Opa-Locka sees highest share of home flips in U.S.

Miami skyline
Miami skyline

South Florida home flippers were less active during the third quarter of 2015, but the region still has more of these quick sales than most of the nation.

According to a RealtyTrac report released Wednesday, 8.6 percent of all South Florida’s home and condo sales during the third quarter were home flips. The analytics company defines a flip as selling within 12 months of the last purchase at arms length, meaning the two parties don’t have a relationship with each other.

At that percentage, South Florida ranks second in the country for home flips. The only other metropolitan area with a higher rate was Las Vegas with 8.7 percent.

And one Miami zip code actually has the highest ratio of home flips in the country: 33056 in Opa-Locka. That region of the city saw 39 flips during the third quarter, which represented a flat 30 percent of its total sales. Those sales took an average of 156 days before closing and raked in an average profit of $59,492.

Another highly ranked Miami zip code was 33147, which is east of Hialeah. Ranked 12th in the nation, the area had 27 flips, or roughly 25 percent of its home sales during the third quarter. They stayed on the market for an average of 128 days before selling, and brought in an average of $51,921 in profit.

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The best neighborhood to flip was the 21229 zip code in Baltimore, Maryland. Out of the 16 homes flipped there, the average profit was $67,517, which breaks down to a 136 percent return on investment. Those houses aren’t exactly quick sells, though: their average time before closing was 238 days.

Daren Blomquist, vice president of RealtyTrac

Daren Blomquist, vice president of RealtyTrac

“After curtailing flipping activity last year due to slowing home price appreciation and shrinking inventory of flip-worthy homes, real estate investors have started to jump back on the flipping bandwagon in 2015,” Daren Blomquist, vice president at RealtyTrac, wrote in the report. “On the acquisition side, investors are finding creative ways to pinpoint potential flips in the off-market arena, and on the disposition side investors have a bigger pool of potential buyers thanks to a surge in FHA buyers this year, many of them first-time buyers looking for starter homes.”

Though South Florida and its neighborhoods still lead the country for home flips, these types of investment sales have been gradually declining — besides a slight uptick during the second quarter. The first quarter of 2015 had a 25 percent decrease in home flips year-over-year, and the third quarter has fallen significantly from the 9.6 percent ratio seen in the second quarter.