The late night comics, the press, the pundits at FAUX NEWS, The Twitter-verse, and TikTok Creators poke fun of the crazy sh*t that happens in Florida, Last week they took aim at the Key West county jail. Our real jail a few years ago below.     FROM THE SMOKINGGUN.COM   Florida inmate charged with assaulting his roommate told cops that the victim “farts too much stinking up the cell” and fails to “give a courtesy flush” after using their shared toilet, according to an arrest report. Investigators allege that Christopher Callen, 33, pummeled Amado Dominguez-Quevedo, 57, during a confrontation Thursday night inside their cell at the Monroe County Detention Center in Key West. Callen (seen above) has been jailed since his arrest in late-September for failing to register as a sex offender w... 11/17/2021

This is a true story. A few years ago a husband & wife team in Ky West at a real estate office where I worked several years ago. They went to the Ft. Zach Taylor to have a picnic lunch at the beach. That's Ft Zach Beach in the photo above. I put an "X" to mark the spot where today's story occurred.  They saw a woman running around in her bathing suit frantically waiving at a cruise ship as it was sailing away from the Mallory Square Pier. The woman and her husband were passengers on the ship. They rented a scooter to see the island. They went to the beach and let time slip away. All of their clothes were on the boat and it was headed toward Mexico. They asked the Realtor couple what they should do. My friend suggested that they stay in Key West a few days and then rent a car and meet th... 11/16/2021

 Key West has been alive with tourists and wannabe homeowners ever since the barriers were removed from US 1 and the Key West International Airport started to allow outsiders inside. I thought we'd get a rest after Fantasy Fest. Nope, they are still here or replacements keep coming in. I have never seen anything like this. There are a lot of potential buyers for Key West properties waiting for something nice to buy. I have just the place you may be looking for.    OPEN HOUSE SUNDAY November 14 12:00 to 2:00  1621 Sunshine DriveOffered at $1,300,000 by Preferred Properties Key WestGary Thomas, REALTOR, Listing Agent It could be YOUR HOME by Christmas!      11/14/2021

Just Listed by yours truly: 1621 Sunshine Drive, Key West. This is a Two Story Three Bedroom / Three Bath 1,672 Square Foot Home built new in 2012. It is located two blocks from the White Street Pier and the Atlantic Beaches.   But you won't need to go to the beach because you have your own heated pool and tropical garden located right outside your living room or which can be viewed from the deck off your second floor master bedroom.  There is more to this home than its excellent location and heated pool with tropical gardens. Let's take a look starting from the front door.The house has Hardie Board Siding and Wind Impact Resistant Doors and Windows. The front and rear porches and decks were recently replaced with Lumberrock Premium Decking. The home was recently painted as well.   A gu... 11/13/2021

All I can say is that I am waiting patiently by my computer for photos from the photographer. I will post them to the new listing, and the listing will appear like magic in tomorrow's blog. The three bedroom / three back house has a heated pool, two off street parking spaces, great location, and will be priced to sell quickly. It won't arrive early. It wont be late. It will be on Open House on Sunday beginning at !2:00 and close at 2:00.  Don't call me now because I can't reveal anything else. Can't show early either.   11/12/2021

 Just Listed: 809 Washington Street #102, Key West, Florida. I have sold four units in this nine unit town home development located in the tony Casa Marina Area of Key West. I have lived in the Casa Marina Ares for 27 years and love it. We are close to just about everything that Key West has to offer but far enough removed not to be in all the hullabaloo except when we want to be. The listing Realtor describes this 1800 sq ft town home this way:   Located in the much sought after Casa Marina neighborhood and set back from the street with mature tropical landscaping, is a well maintained townhome with 3 en-suite bedrooms and a well appointed powder room on the main floor. Custom finishes throughout with Carlisle wood flooring. The kitchen consists of stainless steel appliances and granit... 11/08/2021

 A loyal reader of my blog sent me a text on Friday asking if the Hilton Garden Inn had sold recently. I knew no sale went through the Key West MLS but decided to search the Monroe County Property records. And there it was: the hotel  sold on October 12, 2021 for $58,000,000. The buyer is a new LLC under BLACKSTONE REAL ESTATE in New York City. BLACKSTONE purchased a smaller neighboring property for an additional $5,000,000 on the same day. As I said these sales were not reported in the Key West MLS Readers of my blog will recall I started posting photos of the renovation of North Roosevelt Boulevard in 2013 which included the former Holiday Inn. When the building was renovated and expanded the property was rebranded as Hilton Garden Inn. Other 1970 hotels and motels were each renovated... 11/07/2021

A decade ago I sold one of my favorite homes in Key West to a lovely couple from the Midwest. They looked at houses for a couple of years during and after the Great Recession in 2008. They had cash to buy the perfect or imperfect house. They chose the latter. They engaged a premiere architect and builder and rebuilt their dream house. They added one of those new-fangled tv cameras to the front porch which allowed them to watch Key West in real time from their place up north.    The gentleman owner looked like Mr. Wilson from the Dennis the Menace tv show from the 1960s except he was a soft-spoken man - not one to get prissy about anything like Mr. Wilson.  My owner had true Midwest values but appreciated the quirky Key West lifestyle. To a point. He had a Rule, however: Thou Shall Not S... 11/04/2021

Yesterday I blogged about the sale of an empty lot in the tony Casa Marina Area of Key West. Astounding price. Two days on the market. Later in the day a fellow Realtor listed a small guest house near my office for over $6 million. Bonkers Asking Price or so I thought. We shall see what happens to that. Shortly after seeing the listing post in the MLS I saw a transaction hit the Monroe County Clerk of Court Record in the DEEDS section. Two guest houses located on Duval Street sold to one buyer. First, let's look at what they were.1317 Duval Street over the yearsGuest cabinsCasa Blano ApartmentsStill apartments in 1973. Image by Edwin O.Swift IIIMost recently Avalon Guest House1012 Duval StreetPhoto from the mid 1960s. From 2009 1012 Duval Gardens Hotel  Current Duval Gardens Hotel Okay,... 10/30/2021

I blogged about 1420 Whalton Street a couple of times over the past five years. It was a mid-century house located in one of the best locations in Key West. I showed the place to several people who hemmed and hawed. They had reservations. I told them to buy it, rent it, and bank the place. I said it would only go up in value. I was told that the guy that owns the house across the street bought it to prevent someone from building a monster house on the lot. He paid $1,182,747 or $277 per sq ft in March 2020. Then he took the house down, filled in the pool, and put up a fence to keep people out. I was in Colorado on September 20th of this year when the new owner listed this same lot for sale at $1,450,000. I planned to call the listing agent up to discuss blogging about the property. I th... 10/29/2021

Above photo taken October 24, 2014 across the street from Bourbon Street Pub. That's somebody's mother. It has nothing to do with real estate. Just wanted to post it in remembrance of that day. I started today's blog on February 14, 2011 but did not post it. I found it while searching the word "auction" because today, October 28th, is the anniversary of the day I purchased my first property in Key West. Take a brief read. What I wrote then is playing again.  I hosted an Open House yesterday. Quite successful, in fact. I had 107 plus people.I got so busy I lost track while talking to potential buyers. I kept hearing similar remarks about how much the market has recovered and how much so many people want to buy a place here. There were, of course, the neighbors and lookie-loos who show up... 10/28/2021

  901 Elizabeth Street is located in the X Flood Zone near the tippy Top of of the Island of Key West. In fact the top spot is located just one block north and was once called Buzzards Roost. The present house replaced an earlier building identified as MEAT that appeared in the 1892 Sanborn Fire Map when it was identified as 437 Olivia Street. A new house of different size and location on the lot appeared in the 1892 map. The address was changed to 901 Elizabeth Street on the 1899 map. The aerial photo above shows a carport on the right side of the 7,100 Square Foot Lot (100 feet on Elizabeth Street by 71 feet on Olivia Street). The house three fairly good size porches on the south, west, and north facing sides. There are two additions to the original square house. The single family hou... 10/27/2021

 Do you recognize this Key West location? If you are a local or returning visitor to Key West you probably have walked or driven by it many times. The two buildings in the rear are your clue. If you are a Keywester in your late 70s you might be one of the children. The dark areas of the map show the breadth of the destruction caused by the Great Fire of 1886.  I found some photos on the Monroe County Library website which show how the parking lot behind the children came  to be - FIRE. Not the Great Fire of 1886 that destroyed so many homes and buildings but the one that took down the First Baptist Church and torched two homes across Eaton Street.   The ground breaking for the Masonic Temple at 535 Eaton Street in July 1950. Photo by Key West Photo Service. The Masonic Temple at 535 Eat... 10/25/2021

  Long time readers of my real estate blog know how much I value photos to help add meaning to my posts. I confess I watch repeat episodes of The Three Stooges. I watched the shows as a kid and as an adult. Some are funny. Some are hysterical. And the short entitled Dutiful But Dumb (1941) are prophetic so much so that I stopped eating dinner on Saturday to pen this piece. The episode was described this way in The Three Stooges Online Filmography: Three dimwitted photographers are sent to Vulgaria to take pictures of a new death ray machine. Unknown to the stooges, the penalty for snapping pictures in this country is death. The stooges manage to escape a firing squad and the chase begins as they hide from the Vulgarian army. As I watched the stooges get into trouble with the police for ... 10/23/2021

 I was rummaging around my old shoebox and found some photos of the old Albury House on Southard Street. The house was purchased over a decade ago but it still seems like it was only a couple of years. It is absolutely perfect now. But it was totally different in 2009 when I took these photos. Enjoy.             The back side of the house looked like it might fall off. It didn't. A pool would be built in the open space. The old kitchen was made new with doors that open wide to view the pool. But back 2009 kitchen was but a wreck of a relic. And that is why this house was so incredible before it was made perfect.  I sell houses to rich people because nobody else can afford them.    10/19/2021

  1009 Southard Street, Key West, Florida as it appears today on one of the most important blocks as far as Key West architecture is concerned. I wrote about this house in my blog many years ago. I recently showed it and was reminded of all the potential this house had then and has now. Like many old homes in Key West it was re-purposed by former owners many years ago but retains critical usage advantages today that give a future owner multiple options.  When we look at the historic photos below you will see how the two buildings changed and how those changes may make this property more valuable than it would seem.  The 1965 photo shows us how much the house changed since even then. The screens were removed opening the first floor front porch. A second level porch was added. An existing... 10/18/2021

"Through the crystal-clear air Lori could hear the ringing of the agent's bell...that had begun when the package had first been sighted, carefully picking it's way past the outer reefs toward the lighthouse at Whitehead's Point."          - Thelma Strabel, Reap the Wild Wind 401 South Street, Key West sits opposite what was once called Whitehead's Point. Tourists from all over the world come here to take photos as a remembrance of the best vacation of their lives. I would suggest the ideal buyer must really like people because people will stand across the street from your home every day to take photos of themselves for as long as you own the property - or as I did the wee hours of the morning when nobody, not even the who wakes up our chickens, was awake. But at night when the tourists ... 10/17/2021

Not too long ago I was passing time with a local real estate attorney before he was to close a deal I was working on. We traded a couple of stories about this and that when I mentioned the name of a former head honcho at a Key West bank. The lawyer's ears perked up. I knew the bank officer was let go after the bank where he worked was closed by the FDIC. The FDIC often keep the big shots and operations managers to maintain institutional knowledge. The lawyer told me the acquiring bank kept the former honcho for a short time and and then sacked him for theft. Not money. Toilet paper. Banks keep meticulous records on money. Apparently they keep tabs on toilet paper as well.    10/12/2021

Just Listed: 1302 Reynolds Street, Key West. This smart looking 2/2 is move-in ready and priced to sell. Offered at $1,150,000. Let's take a look outside and then sneak a peek inside.  The house sits at the corner of Reynolds and United Streets. A white picket fence with gated entrance entrance welcomes visitors into this unexpected treasure.  I had searched through my old shoebox for historic photos of the house. I could not find any. I found photos of nearby houses and then realized the house originally faced United Street and that the enclosed east side porches and deck expansion re-oriented the house toward the east and that the address was changed to Reynolds Street. Upon seeing the house in person I saw a gate on United Street on the west side of the house with steps that led up t... 10/11/2021

I was in Colorado two weeks ago when Roger Emmons of Truman and Company listed an empty lot across the street from where I live for $1,450,000. The corner lot is just 4,265 sq ft or 91' X 47' feet. I previously wrote about the property when there was a 1950s house and pool. Current owner owns the property across the street and took the existing house down and filled in the pool. He bought the property for its land value. He paid $1,182,747 in March 2020. The lot sold in two days on the market and closed this week for $1,400,000 ($328 per square foot land only) or a profit of $217,253 in 18 months. Not bad I'd say. I remember showing the formerly listed property to a know it all who already owned a home here. I told him the value of the lot by itself and suggested he snap it up, rent the... 10/10/2021