Cape Coral sees high demand for apartments, rise in development

Plenty of apartment buildings are in the works in Cape Coral, with more than 1,000 units for families to move into.

There is a demand for apartments. Cape Coral says apartment occupancy is at least 90%.

Developers are also seeing a chance to make money.

Everywhere you look in Cape Coral, there is a lot of construction where developers are building new homes.

“We have a developer that’s working out of Chicago,” said Ricardo Noguera, Cape Coral Economic Development Manager. “That’s the aspire development off of Chiquita, 319 units. We have another development, The Palms on Pine Island Road. We have about four projects under construction and close to 1,000 units.”

Noguera said the city needs these rentals. Demand is high.

“People don’t have a place to live, so people are now renting apartments, and that demand is driving up rental rates,” Noguera said.

The average one bedroom will cost $1,100 a month, and a two bedroom is more than $1,300 a month.

Kathleen Rochford doesn’t mind. She’s been living in an apartment for three months and happy to have it.

“We are building a house, so we need a place to live until our house was being built, which is probably around January, February,” Rochford said. “So I called around all over looking for places, and there’s not a lot apartment complexes here in Cape Coral, but I’m so glad we ended up with this one.”

Noguera hopes more apartments bring more options for people looking to move to the Cape.

“The ones that don’t want to invest in a home that don’t want to take care of the property, they just want to a place to come and go when they move to Florida,” Noguera said. “That’s perfect for them.”

There’s one other reason for the apartment boom: To see if the city can draw a younger crowd.

Noguera told us that’s why they want developers to build apartments with amenities. With more younger people, the hope is that will bring more industry to the Cape Coral.