What it's like to shop and live in a neighborhood known for its Christmas decorations [Video]

Denis Phillips, a personable local TV meteorologist, found his Florida home 10 years ago when he was driving through a neighborhood looking at Christmas lights. Today, Phillips is one of many homeowners in Indian Trails who offer visitors an extraordinary Christmas spectacle.

Located in a tree-lined neighborhood near Tampa, the community of Indian Trails has been hosting massive Christmas decorations for over 40 years and is now known in Central Florida as a destination where people drive or walk past to enjoy the holiday spirit.

“We have people who have literally driven three hours to see the lights,” Phillips, who also hosts the Phillips Family Hot Chocolate fundraiser during the December spectacle, told Yahoo Finance. “What we love about it is the family traditions, the way it brings people together.”

For many homeowners, living in a Christmas neighborhood means more than putting up decorations and strings of lights every year – it's a lifestyle they adopted before they even moved in.

“I don’t know anyone who moved into the neighborhood [who] was not warned in advance by the broker,” Phillips said.

Street party with Cher and Elvis

On the other side of the country, homeowners Lisa and Fred Molina in Las Palmas, California, were preparing for their annual neighborhood Christmas party. The cozy Southern California cul-de-sac on Dallas Drive has been lit up with festive splendor at Christmastime for 40 years.

This is Molina's 23rd year of displaying Christmas lights, and the festivities now include not just decorations, but a live jazz band, a mariachi band, Santa Claus, a stilt walker, and lookalikes of Cher, Joan Rivers, and Marilyn Monroe.

When the Molinas were looking for a home, their realtor showed them a house across the street from the Las Palmas neighborhood. They paused their search and waited when they heard that a listing might become available on Dallas Drive, where the Christmas lights hang.

“This is exactly Lisa's thing,” Fred told Yahoo Finance from his living room, where a 13-foot-tall Christmas tree stands. “She just loves the Christmas spirit.”

A few doors down from Molinas, Daniel Koui said he knew the neighborhood's tradition when he bought his house, but it wasn't until his first Christmas there that he felt the true atmosphere.

“We put up some lights the first year and I saw what everyone else was doing and knew I had to try harder,” Koui said.

Part of the attraction

Brad Davidson, the real estate agent who sold Koui his home, said the neighborhood's Christmas tradition was part of the selling point. In his ad for the Kouis' home, he mentioned the Christmas festivities to attract buyers who appreciate the atmosphere.

“The city gives [the neighborhood] “A permit to close the street once a year and then there's a huge street party where people come from all over just to see all the decorations on the houses,” Davison said.

In these festive neighborhoods, houses even sell themselves thanks to the flow of traffic.

Marcello Mennone, a real estate agent in Palm Harbor, Florida, currently has a listing in the Indian Trails neighborhood. He received several calls from interested buyers who came to look at Christmas lights and saw his “For Sale” sign.

“I had a few home visits last week just because [potential buyers] “I walked around the neighborhood and saw how beautiful the place was,” Mennone said.

However, some customers react the other way around. Buyers who prefer privacy and seclusion should stay away from this offer.

“A few days earlier [a potential buyer] said the house was great, but they don't necessarily appreciate the traffic during the holidays,” Mennone said. “It really depends.”

Sellers in Christmas districts have even been known to screen potential buyers before accepting offers. Koui said a previous homeowner on his street specifically sought out buyers who were willing to decorate for the holidays.

In this way, neighbors – even those who have long since moved out – maintain the tradition and the friendships that result from it.

“Before living here, I didn't talk much to the neighbors,” Koui told Yahoo Finance. “But when we moved here, we got to know everyone, learned their names and invited each other over. It feels like a close-knit community, which is something we don't experience often.”

A church with a good reputation for Christmas

Driving down Indian Trails Drive, often congested on weekends, guests are greeted with extravagant decorations: roofs covered in jewel-toned lights, tall palm trees decorated like candy canes, and Christmas lights synchronized to Christmas music.

Phillips and his six children, ages 9 to 30, put up their decorations together starting on Thanksgiving, a family tradition that takes about two weeks, even with all the helpers.

“I started syncing the music to the lights,” Phillips said. “We have almost 40 different songs on our playlist and each song is programmed to each flash and blink. Each phase is manually created in the software.”

In addition to putting on light shows for strangers, Phillip's daughter and her softball team also raise funds by selling hot chocolate and popcorn to visitors for $1 on some nights during the extravaganza. They zip between vehicles, doing a car hop service, taking orders and delivering them. In past years, they have raised several thousand dollars for organizations such as Children's Miracle Network, Feeding Tampa Bay and Suncoast Animal League.

“They run back and forth to the cars because they don't go fast,” Phillips said. “The kids really love it and it makes them feel good to give something back.”

However, putting up Christmas lights is a costly undertaking. The electricity costs for the lights in December are around $700 – even if all the lights use LED bulbs.

“My electric bill is cheaper in December than in the summer because the cost of air conditioning is so high here,” Phillips said.

While the community is collectively in the holiday spirit, not all neighbors like the traffic that comes with it. On busy nights, it can take 30 to 45 minutes to drive through the neighborhood. But Phillips said it's an accepted part of life in Indian Trails.

“[The neighborhood] is known for that,” Phillips said. “Nobody is going to buy a home in this area unless they already know that there is a lot of traffic and a lot of people come here in December for the Christmas lights.”

Rebecca Chen is a reporter for Yahoo Finance and previously worked as a certified public accountant (CPA) specializing in investment taxes.

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