Check Out Yo Chicago

This site features the latest on trends and news in Chicago real estate; check it out here.

It's latest feature is on an apartment complex on the lake that was selling like hotcakes in the summer but may be slowing down now.

Rental Fight

Check out this story from Fox News.

Cities and property rights groups across Minnesota are watching a court case challenging the constitutionality of a first-in-the-nation rental crackdown. The Winona, Minn., ordinance prohibits homeowners from renting their property in the college community.
Three homeowners went before the Minnesota Court of Appeals on Dec. 12 to challenge the law. 

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Rental reincarnation: Developer gives former gym, dorm new life

Check out the story here. 

Matt Phillips is giving the Lake Shore Athletic Club in Streeterville its third life in 86 years.
The 19-story building at 850 N. Lake Shore Drive opened in 1927 as a fitness and social club and became a dormitory for Northwestern University graduate students in the late 1970s. For the past year or so, Mr. Phillips has been busy converting the building into 198 high-end apartments.

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Put North Side Neighborhoods on the Open House Chicago Map

Here's an interesting story from DNA Chicago.

The Chicago Architecture Foundation wants to know what buildings people would like to see included in its annual Open House Chicago tour — a kind of free, all-access pass to some of the coolest places in the city.
Not a single structure in Lincoln Square, North Center, Roscoe Village, Albany Park, North Park, Ravenswood, Ravenswood Manor, Mayfair or Irving Park made the site list in 2013.

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Latest Housing Numbers Disappoint

Here's the story from CNBC

Signed purchase contracts for newly built homes were down slightly in November, according to government data, but only after an unexpected upward revision to October's reading and a strange sales surge in the South.
October's national numbers were already up 25 percent from September, so some had expected the revision to go the other way. These readings, based on contracts rather than closings, are highly volatile and have a 20 percent margin of error. Sales are now at an annualized rate of 464,000, the highest in five years.

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HUD Releases Latest Housing Numbers

Check out the link from HUD. 

Sales of new single-family houses in November 2013 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 464,000, according to estimates released jointly today by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

            This is 2.1 percent (±21.3%)* below the revised October rate of 474,000, but is 16.6 percent (±29.4%)* above the November 2012 estimate of 398,000.  The median sales price of new houses sold in November 2013 was $270,900; the average sales price was $340,300. The  seasonally adjusted estimate of new houses for sale at the end of November was 167,000. This represents a supply of 4.3 months at the current sales rate.  New Residential Sales data for December 2013 will be released on Monday, January 27, 2014, at 10:00 A.M. EST. 

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Tips for Staging a Home Up for Sale

Check out this CNBC story for some helpful hints for home sellers.

Real Estate Investment Start up Takes Big Gamble in Logan Square

Chicago-based investment firm Wicker Park Capital Management LLC, is taking a chance on an apartment complex in the Logan Square neighborhood of Chicago. 

When it comes to the local apartment market, Mark Ibanez and Blake Berg see big potential in small deals.

Nearly nine months after founding Chicago-based investment firm Wicker Park Capital Management LLC, the former J.P. Morgan Asset Management executives have made their third acquisition in the area: 23 unsold units in Logan Station, a failed Logan Square condominium project.

The $6.6-million deal, which closed last week, is their firm's largest to date, adding to 14 units acquired earlier in the year through two transactions. They bought the Logan Square property, 2504-2516 N. Willetts Court, from Greenwich, Conn.-based Starwood Capital Group,which took title to the units, now fully leased, and an adjacent development site last year through foreclosure.

Can you see Logan Square in this map of the neighborhoods of Chciago?

More on the Debacle Behind the Attempted Sale of Michael Jordan's Chicago Area Home

Chicago Now has some blistering analysis on what has gone wrong so far as Michael Jordan attempts to sell his home on the north Chicago suburb of Highland Park.

So his house wouldn't sell at auction for at least $13 MM so what are they doing - at least for the time being? They are putting it back on the market at $16 MM. So who is going to pay more than $13 MM for a house that we already know nobody is willing to pay at least $13 MM for? And let's not forget all the discussion leading into the auction about how an auction was the way to go and auctions get the best price and there was more interest than anticipated. Yeah, right.

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Jordan's Chicago Suburban Home Fails to Sell at Auction

Michael Jordan's basketball prowess hasn't translated into real estate success as an auction he organized failed to attract a buyer to his mansion in the Chicago suburb of Highland Park.

(Photo courtesy of MSN)

Find the story here. 

Jordan spokeswoman Estee Portnoy says nobody offered the reserve price of $13 million for the seven-acre estate in Highland Park, north of Chicago.
Michael Jordan's 56,000-square foot home in suburban Chicago has failed to sell at auction after the bidding fell short

The Days of 3.5% Mortgage Rates are Over

So says CNBC.

Home sales will rebound: After a brief lull in the fall of 2013, I predict that sales activity will return to the market with more home buyers. The steep jump in home prices has brought thousands of homeowners above water on their mortgages, enabling them to sell and move. Negative equity has been one of the biggest barriers to home sales since the housing crash. Come spring, there will most likely be more sellers more homes on the market and therefore more transactions.
Home price gains should ease: Prices will still rise, no question, but probably not as steeply as they did in 2013. Annual gains of more than 12 percent were driven in large part by investors on the low end of the market. As foreclosures ebb and fewer distressed sales are in the mix, prices will moderate. Still low inventories, however, will keep them in the positive.

Also, check out this review of Ted Margaris Construction in Merchant Circle. 

Borrowers struggling to pay back HELOCs

Home equity loans are second mortgages taken out on any equity that may have accumulated by borrowers. This story from CNBC smells trouble for borrowers with this type of debt. 

As home prices rise and the economy recovers, fewer borrowers are falling behind on their mortgages, or at least on their primary mortgages.
During the housing boom, millions of Americans took advantage of equity gains by pulling money out of their homes through home equity lines of credit (HELOCs). These were largely interest-only loans for 10 years, but that decade is now up for some and coming up for many more. Now, as these loans enter their so-called amortization period—the time when borrowers must start paying down the principal—a growing number can't.

Trendy Chicago Neighborhood Sees Condo Prices Gain 30% YTD

The DNA Info Chicago has a full report on the rebound in the Condominium market in Lincoln Square.

It's no secret that the condo market has been less than robust following the 2008

(Flickr/Anthony Doudt)

real estate crash.
But in Lincoln Square, demand and prices for attached units are slowly creeping back up, real estate broker Eric Rojas says in an analysis on hisChicago Real Estate Localblog.
Through mid-September, condo sales in the neighborhood jumped 30 percent compared with the same period in 2012: 250 versus 192.
Prices are on the rebound as well. According to Rojas, the median sale price of $240,000 is $30,000 more than in 2012, and it's continuing to rise.

Chicago has a total of 77 neighborhoods as this map shows.

Lincoln Square is located on the Northwest side of Chicago

Rising mortgage rates a boon to smaller lenders

CNBC has the story again.

While 203,000 jobs added to the U.S. economy in November is welcome news, it will push interest rates higher—specifically, residential mortgage rates. Those rising rates, along with tighter underwriting and fast-rising home prices, are pushing borrowers away from larger lenders.
"If you're buying a house, our advice is to find a local lender that's reputable," said Eric Egenhoefer, president of Waterstone Mortgage, a subsidiary of Milwaukee-based WaterStone Bank, an independent with reported assets of more than $1.6 billion. "An independent company in general is more nimble, can get to a closing faster and provides better service."

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Mortgage applications take a holiday as rates rise

CNBC has the details.

It didn't take much for the mortgage market to plunge into a deep freeze.
As temperatures fell across the country last week, so did mortgage applications, down 12.8 percent from the week before, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. That includes an adjustment for the Thanksgiving Day holiday, but the shortened week still played a role in the drop.

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Jobless and GDP Numbers Impress

Here's the story from CNBC.

The U.S. economy grew faster than initially estimated in the third quarter as businesses aggressively accumulated stock, but underlying domestic demand remained sluggish.
Separate data showed the number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits unexpectedly fell last week, a hopeful sign for the labor market recovery.
Gross domestic product grew at a 3.6 percent annual rate instead of the 2.8 percent pace reported earlier, the CommerceDepartment said on Thursday. Economists polled by Reuters had expected output would be revised up to only a 3.0 percent rate.

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High End Hotel Selling in Downtown Chicago

Here's the story. 

A New York-based investor is paying about $140 million for the Renaissance hotel on Wacker Drive, one of the biggest downtown casualties of the real estate crash.

Carey Watermark Investors Inc. is buying the 553-room Renaissance Chicago Downtown Hotel from the Royal Bank of Scotland Group PLC, which repossessed the property last year from its previous owner, Chicago-based private-equity firm Walton Street Capital LLC, according to people with knowledge of the transaction.

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October New Home Sales Better Than Expected

CNBC has all the details.

  Sales of new U.S. single-family homes recorded their biggest increase in nearly 33-1/2 years in October, suggesting the housing market recovery remains intact despite higher mortgage rates.
The Commerce Department said on Wednesday sales jumped 25.4 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 444,000 units. It also said new home sales fell 6.6 percent in September.
The release of both the September and October reports was delayed because of a 16-day partial shutdown of the government last month.

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Extraordinary Homes On Sale Now

MSN has the story. 

Several Real Estate Projects Winners with Chicago TIFs

The Chicago Reader has the story.

Conversely, the less money an area generates in property taxes, the less money flows into its TIF accounts.
Thus, the program that's intended to help the poorest of the poor neighborhoods largely benefits richer ones, like the near-west- and near-north-side communities Alderman Burnett represents.
Through 2010, the city spent about $197 million in TIF dollars on various projects in the 27th Ward.
In contrast, the city spent about $7.9 million in Alderman Anthony Beale's far poorer south-side 9th Ward.

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Chicago's Invisible Wall That Million Dollar Homes Can't Seem To Penetrate - Yet

Check out the story from Chicago Now. 

It's as if there is an invisible wall running through the middle of Chicago, along Western Avenue all the way south of Montrose. When buyers of million dollar homes specify their search criteria they will often specify that they want to stay east of Western Avenue - or if they specify Ukrainian Village, Bucktown, Wicker Park, Roscoe Village, or St. Ben's those neighborhoods technically stop at Western Avenue so again you are staying east of Western. And it almost doesn't matter anyway because over the last 7 years there have been very few homes above $1 MM for sale west of Western anyway as you can see in the map below. It's pretty dramatic isn't it?
In this map I just looked at home sales west of Ashland to reduce the data points and the sales for each of the last 7 years are color coded. In fact you can turn on or off any particular year by checking different boxes at the bottom of the map. And you can go here to see a full sized version of the map: Million Dollar Homes West Of Ashland.

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