Florida Has 1.5 Million Empty Homes. Here Is What That Really Means
Shebastian Burley, Realtor®
CENTURY 21 BE3 · Tampa Bay
The number
14.7% of Florida's housing units sit vacant. That is about 1.5 million of the state's 10.3 million homes, fifth highest in the nation, per a LendingTree analysis of Census Bureau data reported by WFTV on August 19. The national average is 10.1%.
The part the headline skips
Vacant does not mean for sale. That count includes vacation homes, seasonal snowbird properties, rentals between tenants, and homes already sold but not yet occupied. Florida runs high on this list every year for one simple reason: a huge share of our housing is second homes. And the rate actually fell, from 15.2% in 2023 to 14.7% in 2024. Meanwhile the median Florida home value sits at $359,000, above the national $332,700.
What it means here
From Sarasota and Venice up through Tampa Bay and Spring Hill, this is seasonal-home country, so our "vacancy" skews even more toward homes that were never on the market to begin with.
If you are selling: you are not competing with 1.5 million empty houses. You are competing with actual active listings, and pricing right on day one still wins.
If you are buying: inventory is genuinely better than it was two years ago. More choice means more room to negotiate.
Want to know what this looks like on your street, not statewide? Let's talk, or see what is actually for sale.
*Source: WFTV: Florida faces 14.7% vacancy rate despite rising home values*