New Phoenix transportation/housing index
T oday, metro Phoenix’s planners, developers and government officials are gathering to talk housing and transportation. Two of the region’s biggest issues, after the economy. The event is the Sustainable Transportation and Housing for Sustainable Communities summit in Tempe, where the Center for Neighborhood Technology will unveil its Transportation and Housing Affordability index for the Phoenix area. Despite the mouthful of long terms, the index is supposed to be a much better indicator for the Valley’s growth than some past indexes. The new index tracks an area’s cost of housing as well as the location of communities’ efficiency, by measuring the transportation costs associated with … read the rest of this...
Arizona's $125 million plan to slow foreclosures
T he Arizona Department of Housing has submitted its plan to spend $125 million in federal funds to slow foreclosures. Arizona is one of five states divvying up $1.5 billion in foreclosure prevention funds. All state plans were due to the U.S. Treasury Department today. A few tweaks were made to the original plan, including more focus underemployed homeowners. Here’s the plan that was submitted: ——————————————————————— Arizona Foreclosure Prevention Innovation Fund Funded through the U.S. Treasury Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 (EESA) The Foreclosure Problem Arizona’s home foreclosure rate is currently...
LA real estate agent guilty of homebuyer tax-credit fraud
A Los Angeles real estate broker has pled guilty to filing false tax returns to claim almost $70,000 in fraudulent homebuyer tax credits. Kashawn Monique Savery admitted at a hearing Monday to being involved in filing more than 200 false tax returns seeking more than $1.3 million in fraudulent claims for federal, first-time buyer credits, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office of central California. Savery has been a licensed California real estate broker with the firm Cornerstone Realty Group since 2006. The Internal Revenue Service’s criminal unit found 2031 suspicious tax returns on Savery’s computer. … read the rest of this post
Tempe's Centerpoint towers draw no foreclosure bidders
T he two Centerpoint condominium towers in downtown Tempe failed to sell at a foreclosure auction this morning. The project, which has been stalled for the past two years, went back to the lender Peoria-based ML Holdings. ML Holdings is the predecessor to hard-money lender Mortgages Ltd. Tempe Land Co. was Centerpoint’s developer. It changed its bankruptcy filing from a Chapter 11 reorganization to a Chapter 7 liquidation last September. The move allowed ML Holdings to file to foreclose on Centerpoint. ML Holdings Chief Operating Officer Mark Winkleman said the minimum bid on Centerpoint was $8 million, but there were no bidders. Now that … read the rest of this...
Arizona's plan to spend $125 million in federal foreclosure prevention funds
T he Arizona Department of Housing must have its plan to spend $125 million in federal funds to slow foreclosures to the U.S. Treasury Department by April 16th. A public meeting was held to discuss the plan last Wednesday. There were many questions and some criticisms to the plan. The state’sHousing Dept. had to put the plan to together in only about six weeks. Most of the plan revolves around giving homeowners in imminent danger of foreclosure money to pay down their principal, if lenders will match that amount. If the Housing Dept., with the help of the state’s expert, government-backed foreclosure … read the rest of this post