The softening Florida real estate market may signal some good news for first-time home buyers, and many others who have been shut out of the local real estate market due to sky-high home prices. But now, with more inventory on the market, lower fixed-rate mortgages, and sellers desperately cutting their asking prices, home buyers are […]
Credit Crackdown Shutting Out Home Buyers
Even before Goodman Griffin and his girlfriend began house-hunting a month ago, they sat down with a mortgage broker and were pre-qualified for the nontraditional loan they needed to purchase the kind of home they wanted. So it came as a shock when the loan they thought they had was yanked away from them this […]
Drought spurs order to shackle sprinklers
Turn off those sprinklers. Water restrictions are returning to South Florida. This time, they might be here to stay. Water managers voted Thursday to impose three-day-a-week limits for sprinklers from Tequesta to the Keys, saying it’s time for residents and businesses to share the pain of a drought that threatens the region’s wells and wildlife. […]
More Growth in Refinancings
Overall mortgage application volume increased last week despite mixed movement in interest rates, the Mortgage Bankers Association reported today. The market composite index, a measure of home loan application volume, gained 2.8 percent last week, rising to 690.5 on a seasonally adjusted basis from 671.6 one week earlier. The index that tracks refinancings posted the […]
Boca Raton American Media Inc.’s building reopened
Tabloid publisher American Media Inc.’s former headquarters was reopened Thursday after years of decontamination from an anthrax attack that killed a photo editor six years ago. Boca Raton Mayor Steve Abrams said the building’s opening sends a message to those who carried out the still-unsolved attack on the former offices of the National Enquirer, Sun […]
Starting to plan for Spring Home Cleanup?
A great time to start planning for that spring clean-up is now. Spring is just around the corner and here is a list of some ideas to get you started with your own Spring Cleaning Plan. 1. Thoroughly dust your home and clean air conditioning and heating filters, ducts, and vents to decrease your exposure […]
Group representing small businesses oppose GOP plan to end property taxes
TALLAHASSEE The head of a group representing small Florida businesses opposed the House Republican leadership’s plan to exchange lower property taxes for a higher sales tax, in testimony Thursday before the Senate Finance and Tax Committee. Members of the National Federation of Independent Business are worried that such a swap, while providing short-term property tax […]
Could Condos Rise Above The Vizcaya Museum
Miami city commissioners are still going ahead with a controversial construction project that would offer visitors from around the world who enter the Vizcaya musem a view of condos rising above its manicured tree-lined surroundings. A proposed 300-unit luxury condo complex on nearby Mercy Hospital is steadily moving ahead but resistance is beginning to mount. […]
Office project is so green it’s ‘platinum’
It’s as green as you can get. Overture Development Group LLC of Celebration intends to build a 130,000-square-foot office building that would be rated a ‘Platinum Building’ — tops in environmentally sensitive development — by the U.S. Green Building Council. The Conservatory, as the building would be known, is to be under construction in Celebration, […]
Scripps Research Institute Project Construction Underway
Exactly a year after a divided Palm Beach County Commission approved the final siting of Scripps Florida in Jupiter, the ground’s been cleared, concrete columns have sprouted and officials are for the first time in years looking forward to the project’s completion. ‘It’s been a year, but there was so much work to do to […]
