TAMPA, Fla. — By now, you've definitely heard that it's a great time to be a seller in the real estate market. Rent prices and home prices are skyrocketing across Tampa Bay as more people move into the area every day, driving up demand for housing.
It turns out that even sellers who make a large profit off their homes are running into problems finding a place to live after their sale. Traci Sampson is one of them.
Sampson sold her home in Nokomis, right outside of Sarasota, for double what she paid just six years prior, "I had a lot of offers in the first week, way above my asking price," she said. With enough cash in hand to buy a nice home, she set her sights on Tampa.
She spent some time living in an apartment before searching for a home to rent so she could have more space for her grown children to visit and a yard for her two dogs to enjoy. After paying multiple application fees for several homes, she wasn't having any luck with rentals.
"I was told 'There's a hundred people in front of you, good luck' and that was baffling," said Sampson.
She then shifted her sights to buying a home with the money set aside from her home sale.
During her search, she ended up on the phone with a real estate agent who proposed a solution, "I spoke with him on the phone for about an hour and he explained this situation and said a company would come in, if you said you wanted to rent a home that fits their criteria, if I like it I'd sign on a dotted line and the company would make a cash offer to the owner of the house. The owner has 48 hours to decide and if they accept it, they buy the house, they hand it off to a management company, they paint it and I move in," explained Sampson.
After extensive vetting and putting thousands of dollars down to find a place to rent, Sampson and the real estate agent visited a home for sale in South Tampa.
"I said I liked it and I literally had to sign papers in the driveway. I'll never forget, he said 'If you want this house you need to sit with me right now, fill out these papers and write the check and sign it right now or else you'll never get it'. So that's what I did. We picked paint colors because the company came in right away and painted and did some updates and then I moved in within the month," she said.
The home was purchased by Home Partners of America, based out of Chicago. The company's website shows they offer the rental and purchase of homes in 32 different states. In Tampa, the company has 628 homes listed.
According to the company's website, here's how their process works: you get approved for their lease to own program, you find a house for sale that you like, the company buys the home in cash and you sign a one-year lease.
Your rent price is locked in for five years and you have the option to purchase the home from the company at any time within that time frame.
With many companies like this one buying homes in Tampa Bay, it is tougher for families looking for homes to compete when they don't have the same amount of cash to offer to home sellers upfront.