ANNA MARIA ISLAND – The Island’s evolution into a vacation rental destination and the resulting lack of affordable housing has displaced many former permanent residents who rented their homes. Alex Bounds, Matt Bauer, Dawn Mathisen, Tracy Eckert and Rick Lewis have left the Island, while long-time renter Sharon Bell is among those managing to stay. Here are their stories.
Alex Bounds, Matt Bauer
In September 2022, after living on the Island for about 15 years, Matt Bauer, a two-time leukemia survivor, moved from a rental home in Bradenton Beach to an apartment in the Arium Bristol Bay complex in Bradenton. His friend and roommate, Bounds, moved with him and they now live less than three miles from the Island they used to call home. Bauer owns Reel Clean Marine Maintenance and Management and most of his clients are on the Island.
Before they moved off-Island, Bauer and Bounds rented a house on Avenue B they knew was slated for demolition to make room for a new vacation rental house. At the time, they were paying $1,800 a month in rent and The Sun interviewed them regarding their struggle to find an annual rental on the Island.
“I used to live next to three of my best friends. I had two more up the street. Now I only have a couple friends that live out here,” Bauer said. There’s a growing lack of community. It’s a lot of investors trying to make a quick buck renting or flipping their properties and housing on the Island has been monopolized by vacation rentals.
“I have friends that own businesses on the Island and it’s hard for them to find employees because there’s nowhere to live. And if you live off-Island, you spend so much time stuck in traffic,” he said.
“I was born in 1993. My first house was on the Island,” Bounds said. “I lived out here until I was 4 years old. We lived in one of those little cottages in Bradenton Beach. In all my baby pictures, I’m on the beach. To be on the Island is so important to me and it’s sad to see what’s going on.”
Bauer said he and Bounds are still living at Arium and are doing well.
“It’s kind of weird getting used to living in an apartment with the dogs and everything, but I can’t complain. I’m still close to the Island. I work out there just about every day, but once I get off work I don’t hang out on the Island much anymore. I usually just go home.”
Bauer hopes to live on the Island again someday.
“Our lease is up in September. I don’t know if I’m going to stay or find something else. I’m still trying to find a long-term rental but some don’t allow dogs. I’d like to rent a house out there for a year or two and then maybe buy one someday. Business has been really good and it’s growing a lot since I took over,” Bauer said.
Dawn Mathisen
Mathisen now lives in the Pine Bay Forrest condominium near 75th Street and Manatee Avenue, about five miles from the Island. She sells and rents electric bikes at Beach’N Bikes on Cortez Road, just east of the Cortez Bridge, and often rides her E-bike out to the Island. On Saturday, she took one of the new semi-recumbent trikes for a test ride on the Island.
When asked how she’s adjusted to living off-Island, she said, “To avoid cognitive dissonance, I make the best of it.”
The Sun first interviewed Mathisen in 2022, after she’d been displaced from the Island.
“I lived on Anna Maria Island for four years. I started in Holmes Beach, living with a friend from Indianapolis. I’ll never forget the first time I came across the Cortez Bridge. That was magical. After my housemate got married, I met my next housemate, English Jim. He’d been on the Island for 15 years and I lived with him for about three years, until he got cancer, moved back to England and passed away,” she said.
She then moved to the other side of the Intracoastal Waterway and rented a mobile home in Cortez Park, near the east end of the Cortez Bridge.
“I lived there until the mobile home was sold. I was there three years and that was my first place here without a roommate.”
When asked what she loves about the Island, she said, “I loved everything about it. The natural beauty, meeting the local people and being able to walk to the local pubs. Everyone can see how it’s changed. There are so many more monstrosity-sized vacation rentals and Airbnb’s. The very charm of Anna Maria Island that the gatekeepers like to sell is being destroyed.
“We’ve lost most of our affordable housing on the Island and it’s happening all across the county too. There’s going to be repercussions: staffing shortages and overworked employees. There’s a lot of young people busting their humps working at the restaurants and bars. They make good money but they can’t afford to live on the Island. Don’t treat the local residents like the Native Americans of the past and tell us to take our things and get out,” she said.
“I was renting for $600 a month when I first moved to the Island,” she said, adding that she now considers $1,200 to $1,400 a month to be affordable housing.
Would she ever live on the Island again?
“Probably not, but I want to because I still love the Island and the people. As unhappy and uneasy as I am with the progression of capitalism on the Island, there are still a lot of things to appreciate – seeing a local band at a local bar, seeing people you’ve known for many years and meeting people you’ve never met,” she said, noting that a return to the Island would probably require roommates and a second job.
Tracy Eckert
Tracy Eckert, a retired emergency room nurse, now owns a mobile home in a large mobile home park in St. Petersburg.
He moved to St. Pete in April 2021 after spending 17 years as a rental resident on Avenue B in Bradenton Beach.
He spent 11 years in his first rental unit and paid $850 a month. He voluntarily left that location because the building was dilapidated and was later demolished and replaced by a vacation rental home. He spent five years at his second rental unit and one year at his third rental unit on Avenue B.
“In May 2021, after five years there, my landlord gave me written notice that I had to move out. This was during the height of COVID and I was treating COVID patients at the hospital in St. Pete. It put me in a bind trying to find an affordable place to rent on the Island. It was a hardship financially and emotionally during the height of COVID. I was paying $1,150 a month. The place I found after that was $1,700 and it too was later slated for demolition to make room for a vacation rental.”
Eckert and his dog, Martini, then moved off the Island and into an apartment at Perico Bay Club on Manatee Avenue for a few months before moving to St. Pete.
“I like having my own yard and garden, a hot tub, a billiards room, a pool and it’s not too far from the beach, but it’s not the Island. I miss the Island life. I lived there for about a third of my adult life. I got to know so many people in my 17 years there. I miss my friends. I miss walking across the street to get to the beach. I miss the Island, but its best days have passed and greed has taken over.
“When I moved to the Island, there were 12 residences and two vacation rentals on my block. Now it’s like 10 vacation rentals and four residences. The restaurants are getting more expensive and everything is now geared toward the tourists and not the locals. The ‘old Florida’ experience is gone. It’s more reasonable living off the Island and you get a lot more bang for your buck,” he said.
“I’ll always have good memories of my time on the Island. Everybody seemed to know each other and everybody knew your name. There was a great sense of community but we’ve lost a lot of that. I remember when we were begging for more tourists. Now we have too many. I had a great 17-year run, but unfortunately, it came to an end,” Eckert said.
He still visits the Island but doesn’t expect to live there again.
“I can’t afford it.”
Rick Lewis
Former Island resident Rick Lewis grew up in northwest Bradenton and had a lifelong connection to the Island.
“I was out here a lot. This was part of our playground,” he said.
Lewis now lives on his monthly Social Security benefits and his last Island home was a rented living area in an Anna Maria home he helped care for while the owners were away.
“I was there for three or four years and I moved out last June, in 2022. On Memorial Day weekend, the owners told me they were going to put the house up for sale. I didn’t have a lease. It was just kind of a monthly thing. In early June, I was told I had to be out by the end of the month,” he said.
Lewis stayed with a friend in Port Charlotte for a few months and then relocated to a friend’s home in Parrish. He also travels back and forth to Pine Island to care for a home while his friends are vacationing. He also helped care for their dog, who recently passed away.
Last week, Lewis was back on the Island taking care of a house in Holmes Beach while the owner was on vacation.
“I’ve been bouncing around doing that but I don’t have a stable place,” he said.
A few months ago, Lewis bought a rooftop tent for his old Toyota pickup truck. After he clears up a medical issue, he plans to take his truck and tent to North Carolina to try living there. He also hopes to take some road trips in his mobile rig.
Before moving to Anna Maria, Lewis rented a studio apartment in Holmes Beach for about eight years.
“I lived on the Island for 10 or 11 years. I can’t afford to live out here anymore. When I first moved to the Island, my studio apartment in Holmes Beach was $550 a month, plus electricity. Then it went up to $600. My landlord died and his son took over and sold the place. Then I found the place in Anna Maria that I lived in until last year. There’s still a few hidden gems around, but they’re hard to find and you have to get lucky,” Lewis said.
When asked what he misses most about living on the Island, Lewis said, “Being able to ride my bike to wherever I want to go. And the salt air. I need to be around water. I’m happier around water,” he said.
Lewis doesn’t think he’ll live on the Island again.
“I’d like to, but I can’t afford $1,200 to $1,600 a month for a one-bedroom, and that’s the market rate almost everywhere else too. In the old days, people worked on the Island and lived on the Island. Now they can’t afford it, or they need three or four people living together to afford a place. Normal working people can’t afford to live out here and we’ll never have that again,” Lewis said.
Sharon Bell
Sharon Bell recently moved from her previous apartment on Avenue C to a two-bedroom apartment on Avenue C where she now pays $1,850 a month in rent. Bell tends bar at The Doctor’s Office in Holmes Beach, where she mixes and serves martinis and other craft cocktails.
“It’s the most rent I’ve ever paid, but it’s still a good deal. The reason I have the place is the guy who lived here for 22 years before me, Don White, recommended me. His girlfriend, Cindy, has an apartment in the same building and they decided to consolidate into one apartment. I don’t think I would have got this place without his reference,” Bell said.
“I moved to the Island in early 2018 after I started working at the Drift In in Bradenton Beach. I moved into one of the ‘Carter Cottages’ on Third and Highland that have since been mowed down. There were four units. Charlie Woods lived back there. So did David Marshall and Martha Kelley. Jen from Island Time too. I paid $650 a month – $600 if I paid before the first of month. I could walk to work and live on the Island.
“Then I moved to Avenue B and 24th Street on a 10-month lease, then I moved to a triplex near the entrance to Seaside Gardens in Holmes Beach and lived there until it was sold. Then I spent a couple years in a four-plex behind the Anchor Inn until the owner sold it. I was paying $1,350, then $1,450 a month. It sat vacant for six months or so and someone just told me it’s now renting for $2,000 a month,” Bell said.
Although her monthly rent consumes a considerable chunk of her earnings, Bell’s grateful she still lives on the Island.
“I feel blessed. Most places are going for more, even off the Island. Thank God I don’t have any big outstanding debts. I drive a car that I own and I keep my bills low. I have a small second bedroom but I prefer to live by myself. The longest I stayed somewhere was the two years in the four-plex. It’s hard moving all the time, but I love it out here and I don’t want to go anywhere else. Good timing and being part of the community has saved me so far,” Bell said.
When asked if she ever considered leaving the Island, Bell said, “Yes, but this is where my people are. Rent’s gone up everywhere and I’m paying the same as a lot of people are paying in town. I don’t think there’s another employee I work with that has a place on the Island. They don’t even think it’s possible anymore.”
As for what she loves about the Island, Bell said, “The people, the water and it’s a really great community. I’ve had a lot of loss in the past few years and that’s what carries me. One of the things I love about my industry is people come here to make a memory – to get married or celebrate a birthday. They work a whole year to be here for a week. I’m blessed to be here for the whole year surrounded by positivity, sunshine and the water.”
