have large walk-in closets. 

There is an open living and dining room area, large kitchen with loads of cabinet and counter top space, and a large family room with high ceilings and a cozy fireplace. The large, 17x12 master suite features a separate dressing area, large 12x6 walk-in closet, and has private access to the oversized covered lanai.

The only thing to do here is move in.  All of the little details have been completed by the long term owner.  The roof was recently installed and the A/C system new in September 2011.

Sherwood Forest is conveniently located in central Sarasota and is within minutes of I-75, shopping and the #1 Ranked US beach,  Siesta Key Beach.

There is more information here including interior photos, room sizes, and a detailed description of this exciting new listing.

To schedule your own private showing of this home or to ask any questions, contact John Woodward of Sarasota Real Estate Group.

Contact:
John Woodward
Sarasota Real Estate Group
941-922-8400
john@johnwoodward.com

May 27, 2012 - Sarasota, FL - There are a lot of industry reports saying that now is the time to buy.   Most times I have looked on some of those suggestions with a degree of pessimism.  I understand why these reports generally have a positive spin on given set of market conditions.  A lot of and market is affected by consumer attitudes.  As far as real estate goes in South Florida, the 50% price reductions we have experienced will get anyone’s attention.  Interest rates below 4% also make buying a home much more affordable.  Even though the economy soured some years back, the beaches are just as beautiful as ever.  Just as tides rise and lower, bad economic times are replaced with recovering economies.  No one can ever guess the top or bottom but right now there are definitely buying signals you simply cannot ignore.  If Sarasota and the surrounding markets are on your radar, don’t expect any future leaps to the downside.

The most recent real estate market observations in Sarasota show that in all significant categories, Sarasota has finally broke

Sarasota Sales in April Break Out

Sarasota, FL - Even the most pessimistic Sarasota real estate market observer would have to say that all the signals looking forward are green.  April 2012 succeeded in surpassing the total number of units sold, the average cost per square foot, and the average sales price for any single month over the past several years.  If a market bottom is what you’re looking for, you will most likely find it in your rearview mirror.

March 2012 eked out a record 1000 units sold but total sales for April leaped ahead by 8%  to a break out 1,081 total units.  Any serious analysis has to acknowledge this market is back on track.  The overall trend for the past two years has shown a market that peaked in the 900

Sarasota Foreclosures are Harder to Find

Foreclosure filings have been on a steady upward trend this year since a rather anemic 2011.  It would be accurate to say the number of initial filings recorded at the Sarasota clerk of the court’s office are up as much as 100% percent in recent months but that would be somewhat misleading.  Prior to the discovery that many documents filed as part of foreclosure proceedings included fraudulent DocX documents,  the number of initial filings fell from 600 to almost 1000 per month in Sarasota County to 200 or less per month in late 2010.  Initial filings have been slowly moving upward since late 2011 to today’s 3- 400 new foreclosure filings per month.  Filings may be double from last year that is still only half as much from just a few years ago.

Pine View School - Tops in the Country

Riverview and Venice also Top the 100 Best Florida Schools for 2012

U.S. News and world report has come out with its annual list of top high schools in the country.  Once again the Pine View School in the Osprey Florida ranks at the top of the list coming in at number five

High Five

Sarasota's Highest Selling Homes

It is often said the upper end of the real estate market in Sarasota leads the overall market.  If that is so, the bottom may already be in our rear view mirror.  There have been 33 sales over over one-million dollars through April 8 of this year compared to 22 sales for the same period last year.  That represents a 50% increase year to date.  The average cost per square foot is also up 21% from $420 to $508 and the average sales price is up 8% from $1.986 to $2.136 million.  If you go back to 2010, the average per square foot price was $411 and the average sales price was $1.703 millon which further indicates this upward trend has gained a bit of steam rolling into 2012.

So where exactly are these sales happening?  Let’s take a look at this year’s “high 5” home sales.  One sale was on the exclusive Lido Key enclave of Westway Drive, three are sales on the #1 ranked Siesta Key and of course, Bird Key also came in with the 5th highest sale so far thise year.

#1 - 1255 Westway Drive on Lido Key which is

The Sarasota Short Sale

Last month I had an offer on one of my Sarasota listings that came in at about 80% of asking.  Now, I don’t blame buyers for coming in with low offers on listed properties.  It’s just the nature of what a buyer will do in today’s market.  What struck me as unusual was this buyer insisted I knew about a recent short sale closing in the same neighborhood.  There were other non short sale closings that were more recent which certainly would support a better offer.  It got me to thinking, what is the typical discount a buyer should expect when buying a foreclosure or short sale?  How much longer does a buyer wait for a short sale approval and what are the chances of a short sale being approved?

Short sales can typically have a lot of deferred maintenance and in many cases there is a long wait for the Sellers bank to come back with an answer.  According to the Sarasota MLS

A Real Estate Buyers Guide

Real estate transactions can be one of the more stressful processes any one can go through.  As with many of life's experiences, stress often comes from the unknown.  There are so many people involved and tasks that need to be accomplished to find, negotiate, and ultimately close any home sale.  For many people it is the ultimate David and Goliath scenario.

An Overview of the Buying Process

That is why we decided put together a Home Buyer’s Guide.  While we cannot cover every topic and situation, laying out the basics of the process and what you can expect will help relieve some of the potential stress.  Any book that we would put together should not be confused with having an experienced real estate agent working for you.  There are no two real estate transactions that are alike.  An experienced real estate agent’s knowledge is invaluable and should be the key source to helping you through the process.  The key is to find an agent that you trust.

Some of the Topics Include

Our buyer’s guide covers such topics as how

Search the MLS Just Like REALTORS Do

We designed the search capability of SarasotaOne to be one of the easiest and most powerful MLS search tools on the Internet.  Our system automatically saves your first search when you sign up.  When starting out using SarasotaOne, this is probably a little unrealistic to expect you, the end user, to fully understand the capabilities of our system.

What we have found is that your first saved search may not always be

2011 Annual Market Report for Sarasota, FL

The beginning of a new year is a good reason to take a minute and look at the Sarasota real estate market from a broader and longer term.  I have always felt charts make visualizing market trends easy to spot.  They can tell you about changes and trends long before those in the market acknowledge the market has changed. 

In closing out 2011 with 9,548 total sales, you would have to go back to 2005 to find more sales with 10,999 sales that year.  Since 2007’s dismal 6,360 sales, Sarasota has made a nice steady year over year increase for each of the past four years.  The average cost per square foot from 2010 in Sarasota is