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Quote of the day – some builders are dead men walking

Credit the always-readable Diana Olick at CNBC for our quote of the day: Last year was the worst on record for the nation’s builders, in sales and starts, but demand is slowly returning, and the concern is that when demand really surges in the coming years, there will be too little supply to meet it... Read more »
By Joe Zekas,
Friday at 2:19 pm
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Chicago area ranks high on CoreLogic foreclosure charts

CoreLogic, in a news release not yet updated to its news page, just announced its first national Foreclosure Report which provides monthly data on completed foreclosures, foreclosure inventory and 90+ delinquency rates. According to the report: Completed foreclosures for all of 2011 totaled 830,000 compared with 1.1 million in 2010. In December 2011 there was... Read more »
By Joe Zekas,
Wednesday at 9:40 am
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Every great home is full of surprises

You’re in a time warp as you pass through the tiny Village of Wayne along Army Trail Road. Except for the cars, the scene isn’t much different than it would have been 100 years ago. The traffic slows to observe a 25 mile an hour limit, and the entire pace of life seems to slow... Read more »
By Joe Zekas,
February 5, 2012 at 5:17 pm
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How steeply did Chicago home prices fall last year?

Yesterday CoreLogic issued a news release for its December Home Price Index (HPI), providing a look at full-year 2011 price changes: The CoreLogic HPI shows that including distressed sales, home prices in the U.S. decreased 4.7 percent in 2011 compared with December 2010. This year-end report shows that home prices continued the trend of year-end... Read more »
By Joe Zekas,
February 2, 2012 at 9:50 pm
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A 1930s cottage in Glen Ellyn's Lake Ellyn neighborhood

If you lived in Stacy’s Corner from the late 1840s to the early 1890s you watched your home town change its name to Danby, and then to Prospect Park and, finally, to Glen Ellyn. You could credit, or blame, Thomas E. Hill for the quirky spelling of the final iteration of the name: it was... Read more »
By Joe Zekas,
January 31, 2012 at 8:50 pm
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A distinctive Queen Anne brownstone in River Forest

If the mature trees on the 100 x 200 foot lot at 147 Thatcher Ave in River Forest don’t satisfy your taste for greenery, there’s a forest preserve with a river running through it directly across the street. A two-block walk along the forest preserve takes you to the River Forest Metra station. 147 Thatcher... Read more »
By Joe Zekas,
January 29, 2012 at 7:54 pm
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A snapshot of the Elmhurst housing market

The draws for Elmhurst are its location, its schools and its housing stock – which can start with a move-in ready home for $200,000, according to Tom Makinney of the Gracik Makinney Group. Makinney, who grew up and lives in Elmhurst, outlines his home town’s advantages in the above sponsored video. The Gracik Makinney Group... Read more »
By Joe Zekas,
January 26, 2012 at 9:43 pm
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Chicago-area new home sales fall for sixth straight year

Chicago Real Estate Daily reports: Homebuilders sold 665 homes in the fourth quarter, down 3.3 percent from 688 in the third quarter and 1.8 percent from 677 a year earlier, according to Schaumburg-based residential consulting firm Tracy Cross & Associates Inc. Full-year sales totaled 2,962 homes in 2011, down 4.5 percent from 3,101 in 2010... Read more »
By Joe Zekas,
January 25, 2012 at 11:34 am
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Downers Grove residents gaining a parking lot in their front yards

If you’re thinking of buying near a large institution – a hospital, a high school, a university, etc. – you should always carefully investigate what that institution’s expansion plans might mean for your property value. And you should always be aware that large institutions plan for the long horizon, and execute their plans in a... Read more »
By Joe Zekas,
January 22, 2012 at 11:29 pm
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Calling for a moratorium on real estate deals of the century

We’re four score and eight years away from the end of the century, at which point we can truly pronounce the real estate “deal of the century.” I realize that “deal of the century” can fairly be read to mean “deal so far this century.” But, when every day brings a drumbeat of deals of... Read more »
By Joe Zekas,
January 20, 2012 at 10:57 am
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