http://njrereport.com Real Estate, Economics, and Politics Sat, 07 Nov 2009 10:41:21 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en From the NY Times: Broader Measure of Unemployment Stands at 17.5% For all the pain caused by the Great Recession, the job market still was not in as bad shape as it had been during the depths of the early 1980s recession — until now. With the release of the jobs report on ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/11/07/unemploymentunderemployment-reaches-175/ From the WSJ Developments Blog: It’s (Almost) Official: Home Buyer Tax Credit Extended, Expanded Congress voted on Thursday to extend the tax credit and President Obama plans on signing it into law Friday morning. The $8,000 credit will apply to all contracts, for homes up to $800,000, entered into before April 30, ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/11/06/save-housing-at-any-cost-again/ From the Philly Inquirer: Bad home-building loans plague banks As financial regulators shift their sights to the mounting problems with commercial real estate loans, many Philadelphia-area banks remain bogged down in bad loans for residential construction. Led by construction loans, the overall percentage of problem loans - those seriously behind in payment - ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/11/05/construction-loan-crisis/ From the Star Ledger NJ Voices Blog: Property taxes the major concern for N.J. voters despite political affiliation Route 78 cuts through New Jersey. More accurately, it cuts through the many New Jerseys. Every dozen or so miles, the towns off the highway sit like still portraits of time and place; museum ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/11/04/all-eyes-on-the-fat-man/ From the Star Ledger: Next N.J. governor is in hands of voters Now it’s voters’ turn: Polls will be open across the state from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. today for the General Election. Three major candidates, Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine, Republican Chris Christie and independent Chris Daggett, along with seven others, are ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/11/03/get-out-and-vote/ From the Star Ledger: Whitney Houston unloading Mendham estate Whitney Houston has put the 5-acre Mendham estate where she married singer Bobby Brown on the market for $2.5 million, far less than its assessed value of $5.6 million. The 12,561-square-foot home, which she bought in 1987 for $2.7 million, is described in its ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/11/02/own-a-priceless-piece-of-history-for-its-1987-price/ From the Record: Hard-to-move condos go quickly at auction In one afternoon, the developer of an East Rutherford condo complex sold 26 units in his 32-unit complex. Sales of the two-bedroom, two-bath homes in the new Courtland Arms building had suffered in the slumped housing market, so Rolando Cribeiro, president of CP ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/11/02/east-rutherford-auction-sells-out/ From Bloomberg: New Jersey Won’t Recover Job Losses Until 2019, Rutgers Finds New Jersey, its jobless rate at a 32-year high, won’t exceed its pre-recession employment for a decade, Rutgers University economists predict. The state will begin recovering in 2011, yet will require until 2019 to surpass by 118,000 jobs the ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/10/30/turnaround-by-20-19/ From the Star Ledger: Lack of guests leads Borgata to close rooms in Water Club Hotel The Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa in Atlantic City is taking hundreds of rooms at its Water Club hotel out of service on Tuesdays through Thursdays because of low demand. The casino also shuttered most of ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/10/29/buttoning-up-ac-for-the-winter/ From Reuters: U.S. home price gains may not be sustainable: Shiller The gains in U.S. home prices in recent months may not be sustainable and increases in some areas of the country appear to be in "bubble territory," an economist known for his property market expertise said on Tuesday. Robert Shiller, an economics ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/10/28/bubble-20/ From the APP: Time winding down for home buyers With its expiration just over a month away, a push is on to extend the first-time home buyers' tax credit, which boosted the beleaguered housing market in the midst of a recession. ... There are competing ideas out there to extend — and even expand ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/10/27/the-push-to-extend-credit-is-on/ From Minyanville: Where the Housing Market Goes From Here Subsidizing renters with gobs of greenbacks if they buy a house turns out to be a pretty popular program. Thanks to the tax credit for first-time home buyers, as well as cheaper home prices and lower mortgage rates, existing home sales increased by ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/10/26/we-are-just-trading-off-good-news-now-for-bad-news-in-2010/ From the NY Times: Puzzling Over Home Prices THE housing market in New Jersey has been on a little roll toward recovery — the number of sales has risen and the number of houses on the market has fallen for four straight months — even though activity cooled slightly in August for ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/10/24/stuck-in-06/ From HousingWire: IRS Wrongly Gave Homebuyer Tax Credit to Resident Aliens, Minors: Watchdog The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) believes the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) may have paid out millions of dollars in first-time homebuyer tax credits to individuals not eligible to receive the $8,000 credit. Nearly $4m of incorrectly ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/10/23/homebuyer-tax-credit-free-for-all/ From the NY Post: Army covers its bases on supporting house prices HERE'S a government deal I know you'd love to get in on. More than four years ago the US Army announced that it was closing its Fort Monmouth base in New Jersey and moving all the jobs to the Aberdeen ... http://njrereport.com/index.php/2009/10/22/army-backstops-home-price-declines-in-ft-monmouth-closure/