Consumerist
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mortgages
When To Buy A Home And How To Avoid Screwing It Up
Are you hitting that stage in life where you're thinking of becoming a homeowner? Morningstar has published two home buying articles that together offer some good, concise advice to the prospective buyer, especially if you're a first-timer. More » -
hot infographics
What Recovery? 937,840 Foreclosures Q3
What recovery? There were 937,840 foreclosures in Q3 in the US, according to RealtyTrac, the highest quarterly level since they starting issuing reports in 2005. Let's take a closer look via giant sexy graphic visualization, inside. More » -
home buying
Know Your Closing Costs Or Else A Shark Will Eat You
Homebuyers looking to save money will try to buy without an agent and deal directly with the seller's broker, but beware, they feed on your weaknesses, ignorance, fear, and money. More » -
real estate
$8000 Credit For New Homebuyers Might Get Extended
Washington is working on getting the up-to-$8000 tax credit for first-time homebuyers due to expire in November extended, and perhaps even expanded to current homeowners buying a new house. [AP] (Photo: sflovestory) -
foreclosures
How To Buy A Foreclosed House (That You Might Actually Want To Live In)
Buying a foreclosed home may seem like a great deal, since the bank that's selling it would rather unload it at a loss than stay on as owner. But foreclosures come with a lot of risks — including vandalism by former owners or theives who strip vacant homes of just about anything that isn't bolted down — and even things that are (you know, like toilets). More » -
mortage meltdown
Newsflash: The Next Tsunami Of Aggressively Irresponsible Loans Didn't Magically Disappear
We've been talking about the next wave of the mortgage crisis for quite some time now, and it seems that, as predicted, it's cresting and about to hit. We are, of course, speaking of Option-ARM loans — considered the riskiest of all mortgages due to their ability to grow rather than shrink. Yes, there actually exists a mortgage that allows the borrower to pay less than the interest that is accruing on the loan. More » -
buying a home
Buying Your First Home? Here Are 7 Good Tips
Ron Lieber at the New York Times has put together seven sensible tips that can help you find a first time home that you can both afford and enjoy living in. More » -
auctions
Bernie Madoff's Beach House Sells For $8.75 Million
An unidentified person has offered $8.75 million cash—more than the asking price—for Bernie Madoff's beachfront home in Long Island. Bidders made sealed offers for the property, and the realtors say they won't reveal any more details until after the deal closes. The house is supposedly very fancy, but if we lived there we'd just tear it up looking for hidden piles of cash. This is why we can never have anything nice.
"Sold! Bernie Madoff Beach House Goes to Contract at $8.75 Mil +" [ABC News] (Thanks to Natalia!)
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bankers gone wild
Banker Uses Foreclosed Beach House For Totally Awesome Parties
It's Saturday night! Let's party! ...But where? Oh, I know. I heard that there's this foreclosed Malibu beach house where a Wells Fargo manager is having some killer parties. Well, at least until ACORN had to go and ruin everyone's fun. More » -
weekend at bernie's
Bernard Madoff's Penthouse Now On Sale For $7.5 Million
If you've ever wanted to live like the King of Ponzi Schemes, now's your chance. Bernard Madoff's penthouse at 133 East 64th Street in New York is on the market, and can be yours for a mere $7.5 million. The U.S. Marshal Service, which is liquidating Madoff's assets, gave a guided tour, and The New York Post captured it on video. Inside, a shoe closet to make Imelda Marcos jealous, Ruth and Bernie's separate bedrooms, the shelves that once held monogrammed "BLM" shirts, and Deputy Marshal Roland Ubaldo doing his best Chad Rogers impression. More » -
real estate
What Home Sale Listings Say, What They Mean
With real estate listings, every day is opposite day! The words are stretched so far from the truth that you could break it with a pebble. To help you navigate this real estate mire, the National Association of Exclusive Buyer Agents released a tongue-slightly-in-cheek report on Home Buying Euphemisms and Lingo, based on its members actual experiences. So here's what you might read in the listing, and what they really mean: More » -
real estate
This Is Timothy Geithner's Beautiful House - Not Selling
It's a common enough story. A family puts their house up for sale after one of the parents gets a great job offer in another city. Sure, they bought the house at the peak of the housing bubble, but they refuse to sell for less than they paid. The house stays on the market for months on end. More » -
follow ups
Twitter Lawsuit Company Tells Its Side Of Story
Horizon Realty, the Chicago company that sued a former tenant for libel after she posted an offhand remark about them on her Twitter account, must have felt the full effects of Internet notoriety today. Jeff Michael—who was quoted in the Chicago Sun-Times saying that Horizon was a "sue first, ask questions later" sort of company—has issued a response. Click here to read it (PDF). The short version: he says the tenant in question sued them first (about a month after the tweet in question), and they're all in deep disagreement about any existence of mold in the apartment. (Thanks to Alyssa!) More » -
lawsuits
Tenant Sued After Using Twitter To Complain About Moldy Apartment
If the the puiblic didn't read Amanda Bonnen's Twitter feed before, they will now, thanks to a defamation lawsuit brought against her by Horizon Group Management in Chicago. More » -
suburbia
Top 10 Best Places To Live In The US
If your priorities are in line with that of Money magazine and are looking to move, you'll be glad to know that they have once again put together a list of the best places to call home in all of these United States. This year, Money set out to find "small towns across the country-those with populations of 8,500 to 50,000-where jobs are available, crime is low, schools are top-notch and housing is affordable." Sounds dreamy. The top 10 inside. More » -
real estate
Quick! Snap Up A Multi-Million-Dollar Home Before The Housing Market Corrects Itself!
If you've been following Consumerist religiously and have implemented all our money-saving tips then you will no doubt have saved enough cash by now for a down payment on the 13-bedroom, 9-fireplace Upper East Side home listed recently for $45 million. You didn't? Well, Madonna beat you to it. And since this girlfriend doesn't pay retail price for anything, she managed to get it at the sweet, sweet price of $32.5 million. More » -
recession watch
First-Time Home Buyers: Use $8k Tax Credit For Down Payments Or Closing Costs?
BusinessWeek has an interesting article about a little known program that will allow first-time home buyers (technically, those who have not owned a home in three years) to use the 8k tax credit to offset down payments or closing costs. More » -
forgetfulness
County Sells Wachovia Bank For $16,900 For Failure To Pay Taxes
When Wachovia closed its bank branch in Shoemakersville, PA, last month, a spokesperson made it sound like it was part of a normal review of locations. Local newspaper the Reading Eagle, however, found out that the bank lost the branch last September in a tax sale, when a local company bought the building for only $16,900. More »
real estate
New York, 7:44 AM
Sun Nov 8
7 posts in the last 24 hours
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