Feeling Sarasota: Inbal August Brings New York Hustle to Florida’s Gulf Coast

For most of her 25-year career in real estate, Inbal August has been a New Yorker through and through. She started out as a New York City rental broker to put herself through school before going on to join Douglas Elliman in Long Island, where she has worked out of the firm’s Roslyn office for the past 12 years. But when she and her children drove down to the Gulf Coast of Florida for a pandemic escape, August fell in love with Sarasota. In 2021, after “parking” her real estate license at Elliman’s St. Petersburg office and traveling back and forth from New York, she convinced her husband, a longtime real estate investor and developer, and their three children to make it their full-time home. While she still serves clients in Long Island, August is now based out of the brokerage’s Sarasota office and has already established herself, both as an agent and a member of the community. She spoke recently with Elliman Insider about making the move south, the opportunity she sees in the Sarasota market and how sharing her culinary creativity has opened doors in her new hometown. Elliman Insider: What made you fall in love with Sarasota? Inbal August: It’s really about the lifestyle. The vibe is just so nice. People are friendly, very low-key. Everything here is outside. You drink coffee outside, have playdates outside, play sports, you can ride your bike everywhere. And the beaches—the sand is like flour! Just to have the option to get to the beach in 10 or 15 minutes. In New York, I’d have to drive 45 minutes to see seaweed and waves that you can’t even get in. If you want to escape the jungle, you come here. Even Miami can be like New York. With the traffic and the hustle, it’s like you’re just exchanging zip codes. But in Sarasota, you feel like you’re on vacation. The turquoise water, the dolphins, manatees, sea horses—have you ever seen a seahorse in your life? And the sunsets are breathtaking. On Sundays, people go to Casey Key or Siesta Key to watch the sun go down and clap when it sets. EI: What has it been like to transition to a completely new market? IA: I’m hustling! I’m working very hard, and I’m proud of how far I’ve gotten. My first listing was a $14 million listing, and I’ve had good inventory—last month it was $30 million. I think people are realizing what Sarasota is all about. We’re seeing young families coming in from New York and Texas and California. And for people looking for a second home, who are boaters or golfers, Sarasota is a great place as far as price point. Our most expensive listing right now is around $29 million—super luxurious, on the water—where on the east side of Florida, it would be $75-$80 million. We’re seeing a lot of people who check out Naples but are priced out because Naples has become very expensive. They head up north a bit and find that Sarasota can offer them the lifestyle they’re looking for but much more affordably. EI: Where do you see the market going? IA: We have six months’ worth of inventory right now, so the saturation rate is high, and we’re doing a lot of price reductions all across the board. Sarasota is having a moment. It’s like the Hamptons but better. And I think having Elliman here is going to be a huge game-changer. A year from now, I think we’re going to have the majority of the market here, and high-end luxury sellers are going to realize that we can offer them something that nobody else can. Elliman just brings something different to the table. We can give agents and their sellers a platform that enables us to sell our inventory much faster than anybody can. We are a powerhouse. EI: Does Sarasota feel like home at this point? IA: When we first moved here, I had one mission: get my kids settled and build a sense of community. How do you build a sense of community when nobody knows you? Food! I Iove to cook. It brings people together. Every holiday is an opportunity, so I make latkes and sufganiyot for Hanukkah and hamantaschen for Purim. I started making loaves of challah and giving them out to people that I know. I’ve cooked for my clients when they were sick—and I got listings from it! Somebody told me they remembered me because I brought their daughter a pot of vegetable chicken noodle soup and that’s how I got the listing. People remember how you made them feel. EI: What are your favorite things to cook? EA: I’ve been told by numerous people that my babka is much better than Zabars’, but I don’t eat my own babka because don’t like sweets. I like to make savory food—shakshuka, shawarma, falafel, kibbe, hummus. During the pandemic, like everybody else, I cooked a lot, and I thought about going down the road of opening a business. But as I said, cooking for me is about bringing people together. For years, when we lived in New York, my family and I would cook during the holidays and then drive around New York City to give the meals to homeless people. So, this past Christmas, I said to my husband, “Now we have to do it in Sarasota.” First of all, it’s much nicer to do it without all the traffic and it’s not freezing cold. But we actually got to see people eat the meals. We made soup, rice, pasta, vegetables—it was nice. Life is about leaving a legacy. That’s how I see it. It’s not about the money that you make at the end of the day. It’s about what kind of legacy I leave to my kids, my friends, my family. It’s about spreading the love—and love always comes back to you. Inbal August's Shakshuka Ingredients: 2 tablespoons olive oil 1 large onion, diced 8 cloves garlic, minced (not a must but gives the dish a kick) 1 red bell peppers, 1 green pepper, 1 yellow pepper, diced 2 teaspoons paprika 1 teaspoon cumin 12 teaspoon crushed red pepper 8 large tomatoes sliced or diced Salt and pepper, to taste 8-10 eggs For garnish…crumbled feta, fried eggplants or chopped parsley Instructions: Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the onion and garlic and sauté until the onion is soft and translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the diced peppers, paprika, cumin, and chili pepper to the skillet. Cook for an additional 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Pour in the tomatoes and stir to combine. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Simmer the sauce for 10-15 minutes until it thickens slightly. Use a spoon to create 8 wells in the tomato sauce. Crack an egg into each well. Cover the skillet and let the eggs cook for 5-7 minutes, or until the egg whites are set but the yolks are cooked. Remove the skillet from heat and garnish with chopped fresh parsley, feta or fried eggplants. Serve hot with crusty bread for dipping.