With the freedom-loving hippy generation now reaching retirement age and anti-materialist back-to-nature movements sweeping the developed world, increasing numbers of people are shedding their inhibitions and embracing the naturist lifestyle, especially in hotter climates.
Quite where to place your property particulars when house hunting on a naturist resort might fluster more recent converts but the prospect of buying into a stable real estate market and even pocketing a tidy profit means that “clothing optional” resorts and communities are a growing – albeit niche – market sector.
Nudists in general are an estate agent's dream. “They tend to be older people, probably a little more settled, who generally don't require mortgages and are prepared to pay a premium just to live here,” says Marc Seligman, who lives at The Oasis, a small naturist community in Pasco County, Florida. Commonly referred to as “the nudist capital of America”, Pasco boasts dozens of clothes-free and clothing-optional communities.