Alys Beach New Construction vs. Resale in 2026

Walk the sand path north from the Gulf Green in Alys Beach on most mornings and you will pass at least one lot with rebar still showing through fresh footings, a stack of limestone pavers waiting for a courtyard, maybe a crane parked against a half-finished wall. Walk the same distance through Rosemary Beach and every lot already has a house standing on it. That difference isn't a matter of taste or timing. It's a matter of arithmetic, and it changes what you're actually buying when you compare the two towns.

Alys Beach is still under construction. As of 2026 the community sits at roughly 65 percent complete, with full build-out not expected until sometime between 2029 and 2031. Seaside and Rosemary Beach, both laid out under the same New Urbanism master planning as Alys Beach, are essentially finished. That single fact, more than the white masonry or the courtyard walls, is what separates what you can purchase in Alys Beach from what you can purchase in its more built-out neighbors along 30A.

The Scarcity Is Designed, Not Discovered

It's tempting to assume Alys Beach is expensive because it's simply run out of room. That's not quite right. The community has 899 approved lots but is planning to stop development somewhere around 550 homes, leaving the rest of the acreage for amenities, condos, and commercial frontage along 30A. That's a density decision, not a land shortage. Someone chose to build fewer homes than the entitlements allow, which keeps the finished product feeling private and uncrowded, and also keeps a lid on how much inventory ever reaches the market at once.

The current build zone is Phase 4, known as the GG Block, tucked near the Nature Preserve where the town transitions into pine woodland. It's a collection of cottage homes organized around a wetland park, connected to the boardwalk that winds through the forest. At the center of that phase is The Silva, a gathering space with an event lawn, an enclosed pavilion, a pool, and a terrace café, with an opening that had been targeted for spring 2026. If you're touring Alys Beach this year, this is the part of town where you're most likely to still see building activity.

The Same Builder Might Be Behind Your New Neighbor's House Too

Here's the part that doesn't show up in a listing sheet. Alys Beach maintains its own in-house construction company, Alys Beach Construction, and since the town's founding in 2004 that team has completed roughly 75 percent of the homes built there. Ten outside builders are also approved to work in the community, and the Somerset Custom Home Program pairs an architect's plan with the in-house construction team for buyers who want a more streamlined build process.

What that means in practice is that even a home marketed as new construction today is very likely running through the same pipeline that has shaped the last two decades of this town's streetscape. That's good for consistency. It also means the pace of new supply is set by the developer's phasing decisions, not by how many buyers happen to want a home in a given quarter. When demand cools, as it has in 2026, the supply side doesn't loosen to meet it. It just sits at whatever pace the town has already committed to.

The 2026 Slowdown Is Real, and It's Sitting on Top of That Structural Scarcity

Two things are true about Alys Beach right now, and they pull in different directions. Inventory remains genuinely tight, but the pace of sales has slowed noticeably compared to a year ago.

• In the fourth quarter of 2025, the average sales price ran around $9.04 million, with an average price per square foot near $2,111, and homes that did sell closed at about 98 percent of list price.
• By February 2026, only 17 homes were actively listed, and just 21 homes sold that month, down from 46 homes in February 2025. Average days on market stretched from around 105 days to 139 days over that stretch, and by March some luxury properties were sitting for as long as 185 days.
• As of August 2026, there were 29 houses for sale in Alys Beach ranging from about $2.65 million to $32 million, with a median home price near $5.74 million and an average sale price near $5.93 million. Houses were spending an average of about 98 days on the market.

Put together, that's a market where the phased, developer-controlled scarcity keeps a floor under pricing, while a real cooldown in buyer activity is giving people more time to negotiate than they had a year ago. Those two forces coexisting is exactly the kind of detail that gets lost when a listing site just reports a median price.

What the Fortified Standard Actually Buys You

Alys Beach was the first community anywhere required to build every home to the Fortified for safer living® standard, an insurance industry certification that calls for reinforced walls, solid masonry roofs, and construction methods built above ordinary code requirements. Agents in the market report insurance savings in the 30 to 50 percent range tied to that certification, though the exact number will depend on your carrier and your specific policy, so it's worth getting a real quote before you build that savings into your budget.

That construction standard isn't free. Ownership in Alys Beach typically comes with a one-time capital contribution reported somewhere in the $30,000 to $50,000 range depending on the source, a foundation fee near half a percent of the purchase price, and quarterly HOA dues that different reports place between roughly $3,100 and $3,600. Any exterior change, from a repaint to a landscaping swap, also runs through the town's Architectural Review Board, and that approval process typically takes eight to twelve weeks. None of that is a red flag. It's simply the cost of the architectural consistency that makes the town look the way it does, and it's worth pricing into your comparison against a finished neighbor where no such board exists.

What This Actually Means If You're Comparing 30A Towns Right Now

If you're cross-shopping Alys Beach against a finished town like Rosemary Beach, the decision isn't really about price per square foot. It's about what kind of ownership you want. In Alys Beach, you can still buy a homesite and build to spec, or buy new construction from architects and builders currently active in the community, homes designed by Gary Justiss or corner-lot builds like the one at Sea Garden Street designed by Chancey Architecture and built by Arkon. That kind of ground-up option doesn't exist in a town where every lot is already spoken for. In exchange, you take on ARB review, HOA governance, and a builder relationship that in most cases still runs through the town's own construction arm.

In a fully built-out neighbor, you get finished inventory and no phasing risk, but you also have zero say in what gets built on the next lot, because there is no next lot.

Given where the market sits in 2026, buyers targeting a custom build in Alys Beach have more room to negotiate on contract terms and timeline than they did a year ago, simply because sales activity has slowed while structural supply has stayed just as tight. Sellers with resale listings in Alys Beach are facing longer marketing periods and need sharper, more disciplined pricing to compete with that same slowdown.

A Couple of Questions Worth Settling Before You Tour

Is Alys Beach still selling new homesites in 2026? Yes. The developer continues releasing homesites and completed homes in phases, with Phase 4's GG Block near the Nature Preserve as the current active zone and The Silva gathering space targeted to open there in spring 2026.

Does new construction in Alys Beach have to go through the developer's own builder? Not strictly. Ten outside builders are approved to work in the community, but the in-house Alys Beach Construction team has completed roughly three out of every four homes built there since 2004, so a meaningful share of what looks like independent new construction still runs through the same pipeline that has shaped the town for two decades.

If you're weighing a custom build in Alys Beach against a finished resale in a neighboring town, the phase math matters as much as the floor plan. Laura Calhoun can walk you through what's genuinely available in Alys Beach right now, what a comparable budget buys in a built-out 30A town, and how the current slowdown changes your negotiating position either way. Schedule a free consultation to talk through the numbers before you write an offer.