February 18, 2010

The presentation given by Dr. Denslow this evening was very informative and entertaining. I felt as if I was a student back in his classroom at the University of Florida back in 1987.

He gave many reasons of what contributed to the recent bubble we saw in the real estate markets throughout the country, and through the Tampa Bay area. Very jokingly, he went over his past predictions where he predicted that Tampa housing prices would fall in 2004. Of course they went up. He then predicted that they would fall in 2005. Of course, they went up. Same thing for 2006. Then of course, we know what happened afterwards. He was correct, but he was off a bit on his timing. They say economists are the only ones that can be wrong most of the time, and still make a living!

Overall, I would say he is optimistic about the future of the Tampa Bay economy. The demographics should play a huge role in our economic recovery. The number of people that will be retiring in the next 10, 20 years will increase as the baby boomers reach retirement age. This area is geared towards tourism, healthcare, service sector jobs, etc. He predicts unemployment should remain flat for 2010 with improvement through 2013 where he predicts it will improve to about 6.5%. Not bad considered we are at approx 11% right now.

And even though he was optimistic, he was empathetic to those that are still unemployed, and financially struggling, saying how this is unlike anything ever seen before from an economic standpoint. He acknowledged that the employment prospects for this area are still good, and will be important in the economic turnaround.

Labels: david denslow in tampa, future of tampa bay economy, rise and fall of tampa bay economy