Bayou Oaks is shaping up to be Sarasota’s next hot neighborhood. It’s got a great location—it stretches southward from the airport to Ringling College—Old Bradenton Road is its main thoroughfare—and it’s full of nice old houses and beautiful trees. Yes, it’s still a little rough around the edges, but what up-and-coming neighborhood isn’t? 

This week’s home exemplifies what’s beginning to happen in Bayou Oaks. It’s a smallish two-bedroom cottage built in 1950 that’s been renovated and updated into a stylish little home. It was stripped down to the studs and re-insulated and sheet-rocked, with particular care going into the kitchen and bath. The outdoor area has also been gussied up to take advantage of the tropical setting, with a picture-perfect front porch and a deck out back.

Bayou Oaks is famously diverse. It houses all economic levels and specializes in the town’s more bohemian elements: students, professors, and artists. The homes tend to be small and mostly undistinguished, but they are prime candidates for make-overs, as this little cottage so charmingly illustrates.

1135 38^th St. is priced at $299,000. For more information calls Deborah Woods of Keller Williams at (941) 951-6660.