Florida real estate hit by exodus

From the South Florida Web site: Florida’s population declined last year for the first time in 63 years as the steep global recession put the brakes on migration there and sent many residents packing, new University of Florida research shows.

Florida lost 58,000 residents compared to a year earlier, as the nation’s fourth largest state reported a population of 18.7 million people. The number of Floridians lost represents a city roughly the size of Pensacola, Homestead or Kissimmee.

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“It’s really both a cause and an effect,” said Stan Smith, director of the Bureau of Economic and Business Research at the University of Florida. “The recession is causing people to leave and this is an effect of the recession.”