Top 9 PROS and CONS of living in MIRAMAR Beach FL 2023

So, you're thinking about moving to Miramar Beach, Florida. And you're wondering what the pros are and what the cons are. Well, luckily for you, in this video, we got 9 pros and 9 cons that we're going to knock out for you so that you have the best information prior to making a decision to move here to Miramar Beach.

Well, let's get into, where is Miramar Beach? If you haven't been here to our area, we are right there in the middle of the Emerald Coast. Where's the Emerald Coast? It is from Pensacola all the way down to Panama City Beach. Right? And we're smack dabbed in the middle just a bit off to the strike in Miramar Beach. Now, Miramar Beach is just east of where Destin is if we look at that on the map. And is considered, actually, the far west area of the 30A area. Which is quite interesting, depends on who you talked to. The population of Miramar Beach, according to niche.com, is 8,815. Alright. So, not a big community there, but it's basically an island, but it's really a peninsula. Alright. So, let's hit you with some cons first. I always love getting these out of the way first, and then we'll go into the pros to make it sound real good towards the end because it is. Okay.

CONS

1. TRAFFIC

For the last ten years, I feel like the traffic has just been awful. They're always doing construction on 98. And, it's just so frustrating. Good news is, is that they finally, after all this construction has been done over and over again, have taken that four lane highway and converted it into six. That goes all the way into Destin, until you hit airport road and then it goes back down to four. But there's just so much traffic going down 98, and I'm really, really happy to see that. The construction is still going on. This is 2023 and it's still going on, but we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. A matter of fact, if you've used to this area, you used to be coming in from the east going west, you'd be going through Sandestin, you'd be in the left lane, and all of a sudden that left lane just ended. And it was so frustrating. You're like, I'm going to merge and everybody else forgot to, you know, there's locals mindlessly just going out, oh, man, I'm in the wrong lane. Right? They changed that. So, now it's just three, three four lanes or whatever that go down that way, and the other one just turns into a turning lane. So, it's actually pretty good. So, they have improved it. Now traffic, also in off of Scenic Gulf Drive and Scenic Highway 98, I mean, you're always going to have that, especially during our tourist season, which is usually June through, June, July, August is the peak season. You're going to have a lot of pedestrian traffic. You're going to have a lot of people driving down that road and looking out and not pay attention to anything as well, which I don't blame him because it's absolutely gorgeous. But you're going to get that traffic down there, so just anticipate that.

2. IT GETS HOT AND COLD

It gets hot and cold here. Alright? It can get somewhere up into the 90s, sometimes in the summer, and even as low as 20. We actually have a couple of weeks ago, this is beginning in 2023. We actually got down to, like, 20 degrees. Right? It was really cold for us Floridaians. But, normally you're not going to see that for cold. We usually have about four months of cold, which is somewhere between December and March. And March is when it starts heating up. But cold is relative to us. Average temperature is like 45, 55 degrees, but you'll see warm spurs work get up into the 80s. But we'll see typically around 60s, 70s, low 70s, something like that. It does get hot. If you haven't been here before, the hot makes it more hot with the humidity. So, even so it says 80 something, Just 80 degrees with the humidity, I'm a marathon runner. So, I train during the summer. Don't ask me why, but I just want to run a fall race, somewhere not here. And it is just 80 degrees is as cool as it got. And, it's still 90 something percent humidity and I'm dying. So, if you are into sports and things like that, just keep that in consideration. Okay.

3. CROWDED

It's crowded in the summertime. Go figure, right? This is a tourist town. But again, it does peak somewhere between June and August. Most of your crowds are going to be down towards the beach anyway. And we're going to see a lot of traffic, through traffic on 98. Hopefully, the extra lanes on both sides will help mitigate that.

4. THERE ARE LOTS OF SHORT TERM RENTALS

So, if you're looking to live in this area, just anticipate that there's going to be a lot of not full-time people there. There's a ton of VRBOs, Airbnb's and just rent short term rental managers out there because, I mean, it's the cheap part of 30A, if there's a cheap part of it. If you're curious about this area, ask your local real estate agent, heck, ask us if you are looking to purchase or invest down here, or just check the local HOA's for the specific ones. Now, there are gated communities that are throughout here, which I'll get into a little bit later, which are specifically just for those people that are looking to live there, long term. Alright.

5. HIGHER HOME PRICES

Home prices are higher than the surrounding cities. Right? So, Miramar Beach, it's median single family home price, so the median is $1.15 million. Now, that's as low as $320,000 but as high as 25 mil. 25 mil, that thing was gorgeous. Alright. So, in comparison for single family homes, let's talk about Destin and Niceville. So, Destin has a median single-family home for $950,000. It's the median. Right? And that has a range of $232,000 to $10.2 million. For Niceville, which is just north of this area, you're going to have around $475,000 quite the difference there. And a range of $160,000 to 2 million. Okay. Now, if you're looking for the condo life, which I can't blame you, I'm looking for the condo life down in Miramar, your median or for that area in Miramar Beach is going to be $574,500. And that's a range of $150,000 which is not on the gulf side, it's on the bay side to 4.11 million. Now, let's compare that to Destin. Destin has a average price of $536,500 for their condos or medians. And it's a range of $127,000 to 3.2 million. And, if you want to compare apples to apples with Niceville, well, Niceville doesn't have Gulf front, it's on the Bay. So, take this with a grain salt. But your average or medium price up there is going to be $295,000. That's a range of $121,000 all the way up to 2.6 million. But again, no beautiful gulf front.

6. AIR TRAFFIC

Alright. Moving on to number six for their cons, there's a lot of air traffic. Right? You have Destin airport, but typically, you're just going to see it. You're definitely not going to hear the private airplanes coming in where you're going to be at in Miramar. But you are going to have plenty of the military aircraft. They do exercises where we, I mean, I used to fly. So, we used to do what's called beach runs, the C-130s, and you have all sorts of unique military aircraft and other people who exercises, helicopters, stuff like that. That will be just kind of buzzing down the beach. It's really cool to see if you're into that sort of thing, but you are going to hear aircraft noises throughout that area. Thanks to the military base.

7. FREE PARKING IS IN HIGH DEMAND

There's not a whole lot of it. Especially around Pompano Joe's, that area. But, if you want to get there, you got to get there soon and don't leave. Because there are just constantly people trying to get in there to park. There are some other areas throughout that does have public parking, but it's far and few between and it's usually off the beaten path. A lot of the places down there too, you'd be able to access in different places. There are just different accesses to the beaches, but they're not very big. So, what I would suggest, if you have a cart or close enough to get a golf cart. If you're South of 98, you can have a golf cart and go wherever the heck you want and you won't be so good concerned about the parking.

8. PRIVATE BEACHES

There are private beaches because we're now in Walton County. There's been this big thing for years and years about who owns the beach? Where's the beach? When is it public? When is it private? But most of it's if you're coming from the land side of it, you're not just walking down the beach, and even if you are, it's usually pretty well marked. Just be careful where you set yourself up for a beach day to make sure you're not in any of those private beaches.

9. HIGHER COST OF LIVING

The cost of living is going to be a bit higher here too. Now, if you ever look at cost of living, it's usually on an index of about a hundred. Anything above a hundred is going to be above, anything below is going to be below the national average. Now, overall for Miramar Beach was 126.2, which means is 26.2% higher than the national average for your cost of living.

PROS

Alright. You ready? It's pro time. Alright. Let's talk about the pros of Miramar Beach.

1. SHOPPING

Man, the shopping is awesome there. Okay? You got a good combo of some bargain places as well as high end areas. One thing specific that I would like to mention is the Silver Sands Premium Outlets. This is where all that traffic finally, I think construction's almost done. But there are a ton of different stores throughout here. The infrastructure here is very interesting too because they're still trying to get that sort of beachfront where a lot of things are more whitewashed. To have that more kind of luxury feel for it. So, you're going to see a lot of buildings. Even if you go down to get some food like, Five Guys. It's still in one of those buildings, like, oh, this is a five guys restaurant. We didn't ever I guess. But it's kind of part of the culture that they have there. Leads me to number two, which is that there's great restaurants.

2. GREAT RESTAURANTS

Yes. We've got great Greek restaurants. One of my favorite there is Aegean if you've ever been there. Personally love the chicken Greek salad. Seafood, sometimes seafood with a view. Right? That you can go check out. There's really good Italian places in there, Mexican as well. There's even an Indian place called Holi. We got one in Fort Walton Beach too, which or when I frequent, but when I'm out there, you bet. Holi Indian is really, really good, but it's all over the place. And just because of the high demand with the tourism, there's really good restaurants that you can get to.

3. GATED COMMUNITIES

Like I mentioned earlier, there's a lot of nice gated communities throughout this. So, if you're looking for something that's going to be a little bit more private, a little bit more catered to the locals and you want to become a local hero or a Floridian. Do yourselves a favor and take a look, because there's a lot of small communities. But look on Google Maps, just maps.google.com, and then just look for the shaded areas. If it's shaded, it means that it has a private access and usually has a gate. Now some of these gates are manned, most of which are manned. They'll usually have some sort of key code or something for you to get in there. But those are the areas with those separate places or separate communities.

4. BREATH TAKING BEACHES

You've got, obviously, the white sand beaches flanked with that emerald-colored water, it's absolutely gorgeous. Traffic could be damned, drive down Scenic Highway 98, and you'll see it's absolutely gorgeous. And I'm just taking a slow cruise and just seeing how absolutely gorgeous as it is here. It's amazing.

5. VACATION CONDOS and RENTAL AREA

There's a great mix of vacation condos and rental area. So, it is kind of separated between the two, but it really depends on what sort of environment that you want to live in in order to access what they have there.

6. SCHOOLS

There's really good schools here. Now, if we want to rate them across the board, it's about an A- according to niche.com. So, what are the typical schools that kids go to? Like, kiddos go to? For Miramar Beach, well, first and foremost, is the elementary school, which is Van r Butler, that's where there we go. Middle school is the Emerald Coas and high school in South Walton. Now, if you want to get reviews for that, of course, just Google those names or go to niche.com. That's where we get a lot of reliable information from. And, if you go through the comments, you'll get a real indication of what the school's like. But haven't heard anything really negative.

7. ACCESS TO SANDESTIN

You get access to Sandestin and Sandestin is a resort. It's also on the south side of 98 in the north side. Personally, other than showing different condos, I've spent a lot of relaxation time in the north side. Why? Because it's got great golfing. It's got this place called Baytowne where you've got great dining. There's events all the time. There was tequila and taco fest usually in the fall. Baytowne's Beer fest was a great one too. There's just so many events that are happening in there. There's plenty of art events that happen throughout there. And they've got some pretty good nightlifes too. Baytown and nightlife is pretty nice. If you want to kick it with a tourist. Now, if you do want a little bit more of the local spell, you're not too far away from Destin. Where you can get that in that great nightlife as well. Alright.

8. MORE AFFLUENT

You're on the other end of 30A. Right? And because of this, it's going to feel more affluent. Like I mentioned before, the infrastructure, there's a lot of whitewash on top of it. It's a little bit more decadent. There's a lot more things that you're going to go through that makes it feel like people that spend money and take care of these things. And it's got that sort of 30A feel to it. Which is why I believe that people say that, you know, Miramar and Sandestin is part of 30A. I get it. I don't know how that is because it's not really on 30A, but whatever. Okay.

9. HEALTHCARE

One of the comments that I've got from some people that have lived there that went through us is that health care is really close. So, if that's something that's really important to you, Healthcare is close in both directions, whether you need to get to Destin or we need to get out to South or into Walton, Walton County areas, Sandestin, 30A area, things like that. So, all that healthcare is actually relatively close to be able to help.

Alright. Well, that's all I have for you for the 9 pros and 9 cons of Miramar Beach. If you got any questions about anything I mentioned here, please feel free to call/text us at 850.320.7757 or email us at Admin@WhittemoreGroupRE.com

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