City Properties Journal

There are currently six companies (five national management companies and the State Fair Board Inc.) that are interested in managing Oklahoma City’s Myriad Convention Center, the planned MAPS indoor sports arena and the Civic Center Music Hall. All these companies have submitted their letters of interest to the city officials for their intention to act as property managers for the estates.

According to the memo from City Manager Don Bown, three of the five national companies have stated that they are willing to invest in the indoor sports arena if the structure of the contract were beneficial to them. The Civic Center and the Myriad are currently being managed by the Oklahoma City Public Events Department.

Austin, Texas-based Rick Black Architects is a partnership between husband and wife Rick and Cindy Black. A 2520-square-foot artist’s residence-cum-studio situate in Long Branch Valley was completed this year. Also upcoming is the Volkshaus, four upcoming single family houses with shared carports, also in Austin. Each residence is envisioned to achieve a five star Green Building Rating. Aside from houses, Rick Black Architects also works on buildings and commercial establishments, drawing on Rick Black’s experience with Frank O. Gehry and Associates. The residence they designed for a graphic designer and a choreographer was featured in the March 2008 edition of dwell magazine.

Now that the mortgage rate has been cut, consider investing in real estate. There is a lot of money in the real estate market, but first you must know what properties make good investments. Many people agree that single family homes are good investments because they are easiest to buy. These homes can be found all over the country. Also, there are many foreclosures which can really do you well in the long run. When you find a foreclosure you will be able to purchase it for well below market value. In turn, your return on investment will come about sooner rather than later. Single family homes come at different price points and in a number of different forms. You can find lower cost homes or expensive ones. The choice is yours based on your available money, and what you are trying to accomplish with your real estate investment.

Look at vacation, time-share, real estate and commercial properties. Try www.usa-property-auctions.com/residential_homes.htm

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When searching for a home, you should not buy the most expensive in the block, but instead buy “beater” homes. For example, in homes costing $300,000, you can probably get a cosmetically unattractive home for low price of $230,000. Then with a little improvement like landscaping for $1,000, painting for $5,000, and fixing cracks for $10,000, you already have a $300,000 home value, which you have only paid for $246,000 including improvements.

Words of caution though, buy the house only if the problems are cosmetic. If the home has foundation problems or termite problems, it is not worth it to repair those because it will cost a lot of money.

Many believe that Baja, California is the next big boom in real estate. It is located at the northern most tip of Mexico, and also known as “lower California.” It has round year toasty weather and low cost living conditions. It is also easily accessible by land, air and water.

Residents are just a half hour away from the US border, yet it is one of the rare places where you can enjoy a perfect beach front. The place is famous for miles upon miles of fine white sand. It also offers some of the best fishing areas in the region.

In Portland, the property tax has substantially risen as compared to the previous years which are attributed to the Urban Renewal program in the City of Portland. Compared to last year’s statistics, there was a 14.72 percent increase in the property tax of the city.

During recent years, the share of the urban renewal in the city budget has been steadily increasing from 18.9 percent three years ago to where it stands now at 22.24 percent of the property tax levy which is very close to the 23.06 percent allocation for fire and police pension. With 45.3 percent of the property tax collection going to urban renewal and pension for fire and police, roughly 55 percent is left for other services.

Malls collapsing cannot be a good sign and it isn’t looking good for the many distressed commercial properties that dot metro areas. It also gives clues to the overall health of the consumer’s buying will power, that seems to be on hold at the moment. These malls have been suffering well before the markets collapsed, victims of less consumer spending as people saved as much as they could when the financial market collapse became apparent. Most of these malls close due to huge debts, accumulated from previous years as their owners buffered their properties hoping the economy was going to get better, it didn’t and there was nothing else they could do more that close shop.

Financial institutions are very much cautious of the current economic conditions, though they are getting a lot of business from people who are opting to get new mortgages on new homes or refinancing their existing mortgage due to the very high default rate. A figure of around 62% is alarming indeed for it shows that people are still not getting enough cash to promptly settle their monthly payments. This can lead to another housing market crisis with more properties that could have been saved, again ending up on the chopping block, for sale or lease, hopefully fr good. The pain of people will be lasting a bit longer, a few years to be exact for recovery and full market turn around is predicted to come this 2012 (2 years or so in the future!).

As evident in the growing website foreclosure.com, the sheer number of properties that have suffered foreclosures have grown and are still on the rise due to the economic crisis we are all being subjected to. Though many are really good finds, the many scam around makes it a bit risky and many other factors that may be affecting the industry and your selected property belies their outside beauty. Read the rest of this entry »

Green homes are becoming the next best thing to our ordinary homes which are slowly being replaced by new developments all over the place and in spite of the recession, people say they are willing to spend a bit more for greener products that impact the environment less. New homes are being built with the latest recycling technologies and more people are demanding nothing less in their new homes. America is now called the thrifty country but people will continue to chose better products that are green and recyclable.
Known for pioneering building technologies, the US is making these Read the rest of this entry »