Apopka FL is a town to keep on your radar....here's why

[Russell Holmes]

This is an informational post for anyone interested in the Central Florida area to consider Apopka in your search. It's not about specific deals or asset classes even, but it all comes back to that when an area explodes.  The fuse in Apopka is lit and has been burning a good number of years.  I'm not referring to the overall market.  For a moment, who knows or cares what that is doing, think of this discussion in a "flat appreciation" frame of mind independent of what the overall 'housing market' does or doesn't do.

  Apopka is a town that gets skipped over in most Orlando news, and it blows my mind due to the billions of dollars of development happening right now right here in Apopka.  It's such an 'ignored' town that my Dad's nickname for it growing up was "Apopka-tucky".  Do with this info as you see fit, but as I get to a point of being able to build my investment portfolio, I will stay within a few miles of my home with every property. Not for convenience, but for market stability and growth I see all around me every day.  I feel there's intense growth approaching.  All of the corporate centers around: Maitland, Lake Mary, Orlando, UCF, are all becoming limited on land.  Apopka has literally thousands of acres of raw undeveloped land.  I believe geographically speaking it is one of the largest cities, much of which has been slowly turning from agriculture to neighborhoods with 0.2 acre lots.

I've quite often been a big 'cheerleader' for Apopka on BP, maybe to a fault.  But I love this little country town about 25 minutes Northwest of Orlando and I hope any central florida investor at least considers looking here.  I feel like the signs are all around that it's going to be massive, and sooner rather than later.  Forget, for a moment what the market does this year or next. I'm not even talking 3-4.  Nobody really truly knows exactly what home prices will do.  What I do know for absolute fact is that the 32712 and 32703 zip codes are going to see absolute huge gains in the next decade or two.  We still fall well behind Orlando proper in price per square foot, a bit less behind in market rents.  But the market pricing doesn't seem to be paying attention to what is and has been obvious all around me since at least 2002. Apopka is going to be the next Lake Nona, Lake Mary, or College Park.  

  I grew up a few miles East in Altamonte Springs just across the Seminole County line and loved the area in the late 80s and early 90s.  By the late 90s, Altamonte was overrun by unrestrained and un-planned growth by way of low income apartments next to 30-40 lot neighborhoods with warehouses and auto body shops behind. By the early 2000s, those low income apartments were getting low-grade rehabs and sold at stupid premiums as condos, just in time for a bunch of people to buy them for $200-300k only to see prices fall to below $100k, foreclosures skyrocket, and HOAs fail miserably.  There's no "central Altamonte Springs" despite their marketing efforts with Uptown Altamonte and the failing Altamonte Mall.  I watched Altamonte flounder while seeing the longest serving mayor in the US, John Land, carefully plan and oversee 'his' city of Apopka for 60+ years until shortly before his death in 2014.  We had a shifty lobbyist mayor who slipped his way in when the other mayor bowed out abruptly for health reasons.  This slick fella stuck around and cleaned out reserves for four years, blowing through millions to his buddies. We kicked him out as a collective and have a great local insurance broker as Mayor since 2018, Bryan Nelson, who's whipping the budget into shape in some brilliant ways, including a massive pay cut himself. 

When ready to buy in 2009, way before finding BP or getting my real estate license, I ultimately chose to buy a home in Apopka.  I bought my house 10 years ago even now after having exponentially more knowledge of the market, I would 100% buy it again today even at today's price with 42% appreciation since purchase.  Apopka wasn't big enough at the time of the crash to be littered with apartments-turned condos-turned foreclosures.  It is almost entirely single family homes with many dating back to the early 1900s on original bumpy brick roads with thousands more built in the boom that has been happening since 2002.  Prices dropped in the recession and there were of course foreclosures like anywhere, but builders (the financially stable ones) were still building houses at a steady pace through it all.  Yet drive 5 minutes and there are actual cows and actual fields, several natural springs, nature preserves..... it's night and day from downtown Orlando 25 minutes away.

The wekiva parkway toll project http://www.wekivaparkway.com/ has brought Orlando Toll Road access to Apopka and Mount Dora making commuting easier than from more gridlocked cities closer to Orlando.  Developers have been feverishly building homes and developing land for more communities in and around Apopka, now spreading to Mt. Dora as well.  One DR Horton neighborhood just across the Mt. Dora line has something like 246 houses going in with resort style clubhouse amenities.   Down the road a short way is still massive acreage working farms.

in 2017 Florida Hospital (Now Advent Health) opened a $203 million hospital campus at the hub of toll roads 414/429.  That immediately spiked property values in the surrounding area by 20-30% when the overall market saw 10% growth.  Countless builder neighborhoods followed suit and a luxury apartment complex sprang from the ground with the cheapest 1/1 going for $1200/mo and 3/2 apartments for $1750/mo.

Then comes news that Orlando Health bought 51 acres in North Apopka.  I don't think they've confirmed plans or timeline for build, but obviously an eventual hospital facility.

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/health/os-orlando-...

So that's a pretty big deal for a second huge new hospital to come on the heals of the first.  Then I read that Coca Cola is adding 20,000 square feet to their Apopka R&D facility in town and in talks to build a 300,000 square foot bottling plant on a different 90 acre Apopka parcel:

https://www.bizjournals.com/orlando/news/2019/01/2...

Lots of construction jobs to build and then more permanent jobs once complete.  Just today I see this new article about GOYA foods having plans for 330,000 square feet of processing facility in Apopka as well:

https://www.orlandoweekly.com/Blogs/archives/2019/...

There are countless other businesses building and developing smaller less news worthy projects that collectively are huge too.  There's also a "City Center Apopka" project underway starting with a hotel next to a historic mansion that serves as an event venue.  Next phase is pedestrian friendly businesses and boardwalk around an existing pond with fountain.  In north Apopka close to the Orlando Health parcel is another larger approved 600 acre development called Kelly Park Crossing. It's going to be a mixed use development planned.  So far I believe Publix is the only confirmed with plans to build there, but retail, commercial, sf and mf residential are planned/approved in the future land use guidelines.

I'm still working to build capital myself to get my first investment single family or duplex, helping clients along the way to buy singles and small multi for rentals or flips.  I'm nowhere near the 'pay grade' of these multi-million dollar development projects. However, paying attention to these massive projects is extremely exciting for the $150k little basic house that could be worth $300k well before a College Park house doubles in value. 

So BP, am I just being extremely biased to my home town or does it look to anyone else like the figurative lid is about to blow off this little under-valued town in the next 10 years? 

[Russell Holmes]

@Evan Kiggen and @Shawn G. thanks for the replies!  I had almost forgot I made this post with the lack of replies it got, haha.  Shawn's right though, all the hype going toward Orlando is great for those of us searching the outskirts.  

By the way, Evan, I highly recommend checking out the Orlando meetup Shawn and a few other locals coordinate on a monthly basis: https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/521/topics/704331-central-florida-real-estate-investment-hub-meetup I'm a regular attender but can't take any credit for how incredible it is, I'm in awe every month.

The first few were a handful of people talking Real Estate at a local diner.  Now it has swelled to what, 35 people or so Shawn?  I think there are 60+ in the group chat app, but not all can make each meeting.   We've got speakers scheduled each month and ongoing conversation in a group chat app between meetings.  Several members of the group work together on different projects and share freely. Some self manage condos and others syndicate apartment complexes.  Just last week an incredible property manager spent several hours teaching us all how we could feasibly manage properties ourselves, thereby not needing her services.  Sure down the road with too many doors it may circle back to her for clients, but where else does a PM share their secrets and say "you can do this without me!".  The meeting last month was several members of the group doing a 'deep dive' into their deals and next month is an Attorney.