News

Washington, DC - August 25, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- Changes to the mortgage interest deduction could dramatically impact home owners and aspiring home owners in Grand Rapids, Mich., and beyond. That’s just one of the many issues the National Association of Realtors® wants Michigan residents to know about as the Home Ownership Matters Bus Tour pulls into Grand Rapids this week.

SEDALIA, MO - August 23, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- The 2011 Missouri State Fair ended Sunday, and State Treasurer Clint Zweifel (ZWY-ful) said 426 people went home knowing they will be receiving extra cash. During the course of the fair, $87,157 wo...

BATON ROUGE, LA - August 23, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- Today, Governor Bobby Jindal announced reappointments to the Louisiana Real Estate Appraisers Board. The Louisiana Real Estate Appraisers Board serves to regulate the issuance of real estate app...

MCCALL, ID - August 23, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- With the temperatures close to the 80s in August, it’s is easy to forget the long winters we love so much in McCall, and the high energy bills we don’t really love as much. Residents of The Spring...

WASHINGTON, D.C. - August 23, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- Sales of newly built, single-family homes held virtually unchanged in July with a 0.7 percent dip from the previous month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 298,000 units, according to newly released data from the U.S. Commerce Department."The fact that new-home sales fell by less than one percent in July is an indication of how little conditions have changed in the housing market," said Bob Nielsen, chairman of the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) and a home builder from Reno, Nev. "While new-home inventories are exceptionally thin, home builders are still competing with large numbers of foreclosed and distressed homes on the market and a climate of uncertainty in which consumers are reluctant to go forward with a major purchase for fear of what economic news tomorrow might bring."

WASHINGTON, DC - August 23, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) --– The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development today awarded more than $28 million to 46 rural and tribal communities throughout the nation to address distressed housing conditions and concentrated poverty.

JEFFERSON CITY, MO - August 22, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- State Treasurer Clint Zweifel (ZWY-ful) today renewed his call for the state’s housing commission to approve using 33 percent of its housing tax credits resources, or about $122 million i...

August 22, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- Montgomery County’s Department of Housing and Community Affairs, the Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development and the City of Gaithersburg will co-host HomeFree-USA’s free workshop on Saturday, August 27, to assist persons faced with possible mortgage foreclosures. The workshop will take place at 610 East Diamond Avenue, Gaithersburg.

JACKSONVILLE, FL - August 22, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- U.S. Attorney Robert E. O’Neill announces that Cynthia Darlene Strickland (age 45, Jacksonville) pleaded guilty on Thursday to bank fraud. Strickland was a licensed title agent and the owner of Premier Title Group, Inc., a title agency in Jacksonville. She faces a maximum penalty of 30 years in federal prison.

WASHINGTON, D.C. - August 22, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- The delinquency rate for mortgage loans on one-to-four-unit residential properties increased to a seasonally adjusted rate of 8.44 percent of all loans outstanding as of the end of the second quarter of 2011, an increase of 12 basis points from the first quarter of 2011, and a decrease of 141 basis points from one year ago, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association's (MBA) National Delinquency Survey. The non-seasonally adjusted delinquency rate increased 32 basis points to 8.11 percent this quarter from 7.79 percent last quarter.

WASHINGTON, D.C. - August 22, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- The Mortgage Bankers Association's (MBA) Economic and Mortgage Finance Forecasts released today project $1.1 trillion in residential mortgage origination volume in 2011, roughly $100 billion more than earlier forecasts, as low mortgage rates have brought in higher than expected refinance volume, while purchase volume has been less than anticipated. However, despite lower forecasted mortgage rates, weaker projected economic growth in 2012 led to a reduction in MBA's origination forecast for that year to $931 billion, which would be the lowest volume originated since 1997.

Washington, D.C. - August 22, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- The American Institute of Architects (AIA) Academy of Architecture for Health (AAH) has selected the recipients of the AIA National Healthcare Design Awards program. The AIA Healthcare Awards program showcases the best of healthcare building design and healthcare design-oriented research. Projects exhibit conceptual strengths that solve aesthetic, civic, urban, and social concerns as well as the requisite functional and sustainability concerns of a hospital.

WASHINGTON, DC - August 22, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development today published a notice seeking a qualified partner to help launch, and then manage, a pilot fellowship program to support the Administration’s Strong Cities, Strong Communities Initiative. Initially funded through a $2.5 million donation from the Rockefeller Foundation, HUD’s partner will select, train, and place public service-minded ‘social innovators’ to serve multi-year terms in local government positions to help stimulate economic development and employment.

WASHINGTON, DC - August 22, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- Never in the history of the Federal Housing Administration has there been such demand for FHA-insured financing to build, rehabilitate or refinance multifamily apartment properties. FHA today announced that it has endorsed $10.5 billion in multifamily rental housing loans since last October, with another month-and-a-half remaining in the fiscal year.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA - August 19, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- Attorney General Kamala D. Harris today announced that the California Department of Justice, in conjunction with the State Bar of California, has sued multiple entities accused of fraudulently taking millions of dollars from thousands of homeowners who were led to believe they would receive relief on their mortgages.

BOISE, ID - August 19, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- Idaho Housing and Finance Association (IHFA) announced today the approval of Idaho’s State Small Business Credit Initiative (SSBCI) application by the U.S. Department of the Treasury. The SSBCI pro...

August 19, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- DEXUS Property Group today announced the sale of a LEED-certified 496,000 square feet freezer facility in Riverside, California. USAA Real Estate Company owned and sold the building as well as furnished all of the development capital for the facility. Developed by DEXUS and completed in only ten months, the specialized building was sold for $91.5 million and is one of the largest and leading state-of-the-art LEED-certified cold storage facilities in the world.

Atlanta, GA - August 19, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- USAA Real Estate Company and national developer JLB Partners, LP formed a joint venture to develop Buckhead Village, a Class-A multi-family community in Atlanta, Georgia. This constitutes the first transaction between the two companies, launching this relationship.

SACRAMENTO, CA - August 19, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- Housing affordability in California decreased in the second quarter of 2011 as 16 of the state’s 28 metropolitan areas included in the report showed declines, the California Building Industry Association announced today.

WASHINGTON, D.C. - August 19, 2011 - (RealEstateRama) -- This is the message of 40 housing and community development organizations in a letter to the members of the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, known as the “super committee.” This Congressional committee is charged with achieving further deficit reduction as part of the debt ceiling agreement enacted in early August.