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TOP STORIES:
Rich, famous, and renting - (www.realestate.msn.com) Here are some of the celebrity renters who Zillow featured:
· Diane Keaton is well-known for her work buying, renovating and flipping houses, many of which she sells to fellow entertainers. She sold two renovated homes last year, including a 1927 Spanish Colonial Revival home in Beverly Hills, Calif., to "Glee" co-creator Ryan Murphy for $10 million. Keaton is nowrenting a Spanish-style estate from Meg Ryan. We don't know what she's paying, but Ryan had put her Bel Air home on the market, first for sale for $14.2 million and then for rent for $40,000 a month.
· Meg Ryan is also renting, paying about $25,000 a month for a three-bedroom condo in New York City's SoHo area. Zillow has floor plans and photos of a similar unit in the building, designed by architect Jean Nouvel. The building has all the amenities, including a 24-hour concierge and an indoor lap pool.
· Queen Latifah is another celeb renting from a celeb who can't sell her place in this market. She's paying $10,000 a month for Jane Fonda's 4,700-square-foot modern loft in Atlanta, with city views. Fonda had offered the home for sale for $4.5 million and subsequently cut the price to $1.95 million but still found no takers. Fonda has lots of photos of the loft on her website. It was originally four units in the Copenhill Lofts building downtown. Other units in the building are for sale for $119,000 for a one-bedroom and$400,000 for a two-bedroom.
Utah raises standard in anti-Fed campaign - (www.theglobeandmail.com) Shops in Salt Lake City will soon be able to accept gold Buffalo and Eagle coins (no foreign minted Napoleons or Krugerrands allowed), after a bill to make gold and silver legal tender passed Utah’s House and Senate. The state does not trust the US Federal Reserve. However, visitors need not weigh down their pockets just yet. The bill, which is under review by the governor, ends state taxes on the transfer of gold – they currently treat it as an asset and not as money – but until the federal government does the same, its green paper will have the edge. This proto-gold standard in the American west is a rebuke and challenge to the Fed, and a reminder that easy monetary policy since 2007 has won the central bank many more enemies than friends.
New house sales are at lowest level in almost 50 years - (www.tennessean.com) Home construction in the United States is all but coming to a halt. Americans are on track to buy fewer new homes than in any year since the government began keeping data almost a half-century ago. Sales are just half the pace of 1963 — even though there are 120 million more people in the U.S. The sliding sales show how far the housing market has fallen since the bubble burst four years ago. And they're a blow to the economic recovery as it draws strength from other places. Diminished sales have driven the median price of a new home down to about $202,000, the lowest since 2003. If the sluggish sales continue, analysts say, small homebuilders will fold, meaning less competition as the market improves and higher prices later. "The longer it goes on, the more builders will drift away from the industry altogether," said Paul Ashworth, chief U.S. economist of Capital Economics.
Rapper 50 Cent's Farmington estate price cut almost in half - (www.newstimes.com) The 52-room, 50,000 square-foot mansion was once the property of former heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson, who bought it in 1996 from a Lithuanian businessman. Yes, this estate is in Farmington, not lower Fairfield County, but it is the home of world-famous rapper, actor and entrepreneur, 50 Cent, also known as Curtis James Jackson III. Originally listed for $18.5 million, the asking price has been lowered to $9,999,999 after an intermediate stop at $14.5 million. The 52-room, 50,000 square-foot mansion built in 1985 was once the property of boxer Mike Tyson, who bought it in 1996 from a Lithuanian businessman. The former heavyweight champion was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in December. In 2003, after a five-year marriage and subsequent divorce, Tyson's ex-wife, Monica Turner, sold the home to 50 Cent for $4.1 million. He has reportedly put in improvements and additions costing as much as $6 million. Dr. Turner, who originally asked $25 million for the estate she received in the divorce settlement, is a graduate of the Georgetown University School of Medicine, specializing in pediatrics.
Long Way Down - (www.northcoastjournal.com) The nation’s housing bubble, which evidently is still deflating, should also have deflated a stalwart local myth — that Humboldt County’s housing market is immune from the violent ups and downs of the larger marketplace. It’s not. Granted, our bubble wasn’t as distended as those in Phoenix and Las Vegas, and thus the resulting fallout hasn’t been as ugly. But make no mistake: We rode the bubble, too. At its local peak, in March 2006, the monthly payment on a median-priced Humboldt County home (including principal, interest, taxes and insurance) was a whopping $2,137. Only one in 10 local residents could have qualified for a traditional loan on such a house.
OTHER STORIES:
How Likely is QE-Three? - (www.gonzalolira.blogspot.com)
Bailing out the rich at the expense of the middle class - (www.mybudget360.com)
Mortgage Rates Freddie Mac Survey - (www.courant.com)
Housing raises US recession alert - (www.blogs.reuters.com)
New home sales fall in the Bay Area, nationwide – (www.contracostatimes.com)
The Next Leg Down in House Prices - (Charles Hugh Smith at www.oftwominds.com)
Comparing Housing Prices, Real vs Nominal 1890-2011 - (www.ritholtz.com)
Housing Finance Policy Reform Finally Set to Begin in Congress - (www.theatlantic.com)
No Signs Of Recovery For US Housing Market – (www.businessinsider.com)
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