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The purchase price of U.S. homes fell 4.3 percent in the fourth quarter froma year earlier, as values declined across the country, according to Freddie Mac.
Frank Nothaft, Freddie Mac chief economist, said Monday that low mortgage rates and the fact that foreclosed-property and short sales remain a big part of the market, helped push “homebuyer affordability to levels not seen in decades in most places.” Get the full story »
Almost three years after a series of government bailouts began, what many feared would be a deep black hole for taxpayer money isn’t looking nearly so dark.
The brighter picture is highlighted by the outlook for the bailouts’ centerpiece — the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program.
“It’s turning out to cost one heck of a lot less than what we all thought at the beginning,” said Ted Kaufman, a former U.S. senator from Delaware who heads the congressionally appointed panel overseeing TARP. Get the full story »
Chicago-based Ventas Inc. said Monday that it will buy Nationwide Health Properties Inc. in a $5.8 billion stock deal, creating the nation’s largest health care real-estate investment trust.
The Nationwide purchase solidifies Ventas’ position as an owner of senior housing communities. The combined company will have more than 1,300 assets in 47 states, the District of Columbia, and two Canadian provinces. Ventas also owns hospitals and medical office buildings. Get the full story »
Mortgage rates declined in the latest week, with the average rate on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages landing at 4.95 percent, according to Freddie Mac’s weekly survey.
Rates slumped through most of last year as yields on Treasurys declined amid economic uncertainty. But yields have been on the rise recently, pushing mortgage rates back up earlier this month to the highest level since last April. The rates track the yields, which move inversely to Treasury prices. Get the full story »
Of all home sold in the U.S. last year, 26 percent were foreclosures and short sales, according to a RealtyTrac report released on Thursday. That’s down slightly from 2009, but a jump compared to 2008.
In Illinois, RealtyTrac said 29,194 distressed properties were sold, accounting for 26 percent of all sales last year. Get the full story »
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. plans to open a Neighborhood Market store at the Presidential Towers apartment complex in the West Loop in what would be the discount chain’s first small grocery store in Chicago.
The world’s largest retailer intends to spend $1 million to build out 26,491 square feet on one level at the residential tower at 555 W. Madison St., according to a building permit filed on behalf of Walmart.
The Bentonville, Ark.-based discount chain has been making a push to expand into urban centers of the north to jump start sales growth. On Tuesday, the retail giant reported that sales at U.S. stores open at least one year, a key metric of retail health, fell for the second year in a row. Get the full story »
Sales of existing homes in the Chicago area fell last month, and plunged dramatically within the city of Chicago, but consumers who did close transactions were able to buy a lot of house for their money.
The Illinois Association of Realtors said Wednesday that 3,844 single-family homes and condominiums were sold in January, a 2 percent drop from January 2010. Sales activity within the collar counties mitigated the anemic performance within the city of Chicago, and especially in the condo market. Get the full story »
Elite Street | By Bob Goldsborough | Retired Chicago Cubs catcher Todd Hundley has put his six-bedroom home in Glenview on the market for $1.799 million.
Hundley, 41, played in the major leagues from 1990 until 2003, including with the Cubs in 2001 and 2002. Get the full story »
Signs advertising homes for sale in Naperville in August 2010. (Chuck Berman/Chicago Tribune)
Home prices in the Chicago area in December hit a new low since the housing market’s peak in 2006, falling 30 percent to levels not seen since March 2002, according to a widely-watched housing index released Tuesday morning.
The Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller Home Price Index showed that Chicago was one of 11 markets in December that hit their lowest level since home prices peaked, which locally was in September 2006.
In the Chicago market, according to the index, December home prices slipped 1.4 percent from November, slightly less than the 2.2 percent drop in November. On a year-over-year basis, Chicago-area prices were down 7.4 percent. “Chicago’s been surprisingly weak,” said Karl Case, a professor emeritus of economics at Wellesley College and one of the economists who created the index. Get the full story »
One of the nation’s largest owners of trailer parks has quietly entered Long Island with the purchase of a 328-lot property near the Hamptons and the Long Island Sound.
Hometown America Corp., of Chicago, paid nearly $22 million for the 101-acre Thurm’s Estates community in Calverton, about $66,000 per lot. That’s more than double the national average, says Buddy Martin, one of the deal’s brokers. Get the full story »
From Crain’s Chicago Business | The former Montgomery Ward & Co. catalog building on the edge of River North is set to be sold for $390 million, sources say, four years after a group of New York investors paid $290 million for it, at the peak of the real estate cycle. Get the full story>>
Allstate Corp. sued Citigroup Inc. and Deutsche Bank AG Friday, accusing the banks of misrepresenting risks on more than $385 million of mortgage securities it bought.
Allstate, the largest publicly traded U.S. home and auto insurer, has filed similar lawsuits against Bank of America Corp. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. Get the full story »
From the Daily Herald | Motorola Solutions is offering for lease two major buildings on its Schaumburg campus to outside companies. After Motorola Inc. split on Jan. 4, the remaining Motorola Mobility equipment was transferred to Libertyville, so more space opened at the Motorola Solutions headquarters, located off Algonquin and Meacham roads. Get the full story>>
Farmland values in the Midwest posted their second-largest increase in 30 years in 2010, according to a quarterly report released Thursday by the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
Agricultural land values in Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin and Michigan rose 12 percent in 2010. The report surveyed 212 agricultural bankers in the area. More than half said they expect farmland values to continue increasing in the first quarter of 2011. Get the full story »
There’s a note of optimism in the air about the U.S. mortgage delinquency rate.
The number of mortgages that were past due in the fourth quarter was at its lowest level since the end of 2008 (excluding homes that are already in foreclosure.) Meanwhile, the number of U.S. mortgages that were one month late last quarter fell to its lowest level since the end of 2007, the Mortgage Bankers Association said Thursday. Get the full story »
