BUTLER IS AN AMENITY FOR RENTERS IN A CHELSEA BUILDING Celebrities renting an apartment in a converted Chelsea mansion will get a unique amenity - Graydon Carter’s butler, according to the New York Post. Ivo Juhani, 33, is a modern-day Jeeves who serves as the Vanity Fair editor’s part-time manservant and as head waiter at his West Village celebrity mecca, the Waverly Inn. Now, he will also wait on the five tenants at 436 W. 20th St., including Courtney Love and Olivier Sarkozy, the half-brother of French President Nicolas Sarkozy, whose present and former kin obviously can be counted on to make news (see “SARKOZYS EX . . . in the Boldface section). His daily duties: delivering mail, lighting fireplaces, stocking fresh flowers and booking private cars. He also will stock fridges, book reservations at the city’s most exclusive clubs and don a tux to work private cocktail parties. For $15,000 or more a month, what celebrity wouldn’t expect such service? THE HOUSEKEEPER QUESTION GETS SOME ANSWERS Many apartment dwellers in the Big Apple don’t know whether they compensate their housekeepers enough, too much or too little, observes BrickUnderground.com. If you’re one of them, one way to get an idea would be to click on the link. ‘NO, NO, NO, I’M NOT GOING,’ RENTERS TELL OWNERS Over the past year or two, many owners who couldn’t sell - or didn’t dare try - decided to rent out their properties rather than accept an impossibly low offer (if they even had an offer), notes the New York Times. But in recent months, a number of these accidental landlords have been surprised to find renewed buyer interest in their properties. The problem is, the renters are happily in place. And that can complicate showings - let alone negotiating an actual deal. Example: A 4,100-sf loft on East 24th St. has sat on the market for nearly two years despite a drop in price to $3.995 million in July 2009 from $5.535 million in April 2008. In September 2008, the owners started renting out the place. Shortly after the newest tenant moved in, the long dry spell ended and brokers started showing up with prospective buyers in tow last fall. Now a buyer is saying he will make an offer only after the lease expires next fall. He hasn’t explained why, but once buyers hear there is a tenant, they are always concerned that the tenant won’t leave. And that is even though the loft’s lease has a rider saying the owner can request that the tenant move out with two months’ notice. CAN YOU HEAR THEM NOW According to 311 records for 2009, the fewest residential noise complaints in Manhattan emanated from the neighborhoods comprising Community Board 5 (Midtown), and Community Board 1, a.k.a. Tribeca, the Financial District, Battery Park City and the Seaport, reports BrickUnderground.com. Accumulating 403 and 436 complaints respectively, those relatively quiet zones logged approximately 93 percent fewer residential noise complaints than the loudest area - Washington Heights/Inwood - where 6,439 grievances were filed last year. “It was ridiculously loud,” recalls former Washington Heights resident Alinca Hamilton, who says loud music was a big culprit. “You would have thought you were at a Bachata concert.” THE TIMES LOOKS UP AND BACK Thirty years ago, Broadway north of 96th Street was a vibrant but shabby area, its Hispanic groceries and Chinese restaurants mixed with declining Edwardian apartment houses and S.R.O. hotels, observes the New York Times. Now, most of this stretch has turned over a gold-plated leaf, especially as the newish towering condominiums at 100th Street settles in. A short walk up the 10 blocks to 106th Street takes an inquiring walker from wood frame to glassy modern dwellings. Take the tour. STATE TAX PEOPLE MANAGE TO EMBARRASS DEBTORS The State Department of Taxation and Finance went live on its Web site with lists of the top 250 individual and corporate tax debtors in the state. Having combed through the records, the Real Deal found that those on the list include luxury broker Agnes Nolan and her late husband, who owe more than $850,000 in personal income taxes, and JPMorgan Chase, which owes upwards of $300,000. Perhaps the highest-profile individuals listed were Bernard Madoff, with $984,281 in sales taxes (good luck with that) and Annie Leibovitz, $503,740. Nolan, dubbed the "grand doyenne of luxury real estate," recently put her 4,000-sf duplex penthouse at 271 Central Park West on the market for $13.9 million and declined comment. SMOKING BANS IN APARTMENTS MAY BE HEATING UP Writing in the New York Law Journal, two of the city’s top co-op and condo lawyers draw on a critical mass of secondhand smoke cases, opinion polls, and health and safety data to suggest that a tipping point is knocking at the doors of the city's co-ops and condos, reports BrickUnderground.com. In their analysis, Richard Siegler and Eva Talel say boards should worry about unlawful discrimination against smokers. “Smoking restrictions do not violate the Fourteenth Amendment, and smokers are not members of a protected class,” they write. According to the authors, recent legal developments make it clear that boards are legally required to address secondhand smoke complaints and that smoking bans may enhance property values. A poll cited by Siegler and Talel suggests that 58 percent of the Big Apple’s residents would pay extra to live in a smoke-free building and 68 percent might avoid a building where smoking is permitted. ONE MORE LIST FOR THE DEPARTMENT OF DUBIOUS DISTINCTIONS How many bad landlords are there in New York City? asks the Village Voice, which names 10 “really bad landlords” after what it related were months of research. “We combed through records of unresolved violations, lawsuits, eviction notices, and court documents,” the weekly said. “We spent thousands of hours in deeply depressing apartments and interviewed wave after wave of equally gloomy tenants. We also talked with scores of landlords, city bureaucrats, prosecutors, defense attorneys, housing advocates, and others.” Read all about the terrible 10. SHOCKING: CITY BOOSTER CLAIMS NYC STILL IS A POWERHOUSE New York City is faring well in comparison to other global capitals following the economic downturn of 2008, according to an annual report on what makes cities thrive.Released by the Partnership for New York City and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), CONDO DEVELOPMENT IN HARLEM FILES FOR BANKRUPTCY The developer of Lenox Condominium in Harlem has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, Crain’s reports. The mortgage on unsold units totaling approximately $10 million was past due, and the developer filed to buy more time to negotiate with lender Capital One for a loan extension. “We had to temporarily protect our rights to give us enough time to negotiate and get apartments sold,” Lewis Futterman, the developer, told Crain’s. “We are inches away from a settlement with the bank. I would be surprised if this filing is not withdrawn in three weeks.” At West 129th Street on Lenox Avenue, the building opened in 2007. Since then 59 of the 77 units at the building have been sold, Futterman said. The original mortgage for the building was $20 million, and the developer paid down half that amount through sales. The remainder of the mortgage expired in July 2009, and the due date for the forbearance on that loan was Wednesday. THE RANKS OF SALES AGENTS ARE SLIMMING The number of real estate sales agents in New York City has dropped roughly 25 percent in the last five years, while the number of brokers has increased approximately 8 percent, according to the Real Deal, which provides graphs here of the data for New York City and the suburbs over the last five years. All boroughs saw a drop in sales agents between 2005 and 2009. At one extreme, the number of Staten Island agents plummeted 40 percent, while the decline at the other end of the spectrum, in Manhattan, was at 17 percent. THEY MAKE YOU ITCH AND SEEM TO SMELL Entomology researchers at the University of Florida report that well-trained dogs can detect a single live bedbug or egg with 96 percent accuracy, according to the New York Times. In cities such as New York, where neighbors are often separated only by bricks and mortar, one person’s infestation is everybody’s problem: Bedbugs can crawl through walls and along wiring and pipes, plus hitchhike on clothing, furniture, luggage and more. Still, a dog’s reaction may be questions, says one skeptic. “False positives are something that’s seriously wrong in the extermination industry and need to be addressed," John Furman, president of Boot-a-Pest, who was named the best bed bug exterminator by New York Magazine last year, tells BrickUnderground.com. "The dog’s alert is not proof that you have bedbugs. Don’t be fooled when these companies tell you the dog finds what we can’t see - that’s nonsense." A new, relatively inexpensive device will allow you to detect the critters on your own - with no sniffing required. As for putting a bedbug clause in a sales contract, lawyer Jerry Feeney maintains that it’s better to examine the building’s extermination program and discover whether its management has a process in place to deal effectively with all kinds of pests. THINK TWICE ABOUT DOING YOUR OWN LEATHER REPAIRS Do-it-yourself leather-repair kits costing about $10 sometimes work, the Washington Post tells readers. But if the tear is on the side of the back of a chair where a person sits, you're probably better off getting a professional repair. A kit repair often looks okay at first, but the rip is likely to open up in time, says Rob Griffey, who used to run a company specializing in leather repair. "They do more harm than good," says Griffey. He recommends a professional repair that includes applying an underlayment that supports the rip on the back and a fiberglass mesh that reinforces the mending material. Fabrion, a franchise company, uses this approach and does good work, according to Griffey, who says he has no connection to the enterprise. A typical fee might be $100 for the first hour plus $75 for additional hours; a simple repair may take one or two hours. TECHNOPHOBES, BEWARE OF SWITCHING FROM CABLE-TV To hear recent converts talk about it, there is a promised land where TV shows are instantly available on demand, and cost nothing - for far less than the hundreds of dollars that consumers usually pay cable companies each month. Reaching this glorious destination, while far easier than it used to be, can require some technological know-how and an initial outlay of cash, notes the New York Times in an extensive description of the details. IF YOUR BATHTUB CAULK TURNS YOUR STOMACH, READ THIS Bath oils and creamy shampoos and soaps build up the most residue in bathtub caulk, so try switching to clear shampoos and soaps, says the Washington Post. Since mildew needs moisture to grow, keep shower walls dry by wiping them down promptly. You might also try any number of after-shower sprays. Jim Mason, a customer-support person for caulk manufacturer DAP, says those products work very well on caulk that is 100 percent silicone. However, they could ruin caulk that has a latex formula. Unfortunately it's hard to tell which kind of caulk you have once it is applied, but if the mildew seems embedded in the caulk, your best bet might be to replace it. It's very important to remove all of the existing caulk first. A razor blade helps. Also try gently heating an area with a hair dryer; if the caulk is 100 percent silicone, it will soften so that you can pull it out like a rubber band. If it was used before, stick to 100 percent silicone, which can replace other kinds of caulk as well. YOU CAN SMARTEN UP YOUR PAD WITH DOUGH, GOBS OF IT “There have been lots of articles about smart homes, but few that apply to someone who lives in a 970-square-foot, one-bedroom apartment in New York City.” So notes a long piece in the New York Times that provides the lowdown on the high costs of, say, controlling your radiator with a remote device. DO YOUR FLOORS, TUBS, A/C SYSTEMS, WINDOWS NEED HELP According to New York magazine, the place to go for perfectly restored pre-war flooring is I. J. Peiser’s Sons, 212-348-7500. To re-glaze a bathtub, check out Al & Dave & Son at 718-761-5800. Your HVAC system will benefit from a visit from AMHAC, while you can get your windows cleaned beautifully by contacting Expert Window Cleaners at expertwc@gmail.com or 212-831-1115. You’ll find a host of other resources on the Service You Can Trust Web site. THE SELLING SEASON IS NICELY UNDER WAY, SAYS ANALYST After polling builder communities in North Carolina, Virginia, Florida, Texas and California’s Inland Empire, Ticonderoga Securities analyst Stephen East says the spring home-selling scene is coming along nicely, according to the Wall Street Journal. “The season is indeed under way despite being delayed a bit by bad weather,” he writes in a client note. Moreover, “While the market is benefiting from the tax credit, it is also showing distinct signs of normalizing.” He adds his belief that “there are buyers turning out regardless of Uncle Sam’s generosity.” Says East: “Sales are occurring at price points where the credit is nothing but a mere token, or in certain instances, for closings that will not occur until after June 30,” when the credit officially expires. Still, East continues, “The overall demand picture likely may not prove that robust.” ACTIVITY AND PRICES IN THE D.C. REGION SHOW IMPROVEMENT February market statistics just reported from Metropolitan Regional Information Systems, the local multiple listing service, and accounts from brokers and buyers indicate increased competition for properties, says the Washington Post. Average time on the market has fallen – for example, down 26 percent to 83 days in D.C., down 52 percent to 54 days in Fairfax County, down 34 percent to 63 days in Alexandria and down 33 percent to 79 days in Montgomery County. Average sale prices in all jurisdictions were at least 90 percent of the average list price in February. And median sale prices in most jurisdictions were higher in February than a year ago. The shift could reflect a larger number of more-expensive homes being sold as well as the possibility that an individual home gained value. RATE OF DECLINING SALES TAPERS OFF IN JANUARY National home prices, including distressed sales, declined by 0.7 percent in January from one year earlier, according to First American CoreLogic and its LoanPerformance Home Price Index (HPI). The company termed the result a “significant improvement” over December’s year-over-year price decline of 3.4 percent. Excluding distressed sales, year-over-year prices declined in January by 0.4 percent; in December, that percentage was 3.3 percent over the year. In contrast to a year ago, the data firm added, the month-to-month rate of decline is lessening - in January 2009, the HPI showed the largest one month decline in its more than 30-year history. On a month-over-month basis, the national average home price index decline accelerated, falling by 1.9 percent in January 2010 compared with 0.8 percent in December 2009, indicating the housing market still remains weak. BELOW JANUARY, FEBRUARY HOUSING STARTS TOP RECORD LOW Permits for privately-owned housing units in February were 1.6 percent below January but 11.3 percent higher than one year earlier. Single-family authorizations in February were 0.6 percent below the revised January figure. Permits for multi-family construction plunged by 30.3 percent, dragging down the total by 5.9 percent from January. But total issuance was 10 percent higher than last April’s all-time low. "This latest data indicates that the single-family sector is gradually finding more stable ground, particularly in light of the poor weather conditions that hampered new building activity in two out of four regions last month and the continued difficulties that builders faced in accessing financing for new projects," cheered Chief Economist David Crowe of the National Association of Home Builders. "With the deadline for purchasers to take advantage of home buyer tax credits fast approaching at the end of April, improvement in single-family building activity was expected and may have continued into early March. Moreover, the very thin inventory of new homes now on the market, the pent-up demand from three-plus years of low household formations and good affordability conditions will provide the platform for a 25 percent gain in new-home construction in 2010 over 2009." Yet Paul Dales, an economist for Capital Economics, wrote in a research note, “The outlook remains bleak. Home building activity remains very low by historical standards and is set to remain that way for some time.” YOU WILL DOUBLE YOUR MONEY IN REAL ESTATE SAYS AN AD “Our innovative strategy guarantees our homes will sell quickly for excellent profits,” a display advertisement in the New York Times promises investors. Alluding to Bernard Madoff, a post in the Service You Can Trust Blog on Friday, March 19 dissects the advertiser and exposes to scrutiny his seemingly unwarranted claims that may skirt, if not violate, the law. BARRON’S SUGGESTS IT’S TIME TO BUY A SECOND HOME Scoping out dozens of deluxe enclaves across the country, Barron’s found prices off as much as 40 percent in some locations and lists the best cities to make a purchase. “Seemingly at or near bottom, they are starting to attract the first wave of bargain hunters,” the publication tells both families and investors. "We've seen an uptick in buying in just the last couple of months," Jan Reuter, head of residential real estate at U.S. Trust Bank of America Private Wealth Management, confirms. According to Barron’s, the10 best places in the U.S. for second homes are Maui, Kiawah Island, the Hamptons, Park City, Aspen, Pebble Beach, Palm Beach, Captiva/Sanibel Island, Asheville and Gasparilla Island. WOULD YOU LIKE A PROPERTY TO GO Real estate firms now feel compelled to have an "app" for Apple iPhone and other smart phones, the Wall Street Journal observes. Many of the apps' functions - such as listing which nearby homes are for sale, which have sold recently, pricing and other data - have long been available via traditional Web sites. But the apps combine those functions with smart phones' global-positioning technology so that users can get information on their immediate surroundings without having to undertake the arduous task of typing the address or zip code. "It's like having your laptop with you on the ride," says Rachel Ashby, a marketing manager in Seattle who is using Redfin's app in her search for a house. YOU’RE NOT GONNA LIKE THIS GIFT THAT KEEPS ON GIVING A new concept being promoted by a New York firm promises developers a lasting pot of gold: Every time a house sells during the next 99 years, 1 percent of the price goes back to the original developer or is shared among investor partners, reports Kenneth R. Harney in the Washington Post. It's a covenanted mandate - a novel type of lien on the underlying real estate - called a private transfer fee. The fee is not a government transfer tax or homeowner association or environmental protection covenant. It's purely a private requirement that runs with the land. Manhattan-based Freehold Capital Partners declines to identify any clients or participants in its private-transfer-fee program, but it claims on its Web site that as of late 2009, "the owners of an estimated $488 billion in real estate projects nationwide, including some of the country's largest, most well-respected companies,” have partnered with Freehold. BIRDBRAIN CLOSES DOWN HOUSE NOT IN FORECLOSURE Bank of America apologized after its local contractor entered the home of a mortgage borrower when she was away, cut off utilities, padlocked the door and confiscated her pet parrot, Luke, reports the Wall Street Journal. Angela Iannelli, 46, alleged in a lawsuit that the October incident - which separated her from her 10-year-old parrot for more than a week - caused so much emotional distress that she needed a prescription medication for anxiety. A Bank of America spokesman said a bank employee erroneously believed the house was vacant and sent the contractor there with instructions to install a new lock and otherwise secure the property. The bank spokesman said those instructions were inappropriate because Iannelli wasn't in default and the house wasn't vacant. Whether the employee’s job is secure was not disclosed in what was the first of two such unwarranted seizures reported in a week. WHO WOUDDA THUNK THAT THE BIG APPLE WAS SO LOW Tokyo is the most expensive city in the world, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit, part of the Economist Group. In its latest Worldwide Cost of Living survey, the Japanese capital climbs from seventh place to first. Based on a weighted average of the prices of more 160 items found in 140 cities, from a loaf of bread to a luxury car, the survey shows substantial changes from last year because of recent exchange-rate fluctuations. For example, when the data was actually collected in September 2008, Oslo was the most expensive city in the world (as it was the year before). But the depreciation of the Norwegian krone since then has pushed the city down to fifth place. By the same token, London, which was third last year and eighth when the data was collected, is now ranked the 27th most expensive city in the world, thanks to the pound’s fall. It is cheaper than New York for the first time since 2002. Chicago, Los Angeles and New York are the dearest American cities, tied at 23. At the other end of the scale, Karachi replaces Teheran as the cheapest city. In order, the winners (?) were Tokyo, Osaka/Kobe, Paris, Copenhagen, Oslo, Zurich, Frankfurt, Helsinki, Geneva and Singapore. CALL HIM A CA— A WHAT? CALL HIM A CONDO OWNER Screenwriter Paul Schrader has just closed on a $1.9 million, three-bedroom, two-and-a-half- bath condo at 350 W. 23rd St., the glassy building known as Modern23, according to the New York Post. Schrader, who wrote “Taxi Driver,” also directed films including “American Gigolo.” LATE COOKBOOK AUTHOR’S CO-OP FINDS A BUYER The two-bedroom Manhattan apartment of Sheila Lukins, best-selling co-author of the "Silver Palate" cookbooks who died in August of brain cancer, has gone into contract for an undisclosed price, reports the Wall Street Journal. The most recent asking price was $3.15 million. The Upper West Side 2,300-sf co-op in the Beresford on Central Park West went on the market in September with an asking price of $3.28 million. Among numerous other celebrity neighbors are Glenn Close, who is asking $11.8 million for her two-bedroom apartment, and film studio co-founder Bob Weinstein, asking $29.75 million for his 14-room duplex. SARKOZY EX AND HUBBY MAKE 57TH STREET DUPLEX CHEZ THEIRS Married in 2008 after Nicholas Sarkozy’s affaire ripened, his former wife, Cecilia, and Richard Attias have split their time between New York City and Greenwich, Conn., says the Observer. They now have purchased a two-bedroom duplex at 322 East 57th St. for $3.2 million, according to city records. The seven-room co-op in a 1929 building has double-height ceilings, two wood-burning fireplaces, four city view exposures and a maid's room with its own en suite bath. Available via an estate sale, the apartment has been off the market since 1947, when its late owner, MGM actress and former Ziegfeld girl Mary Howard and her Broadway producer husband Alfred de Liagre, bought it for . . . $10,000. Asked by French reporters back then why she left her presidential husband, the former Mrs. Sarkozy famously replied, "I was beginning to feel like a piece of furniture." SHE HAS HER NEIGHBORS SEEING NOT BLUE, BUT RED And it’s not from worry. The renovation of Brooke Shields’ West Village townhouse is raising the ire of the actor’s neighbors, says the New York Daily News. "They start construction at 6 a.m. every morning, and people are outraged," one nearby tenant complains. When a group of neighbors went to plead with the workers, the tenant added, they huffed, "If you have a problem, take it up with Brooke Shields." Work on converting the house into a single-family home, which Shields bought for a reported $5.6 million in April 2008, has caused the sidewalk on her side of the street to be closed. A Shields representative says she would like to see the job completed soon as well: "They truly apologize about the noise or any inconvenience and hope more than anybody to have it finished as soon as possible.” AFTER A FINAL GOOD NIGHT LAST YEAR, HIS APARTMENT SELLS Walter Cronkite’s three-bedroom, five-bath apartment on the 25th floor of 870 United Nations Plaza has sold for $2.5 million to Citi Private Bank managing director Georgia S. Mouzakis Tavlarios, reports the Observer. The corner apartment, which has views to the south and west through floor-to-ceiling windows, had an asking price of $2.995 million in December and went under contract four days later, in January. The buyer was said to feel “a reverence for his spirit and reputation” and, therefore, planned to keep Cronkite’s office intact. THIS PRICE REDUCTION IS FAR FROM CONSERVATIVE The 10-room duplex that William F. Buckley Jr. and his wife Pat occupied until their deaths months apart in 2007 and 2008 came on the market at $24.5 million in May 2008. With the real estate market choking, the New York Times observes, the estate decided to take down the for-sale sign. Now, more than a year later, the apartment at 778 Park Ave. has been relisted at $12 million. Another apartment in the building has suffered a similar fate: The late Brooke Astor’s 15th-floor duplex, with 14 rooms and 6 terraces, started at $46 million in May 2008 and is now being offered for $24.9 million. HIGH CREDIT SCORERS DEFAULT ON MORTGAGES FIRST So says the FICO credit company. “Reversing a long historic trend, mortgage default risk for consumers with high FICO scores now exceeds their credit card default risk, even though most credit cards are unsecured credit and mortgages are secured by real estate,” the company said. In 2009, 0.3 percent of consumers with FICO scores of 760-789 defaulted on real estate loans in comparison with 0.1 percent who defaulted on bankcards. “We’re identifying lending industry situations in FICO Score Trends that to our knowledge have never been seen before,” said CEO Mark Greene. “Economic instability is creating unknown risk in lenders’ credit portfolios as well as counter-intuitive trends in consumer behavior.” The company also found new evidence that lenders tightened their criteria for new loans in 2008-2009 and began “cherry picking” the kind of borrowers to whom they would extend credit. In 2005, nearly 46 percent of consumers who opened a new mortgage had a FICO score less than 700. In 2008 this percentage had dropped to just 25 percent of the newly booked mortgage population. YOU MAY NOT REALIZE HOW THE RECESSIONS CUTS CREDIT SCORES The recession may have done a number on your credit score, even if it spurred you to reform spendthrift ways and cut up your credit cards, notes the Washington Post. SO, WITH BANKS BEARING DOWN, BORROWERS MUST GUARD CREDIT Lenders have a long list of what they want to see in a building and in a prospective borrower. One potential obstacle is your credit history. The New York Times offers good advice about what should know about your credit. ONE-YEAR INCREASE IN FORECLOSURES DROPS TO 4-YEAR LOW RealtyTrac reports that default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions were reported on 308,524 U.S. properties in February, a decrease in foreclosure filings of 2 percent from the previous month and a 6 percent rise from one year earlier. “The 6 percent year-over-year increase we saw in February was the smallest annual increase we’ve seen since January 2006, when we began calculating year-over-year increases,” said CEO James J. Saccacio, who added that the result was the 50th consecutive month of year-over-year increases. “This leveling of the foreclosure trend is not necessarily evidence that fewer homeowners are in distress and at risk for foreclosure, but rather that foreclosure prevention programs, legislation and other processing delays are in effect capping monthly foreclosure activity - albeit at a historically high level that will likely continue for an extended period,” he ran on. Saccacio also said winter storms may have slowed the processing of foreclosure records. In New York City, foreclosure filings were off 23 percent from January and 5.5 percent from a year ago. LOAN APPLICATIONS SLIP For the week ending March 12, the Mortgage Bankers Association says loan application volume dropped 1.9 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier and 1.7 percent on an unadjusted basis. Refinance activity decreased 1.7 percent and purchase volume declined 2.3 percent, seasonally adjusted. Unadjusted, purchase applications dipped 1.8 percent compared with the previous week and 13.9 percent versus one year ago. The refinance share of mortgage activity edged up to 67.3 percent of total applications from 67.2 percent the previous week, and the adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share fell to 4.6 percent from 5.1 percent. RATES FOR FIXED-RATE LOANS ARE ESSENTIALLY FLAT The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) averaged 4.96 percent for the week, 0.01 percent higher than the prior week, according to Freddie Mac. Last year at this time, it was 4.98 percent. The 15-year FRM only inched up by the same amount, to 4.33 percent. The average a year ago was 4.61 percent. The five-year Treasury-indexed hybrid adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) rose to 4.09 percent over last week’s 4.05 percent; a year ago it was 4.98 percent. The one-year Treasury-indexed ARM averaged 4.12 percent, down from 4.22 percent the previous week and 4.91 percent last year. ZILLOW DEFENDS ACCURACY AFTER RESEARCHERS FIND ERRORS In responding to a widely reported study that also was summarized in the last Realty Digest, Zillow spokeswoman Jill Simmon referred to its Web page disclaimers about the accuracy of its “Zestimates,” Inman reports. The home details page on the company's site say that the estimated valuations are not appraisals and should be used as a starting point to determine a home's value, she contended. "Regardless of the paper's conclusion, it's out of date and limited in scope," said Simmons. "What's important to our users is our accuracy today, not our accuracy from three years ago. To that end, Zillow publishes updated accuracy for every county in the country several times a year, accessible on every page of the Web site, for consumers, professionals and researchers alike." Published in Appraisal Journal, the contested study by three University of Texas professors found that Zillow overestimated value by at least 1 percent for approximately 80 percent of the Arlington, Tex. houses in their sample. Only 0.88 percent of values were underestimated by more than 10 percent, while the average overestimation was 11.66 percent. FEDS TO STUDY DISCRIMINATION BASED ON SEXUAL ORIENTATION The Department of Housing and Urban Development plans to study the impact of housing discrimination against gay, REAL ESTATE LOSSES DENT HOUSEHOLD NET WORTH According to the Federal Reserve, says CalculatedRisk.com, household net worth is now off $11.8 trillion from the peak in 2007 but up $5.0 trillion from the trough last year. A majority of the decline in net worth is from real estate assets, with a loss of about $7.0 trillion in value from the peak. The household portion of equity (of household real estate) was up to 43.6 percent from the all time low of 40.8 percent last year. The increase resulted both from an increase in the value of household real estate and a $72 billion decline in mortgage debt. Since fewer than one-third of households have no mortgage debt, the more than 50 million households with mortgages have far less than 43.6 percent equity. THOSE POOR BUILDERS ARE EVEN MORE DEPRESSED Builder confidence in the market for newly built, single-family homes fell back two points to 15 (on a scale of 100) in March owing to poor weather conditions and distressed property sales, according to the latest National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI). "The lack of available credit for new projects, the large number of distressed properties for sale and the continuing hesitancy of potential buyers due to the weak job market are definitely weighing on builder confidence at this time," said Chief Economist David Crowe of the National Association of Home Builders. "That said, the inventory of new homes on the market is at an extremely low level, and we do expect a 25 percent improvement in new-home construction in 2010 over 2009 to rebuild inventory and meet expected pent-up demand." NUMBER OF BANK-OWNED HOMES IS TRENDING UP Barclays Capital has found that the supply of foreclosed homes that banks need to sell is rising again, signaling further downward pressure on home prices in some parts of the U.S., says the Wall Street Journal. Mortgage analysts at the firm estimated that banks and mortgage investors held a total of 645,800 foreclosed homes in January, up 4.6 percent from 617,286 a month earlier. They said that the supply peaked at around 845,000 in November 2008 and then declined through 2009. Now the supply is rising again because banks are determining that many homeowners don't qualify for loan modifications and are completing more foreclosures. Barclays projects that the supply of foreclosed homes will rise to about 733,000 in April, then begin to decline again gradually. Foreclosed properties now account for roughly a fifth of all homes listed for sale nationally. WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN THERE SO LONG Multigenerational families - which accounted for 25 percent of the population in 1940 but only 12 percent by 1980 – grew to 16 percent in 2008, according to an analysis of Census data by the Pew Research Center, says the New York Times. “The Waltons are back,” commented Paul Taylor, executive vice president of the Center. The analysis also found that the proportion of people 65 and older who live alone, which had been rising steeply for nearly a century - from 6 percent in 1900 to 29 percent in 1990 - declined slightly, to 27 percent. At the same time, the share of older people living in multigenerational families, which plummeted to 17 percent in 1980 from 57 percent in 1900, rose to 20 percent. While the share of 65-to-84-year-olds living alone began to decline as Americans lived longer and healthier lives, the proportion of those 85 and older living by themselves grew, to 39 percent in 2008 from 22 percent in 1970. Nearly half the 49 million Americans living in extended families are in households made up of two adult generations, with the youngest adult at least 25 years old. Almost as many live in households with three or more generations. ECONOMISTS EXPECT HOUSING RECOVERY LATER IN 2010 The U.S. housing market is poised to withstand the removal of government and Federal Reserve stimulus programs and rebound later in the year, according to economists quoted by Bloomberg.com. Increases in jobs, credit and affordable homes will help offset the end of the Fed’s purchases of mortgage-backed securities this month and the expiration of a federal homebuyer tax credit in April. Sales will rise about 6 percent this year, and housing will account for 0.25 percentage point of the 3.6 percent growth, according to forecasts by Dean Maki, chief U.S. economist for Barclays Capital in New York. “I would bet even odds that we’re at a bottom and that we’re going to see improvement in the coming months,” said Karl Case, co-creator of the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index and a professor of economics at Wellesley College. FANNIE MAE ECONOMISTS EXPECT 2ND QUARTER REBOUND “We continue to expect home sales to rebound in the second quarter, as homebuyers rush to close sales before the expiration of the second tax credit in June,” Fannie Mae economists Doug Duncan and Orawin T. Velz aver in their monthly report. HOME EQUITY LENDING IS ON THE WAY BACK Rising home prices and an improving economy will spark a modest rebound this year in U.S. home equity lending, says Bloomberg.com. “Home equity borrowing won’t be the economic crutch it was a few years ago,” Greg McBride, based in North Palm Beach, Florida, said in an interview. “This is not an economy in which consumers are going to be able to go nuts.” But lenders will make about $36 billion in new home equity loans in the next 12 months, according to a forecast by Moody’s Economy.com, thereby increasing the outstanding balances of the loans by 4.2 percent to $903.5 billion from a two-year low of $867.3 billion this quarter. Approximately $34 billion of home equity loans were made at the peak, in 2008. Any growth in equity lending during 2010 will necessarily be limited to homeowners whose properties are worth more than what they owe. Chris Lafakis, an analyst at Economy.com, said there likely will be “modest” growth in home equity lending in 2010. “There is a lot of distress out there, but initial claims for unemployment insurance are coming down, most of the home price declines are behind us, and banks are pretty much done tightening their lending standards,” he said. Land Lease: Last Resort The phrase “land lease” often strikes terror in the heart of buyers and brokers alike. It should. That’s because a land lease means that the building sits on land it doesn’t own. Someone else holds title to the property and rents it to the building. A two-year-old article Wall Street Journal article notes that the arrangement occurs when developers fall in love with a site but the owner refuses to sell. Or, land leases are known to occur when developers convert a rental property to an owner-occupied cooperative building and, again, the original owners refuse to sell the land. The leases usually run 50-100 years. Paying rent wouldn’t be so bad if (1) the property were not subject to the landlord’s possession legally but, for the most part, just theoretically; (2) the rent were not renegotiable (always up) at intervals as frequent as 10 years; (3) the were no tax consequences. When the rent goes up, generally by an unforeseeable amount, maintenance increases for that reason alone. For potential residents, such properties can be hard to finance and thus harder to sell. Moreover, the usual co-op tax deduction will be smaller. Reason: The portion of the real-estate tax paid by the co-op on the value of the land will not be deductible because the tax on the land is paid on the behalf of someone else, a usual stipulation in the lease. Also, the ground rent is not deductible; that’s in contrast to interest payments on a mortgage that frequently covers the cost of a co-op’s ownership of that land. Withal, there is one big advantage to purchasing an apartment in land-lease building, and that is the tradeoff for the disadvantages: Purchase price. Consider the appealing 680-sf co-op on the sixth and top floor of a modest 1950 building in a prime Greenwich Village location. The one-bedroom corner unit has open views north and west, gleaming hardwood floors, a big and decently renovated open kitchen with breakfast bar, nice bath, plenty of closet space and generously proportioned rooms. The elevator building itself has a common garden, live-in super, central laundry and a garage. The board allows pets, renters, pieds-ŕ-terre and co-purchasing. Included in the maintenance of $1,063 a month is the cost of electricity plus the usual heat and hot water. Two days after the collapse of Lehman Brothers on Sept. 15, 2008, when everyone knew that the local housing market would tank, the apartment went on the market for $650,000. After fluctuating in price up and down 10 – 10! – times and changing brokers once, the seller is asking $519,000, a bargain in contrast to comparable apartments that are unburdened by its presence in a land-lease building. If buyers have proved wary of making an offer on the place, their reluctance is not only understandable but justifiable as well. Meantime, that apartment is only one many properties listed by various brokers and seen recently, to wit: Two-bedroom Apartments
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lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans, says the Washington Post. HUD officials recently held town hall meetings in Chicago, New York and San Francisco to solicit feedback on how to conduct the study and also are 
They express their expectation of a “payback” in the third quarter as the tax credit “will likely pull some of the demand forward.” By the end of the year, they continue, if the labor market improves as expected, sales should start to trend up on a sustainable basis. “For all of 2010, we project a nine percent increase in total home sales, compared with an increase of 12 percent in the previous forecast,” the economists write. “Home price declines moderated in 2009 and we expect the trend to continue this year.” Because of projected lower housing starts, lower home sales and lower sales commissions in the near term, Duncan and Velz lowered their projection of real residential investment in the first quarter. “We forecast a double-digit drop in the first quarter, rather than a slight increase as noted in the previous forecast.” Their projection is for real residential investment to grow approximately 10 percent for all of 2010, just slightly lower than in the previous forecast. 
