Northeast Region

Election gives Staten Island housing market a jolt

Nov 10th, 2008 | By RT Staff | Category: Northeast Region

Hope is quietly spreading across the lifeless Staten Island real estate market following the Obama victory that the new president will take immediate action to help homeowners.
Trudy Scafiddi, who is trying hard to save her Huguenot home, symbolizes the kind of troubled constituent President-elect Barack Obama will face when he takes office in January.
She and [...]



‘Underwater’ need not mean foreclosure

Nov 5th, 2008 | By Gregory Arzumanov | Category: Housing News, Northeast Region

NEW YORK - Nov. 5, 2008 - What does being “underwater” in your house really mean? Probably not that you’re drowning.
The number of underwater homeowners - those who owe more on their mortgages than their home is now worth - has been growing sharply since 2006 as real-estate prices have tumbled. By some estimates, between [...]



Rent prices on the rise in Boston

Oct 29th, 2008 | By RT Staff | Category: Northeast Region

Rising rents in the Boston area are forcing families to spend a higher portion of their income on housing costs, according to the Boston Foundation’s Housing Report Card, which was released yesterday.
Globe reporter Kimberly Blanton writes about the foundation report and rent prices in the city in today’s Business section.
At the same time, renter incomes [...]



NYC Housing Market Crisis Hits Minorities Harder

Oct 27th, 2008 | By RT Staff | Category: Northeast Region

The New York City housing market is more active than others around the country, but that’s working out better for whites and Asians than it is for blacks and Latinos. That’s according to an analysis of recent financial data gathered by the Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy. Director Vicki Been says from [...]



Apartment vacancies rising in Philadelphia

Oct 27th, 2008 | By RT Staff | Category: Housing News, Northeast Region

The vacancy rate for the Center City and suburban Philadelphia apartment markets is inching up, despite a renewed focus on rental living rather than buying a home.
Apartment landlords, particularly in lower-tiered complexes, are reporting that tenants are doubling and tripling up to save money, and in the upper echelon, more product is coming on the [...]



Mixed numbers for Long Island real estate market

Oct 24th, 2008 | By RT Staff | Category: Northeast Region

A jump in sales and a dip in inventory are providing a ray of hope for a depressed housing market.
The bad news is that home prices are still dropping and many buyers remain on the sidelines.
There were 1,740 homes under contract for sale in Nassau and Suffolk counties last month, a 26 percent increase over [...]



Report: Manhattan Rental Market Softening

Oct 13th, 2008 | By RT Staff | Category: Northeast Region

A report shows that the Manhattan rental market has decreased slightly over last year.
The New York rental brokerage firm Citi Habitats says the price for all apartments, excluding one-bedroom apartments, dipped slightly between July and September compared to the same period last year.
One-bedroom apartments increased 1.7 percent.
The dip may seem to indicate a weakness in [...]



Corzine says N.J. will help protect against foreclosures

Oct 13th, 2008 | By RT Staff | Category: Northeast Region

Gov. Jon Corzine today said the impact from the recent stock market plunge and credit crisis has yet to be fully realized and will likely bring “rising levels of unemployment,” adding New Jersey may even try to purchase homes to protect residents from foreclosure.
Speaking this morning on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Corzine proposed the federal [...]



Crisis Squeezes New York Real Estate Market

Oct 12th, 2008 | By RT Staff | Category: Northeast Region

Property developers and financiers - including international companies that have invested heavily in everything from trophy office buildings to Brooklyn residential renovations - are being whiplashed by the spreading credit crisis, which has brought New York’s real estate market to a screeching halt.
Some are rushing to draw down credit lines before they are withdrawn, while [...]



Stamford Foreclosures Double Over Past Year

Oct 7th, 2008 | By RT Staff | Category: Northeast Region

Home foreclosures in Stamford Connecticut remained low compared withother cities hit by the subprime mortgage crisis, but they more than doubled over the past year, according to the mayor’s office.
Foreclosures increased in each of the past four quarters, rising from 15 in the final quarter of last year to 39 in the third quarter this [...]