ISLAND REAL ESTATE
Caribbean Castaway Global Buyers Find a Second Home in the Bahamas by Sunny Alexander
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here do you go to get away when you already live in a classic get away location like Tampa? The Caribbean of course! From the beautiful beaches of the Bahamas in the North to the ABC Islands in the South, the Caribbean offers over 700 islands with something for everyone. Deciding to take a vacation in the Caribbean is a no-brainer. But have you ever let yourself fantasize about taking the leap from being a tourist to becoming a local? Just for a moment, imagine yourself in the market for a luxury home in the Caribbean. For Jim Bernard, helping people turn that fantasy into a reality is just another day at the office.
So, who in the world buys a home in the Bahamas? According to Jim, even though the Bahamas attract a global market, they see most of their international buyers coming from the U.S. or Canada. He believes that is primarily due to the proximity and ease of access to their vacation homes. The largest percentage of their U.S.-based buyers tend to come from Florida and New York while the majority of their Canadian buyers are out of Ontario. Interestingly, in the past year, Jim sold second homes to buyers from Mexico, France, Switzerland and India.
In Jim’s experience, both condos and single-family homes are popular in the Bahamas luxury real estate market. Clients looking for Jim took the plunge into real estate a simple, turn key second home in the Bahamas in 2005 and “never with low maintenance are drawn looked back.” Today, he works at to condos. Of course, that comes Bahamas Realty which is affiliated at the expense of privacy. Clients with LeadingRE/Luxury Portfolio who value privacy go for the singleInternational and he specializes in family homes. Although singlethe luxury second home market. family homes require a property Clearly, his specialty is a recipe manager to assist with the day-tofor success because Bahamas day maintenance and operations Realty named Jim as its overall Top of the home, they offer significantly Producer for 2017. more privacy for the home owner. 18 TAMPA REALTOR® • July - August 2018
Since the Bahamas are currently a buyer’s market, Jim is seeing properly priced listings averaging six months on the market and they have plenty of inventory and opportunity for buyers to find their dream home at the best possible price. And, since most of his second buyers are also cash buyers, financing is not an issue. For those of us who don’t have that kind of money lying around, they have several Canadian Banks in the Bahamas willing to offer financing to foreign home buyers at slightly higher LTV rations than local loans. Visit BahamasRealty.bs to check out the going rates for luxury properties in the Bahamas.
Sunny Alexander graduated from West Point and subsequently served six years in the Army. She has a master’s degree in communication and has over 10 years’ experience in the real estate and business development fields. She is a REALTOR® with Tomlin St Cyr.