Only 21 of 2,397 South Florida Condo Buildings Take FHA Loans

Here is a number that explains more about the Miami condo market than any price chart. Across Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties there are 2,397 condominium buildings. Twenty-one of them are approved for an FHA loan. That is 0.9 percent, and it comes from HUD data that MIAMI REALTORS published with its July 2026 statistics on August 17, 2026. Everything else about Miami condos, the cash share, the long days on market, the price gap against single-family homes, follows from that one fact. If you are buying, my 2026 Miami pre-construction buyer guide covers the contract side once financing is settled.

Buyers hear "FHA" and think first-time buyer with 3.5 percent down. That is the point. Miami's median condo sold for $400,000 in July 2026, and the loan program built for that exact price point is unavailable in 99 percent of the buildings.

What the 21-Building Number Actually Means

FHA approval attaches to the project, not to the unit or the borrower. The condo association has to get the whole building on HUD's approved list, and that approval expires and has to be renewed. You can look up any building yourself in the HUD condominium lookup, which is the same database the 21-building count comes from.

Buildings fall off the list for reasons that have nothing to do with how nice the units are. Reserve funding below the required level. Active litigation. Too high a share of investor-owned or rented units. More than 15 percent of owners delinquent on dues. Structural repairs identified but not finished. Post-Surfside, South Florida associations carry more of all five than associations in most states, and many boards simply stopped renewing an approval that costs money and paperwork.

Why Miami Condo Buyers Pay Cash Instead

The financing gate shows up directly in how Miami condos get bought. Cash covered 47.5 percent of Miami existing condo sales in July 2026 against 21.2 percent of single-family sales, per MIAMI REALTORS. At the top of the market it is close to total: 82 percent of Miami $1 million-and-up condo sales in 2025 were all cash. Nationally about 26 percent of home sales are cash, according to NAR.

Some of that is foreign capital and buyers moving equity from more expensive markets. But a large share is buyers who would happily take a mortgage at the 6.54 percent average 30-year rate Freddie Mac reported for July 2026, and cannot, because the building will not clear a lender's project review.

Here is how the two halves of the same county compare in July 2026:

Measure, July 2026	Miami-Dade condos	Miami-Dade single-family
Median sale price	$400,000, down 1.48%	$685,000, up 3.79%
Cash share of closings	47.5%	21.2%
Months of supply	12 months, buyer's market	4.8 months, seller's market
Median days to sale	125 days, from 107	88 days, from 85
Percent of original list received	93%	96%

Source: MIAMI REALTORS July 2026 statistics, released August 17, 2026. Note that condo sales still rose 11.4 percent year over year to 1,026 closings, and condo inventory fell 11.79 percent to 11,324 listings. Demand is not the problem. The lending pipe is narrow.

The August 3 Full-Review Rule Narrowed the Financed Lane Further

On August 3, 2026, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac retired the Limited Review, the streamlined project check that had covered roughly 40 percent of condo project reviews. Loan applications dated on or after that day need a full project review unless the project qualifies for a waiver, which CNBC reported on August 1, 2026 means lenders now examine association reserves, insurance and building condition in detail on far more deals. I wrote up the mechanics in the full breakdown of the 2026 Fannie Mae condo rules.

MIAMI REALTORS frames the change as a move toward a more transparent lending environment, and long term I agree. Short term it means a building that quietly passed on a streamlined check last year may not pass this year. The practical effect for buyers:

• Approval timelines stretch, because the lender is now reading the association's budget, reserve study and insurance certificates rather than skipping them.
• Some buildings that financed fine in 2025 will come back ineligible in 2026 on a technical point in the documents.
• Once a lender completes a full review, the project is recorded as approved, so the second buyer in that building has an easier path than the first.
• Sellers in weak-reserve buildings lose financed buyers first, which is where price concessions start.

The question I get asked is what a unit is worth. The question that decides the deal is whether anyone can get a loan on the building. I check the second one first.Gerardo Gonzalez, Licensed Agent at Compass

How I Handle Condo Financing on a Miami Deal Right Now

My advice on this is to reverse the usual order of a condo search. Most buyers pick the unit and then find out what the lender says. In 2026 I pull the building's financing status before I take a client to see anything, because it decides both what they can borrow and what they can resell to. Concretely, I want four documents before an offer: the current year budget, the most recent reserve study, the insurance certificate, and the last twelve months of board minutes. My guide on reading a Miami condo building's financial health walks through what to look for in each one.

The delinquency line and the reserve percentage are the two numbers that predict a financing problem best. If more than 15 percent of owners are behind on dues, or reserves are funded thin against a known structural repair, assume the building will be a cash-buyer market and price your offer that way. Florida's structural reserve requirements are the backdrop to all of this, and my SB 4-D special assessments guide explains why so many South Florida associations are carrying repair obligations that lenders now read line by line.

If a building genuinely will not finance conventionally and you still want it, the honest options are cash, a portfolio lender, or a DSCR loan if the unit will be rented. All three cost more than a warrantable loan, and that extra cost belongs in your purchase price, along with the fact that your eventual buyer hits the same wall. Run the real carrying number too: my true cost of owning a Miami condo breakdown covers dues, insurance and assessments.

Call me at (305) 964-8614 or email [email protected] and I will check a specific building's FHA and warrantability status before you spend a weekend touring it.

Last verified August 18, 2026: the 21-of-2,397 FHA approval count, cash shares, prices, inventory and days-on-market figures are from the MIAMI REALTORS July 2026 statistics release published August 17, 2026, which cites U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development data for the FHA count. The 30-year rate is the Freddie Mac July 2026 average. The Limited Review retirement date is from the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac 2026 condo policy changes effective August 3, 2026.