The 234 Apartment

One district dominated San Francisco ’s luxury market when it came to both apartment and single- family home sales over the past year, according to a report out Monday from Paragon Real Estate Group . It’s an L-shaped stretch of four neighborhoods on the northern edge of the peninsula, including Pacific Heights , Presidio Heights , Cow Hollow and Marina. The tony area rises up on a ridge that overlooks the landmark Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz Island and is home to celebrities and historic mansions . More:  Check Out News from San Francisco ’s Luxury Market This area had the most single- family house sales over $3 million in the 12 months ending July 31 —a total of 77 deals at an average price per square foot of nearly $1,500, according to the report. It also dominated the city’s ultra- luxury transactions with nine sales for mansions priced over $10 million. The Pacific Heights- Presidio Heights district also led in the luxury apartment market . Over the past 12 months, there...

Fewer of these, please. iStock/Thinkstock It's possible to get rich if your business only caters to rich people. But it's hard to have a massive and really successful industry in the United States today if you only cater to rich people. There are only so many people in the country with good credit and lots of cash sitting around. And this week, we got evidence that one of America’s largest industries may be running into trouble because its products appeal only to the upper crust. I’m not talking about jewelry or apparel. I’m talking about housing. On Tuesday, luxury homebuilder Toll Brothers reported a blow-out quarter, noting that contracts and sales were up 20 percent from the year before, and said it might sell more than 2,500 homes in the upcoming quarter. Advertisement On Wednesday, the Census Bureau announced that new home sales in July were down 9.4 percent from June, and down 8.9 percent from July 2016. On Thursday, the National Association of Realtors reported t...

Chesterfield County again led the region for single- family home sales last year, but faces challenges when it comes to housing affordability.  That's according to Laura Lafayette, chief executive officer of the Richmond Association of Realtors, during her presentation to the Chesterfield Board of Supervisors this week. In the county, 5,460 single- family homes sold in 2016, a 13.5 percent increase from 2015 when Chesterfield again led the region. Sales in Chesterfield outpaced Henrico County , the second hottest housing market in the region last year, by 1,805 homes. The average sales price in Chesterfield was $266,484. Lafayette said she expected the number to be the same, if not slightly higher, by the end of 2017. "This is obviously a sellers market. If you want to purchase a house, you’ve got to bring a full-price offer," Lafayette said. While Chesterfield led the region for single- family home sales , Henrico came in first for condo and town home sales ...

2/22 Stephenson St in Spotswood is up for auction with a price guide of $500,000-$550,000. APARTMENTS by the beach and near the city have been star performers on Melbourne’s property market this year, new figures show. Albert Park apartments have outperformed all other suburbs and property types for value growth in the first half of the year, CoreLogic data reveals . Units in inner western Spotswood were also on the list of top performers , while houses in Kooyong and St Kilda West also notched impressive growth in median value. RELATED: Land sales hit record pace as population booms Top 10 growth suburbs. The CoreLogic data shows Albert Park and Spotswood median unit values grew 54 .5 per cent and 27.6 per cent, respectively, in the six months to June. Albert Park has a median unit value of $1,029,274 and Spotswood is $649,133. CoreLogic Victorian director Geoff White said while the growth in Albert Park was staggering, it reflected a change in buyer behaviour. He said owner-o...

Five Broward County cities rank as the priciest rental markets in Florida — and, no, Fort Lauderdale doesn ’t top the list. Miramar leads with a July average rent of $1,800 a month, up 3.2 percent from a year ago, according to RENTCafé, a nationwide apartment search website . Adrian Rosenberg, a representative for the website, noted that Miramar rents have increased steadily in recent years and that more than half of Miramar’s apartment stock is made up of high-end buildings, which includes 1,500 new units delivered since 2013. Despite the recent building boom of luxury apartments in Fort Lauderdale , Broward’s county seat comes in only at No. 2 at $1,751 a month. Davie is third at $1,739. Coral Springs and Pembroke Pines are tied at No. 4 at $1,653 a month. In another upset, Miami came in at only No. 6 ($1,587) because lower- priced neighborhoods drove down the average rent, Rosenberg said. West Palm Beach was No. 7 at $1,344. No other Palm Beach County community made the top 1...

Foreclosures just keep falling. On Thursday, data from Black Knight Financial Services showed the number of homes in foreclosure fell below 400,000 for the first time since February 2007. The foreclosure inventory has dropped by 28% in the last 12 months alone. That’s indisputably good news . It means fewer homeowners are presumably facing hardship and already-distressed situations are getting resolved. But that good news comes with a few caveats that underscore the lingering effects of a housing crisis so deep and enduring that it cost millions of Americans their homes. First, the robust market in home flipping —where mostly investment- focused buyers scoop up cheap properties, remodel quickly and resell—that sprang up after the crisis may be drying up. At the end of last year, Attom Data released a report showing that the number of house flips was on the decline as steeper home prices compressed margins on their investments. Also read: House flippers flee ‘flashy’ cities ...

Johnson Chrome was a notorious big spender with a taste for bottle service , bespoke suits and $10,000 shoes. The source of his wealth? A sophisticated identity theft scheme that may have conned Torontonians out of millions. The untold story of the city’s most wanted fraudster Photographs: All portraits via Facebook; background by iStock T he fraudster who called himself Johnson Chrome liked to sit on a bench at the intersection of Hazelton and Yorkville, smoking a Montecristo Edmundo robusto and talking about fashion, cars and cigars to anyone who’d listen. He was charming and handsome, with a neatly trimmed beard , a shaved head and perfect teeth. The perch placed him at the centre of the rarefied universe he’d come to inhabit. His condo, in the former Four Seasons hotel, was steps to the west, and he parked his black Jaguar at the Hazelton Hotel opposite . His gym, the sleek Equinox, was a minute’s walk northwest; his preferred cigar shop , La Casa del Habano , was to the sout...