Local Market Observations
What do you see in your housing market this weekend? Statistics? "In York County, distressed properties — those in some stage of default or foreclosure or being sold under pressure at below market value — are 30 percent of sales, said Marty Sowa, president of the Realtors Association of York and Adams Counties Inc. House prices will continue to fall nationally, but it's not clear if they will do so in Central Pennsylvania, said Austin Jaffe, chairman of the Department of Insurance and Real Estate and associate director of the Institute for Real Estate Studies at the Penn State Smeal College of Business."
"The recent Case-Shiller numbers were worse than many analysts expected, Jaffe said. 'If next month is bad news, this will be a more serious double dip than people thought,' he said."
"The national real estate market won't recover until unemployment comes down and health returns to the economy generally, and 'that doesn't seem to be on the horizon,' he said. 'We can't look to our housing industry for employment opportunities. In fact, it's the contrary,' he said."
Condo reversions? "A luxury condominium development in Ruston that failed to attract buyers with its pricetags of $900,000 to $1.4 million, may soon find new life as a high-end apartment project. The building, which overlooks the former Asarco smelter site and the bay, was never finished. The developer tried to stir interest in the property by offering a unit as first prize in a fund-raising raffle sponsored by the Broadway Center for the Performing Arts. That arrangement collapsed, however, when raffle sales fell short of projections and the building completion stalled."
Or foreclosures? "The riverfront home of Jeffrey A. Martinovich, the CEO of shuttered financial services firm MICG Investment Management, is in foreclosure and will be offered at a public auction in front of the Newport News Circuit Court building on June 27. The 7,900-square-foot home on Riverside Drive was on the market for nearly a year with an asking price of $2.6 million."
"Featuring soaring ceilings, six bedrooms, seven bathrooms and four fireplaces, the home was featured in 2006 during Historic Garden Week in Virginia. According to court records, Martinovich has not made a mortgage payment on the home since April 2010, around the same time his firm, MICG Investment Management, neared collapse."
"He owes more than $2 million on the home to HSBC Bank USA, according to a filing in U.S. Bankruptcy Court. The court also lifted stays on two other Martinovich-owned properties, a rental home in Newport News and a beachfront mansion in theOuter Banks."
"Martinovich hasn't lived in the Riverside Drive home for more than two years, according to public records."