Re-purposing has certainly become the buzzword of the day. We've had former grain silos turned into homes, as well as a military base, a post office and even the Watchtower printing press in Brooklyn is now a condo complex. But taking a sidelined nuclear plant and making it into a theme park may be pushing the envelope. ... Continue Reading »

Many investors have Miami Beach in their sights, so we thought we'd do a little bargain-hunting ourselves. We turned up this uber-sophisticated 20th-floor condo on Miami Beach's Millionaires' Row with a price tag of $1.2 million. At the market's peak, it would have been listed at least 30 percent more. ... Continue Reading »

Almost a third of the escrows that open today fall apart, a disheartening fact for buyers, sellers and agents -- but mostly sellers, who often have been waiting a good long while for a viable buyer to come down the pike. The good news is that we know why deals are imploding and have some solutions: ... Continue Reading »

The closest thing to a sure bet in real estate may be going to college. Investments in college towns -- places where the community is shaped by a university's presence -- have done well while other niches in the housing market have, for the most part, fallen off the Dean's List. It comes down to the basic law of ... Continue Reading »

It's been hard enough just to find a buyer for your house. Now the challenge is to drag them across the finish line. Only two-thirds of opened escrows close on time and 16 percent of the deals fall apart without closing. Of agents polled in June by the National Association of Realtors, one in six reported having a deal ... Continue Reading »

Everyone may love Raymond, but not everyone may love Patricia Heaton's West Hollywood condo. It's back on the market at a lower price than it was two years ago when it didn't sell. What's that they say about if at first you don't succeed, try, try again? Ten years ago, Heaton and her actor/producer husband David Hunt ... Continue Reading »

Managing income property is the bane of many a landlord's existence. But Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. has locked in a tenant, on the cottage next to his waterfront home, that likely won't be bouncing checks or moving out any time soon: The U.S. Secret Service detail that's hired to protect him. To recap: Our tax ... Continue Reading »

Generally when somebody screams "Once in a lifetime opportunity!" in our direction, we think about the proverbial snake oil salesman and hurry our pace away. This time, that somebody means it. This 50-room mansion was designed by famed Boston architects Peabody and Stearns during Boston's most notable era in ... Continue Reading »

We like to panic as much as the next homeowner, but reading the proclamations each month uttered by the Great Gods of Real Estate -- Case and Shiller -- is simply growing wearisome. Nobody really knows what to make of all the contradictory statistics and reports about home sales and prices that are released every few ... Continue Reading »

There's an adult toybox posing as a house for sale in the Los Angeles County town of La Habra Heights. It has its own casino with restored slot machines plus a swimming pool with rings of fire and an underwater observation lounge. Originally listed last year at $21 million, the price is now a mere $7.8 million. We can ... Continue Reading »

When Virginia Henry bought her boarded-up and abandoned Rochester, N.Y., home in December 2007, she saw potential where others were blind to it. The house, a short sale, became her home to live in and care for, she said. She plopped down her $20,000 and filed her paperwork for a loan program that would pay the balance ... Continue Reading »

Neither rain nor sleet nor hail nor freeway closures shall stop the mighty Realtor from his or her appointed rounds. While officials are predicting dire traffic consequences from the planned closure of a 10-mile stretch of Los Angeles' 405 freeway for 53 consecutive hours beginning tonight, most real estate agents ... Continue Reading »

Buying a newly built house costs more -- even with all the builder incentives thrown in. The National Association of Realtors reports that the median price for existing homes in May was $166,700. The Census Bureau says the median home price for new homes was $222,600 -- or 33.5 percent higher. The price gap explains why new ... Continue Reading »

Calling Mark Spitz: Maybe you don't need to be an Olympic swimmer to want to have a 26-foot-long pool inside your Manhattan townhouse, but this one on West 15th Street will certainly attract those with a penchant for the water. Listed at $10,995,000, the 22.5-foot wide Chelsea home has five floors. The pool, by the ... Continue Reading »

The problem with most ranches, at least for this city slicker, is that they look so, well, ranch-y. The Mill Creek Ranch in Red Bluff, Calif., just listed at $29.5 million, would be a spectacular Spanish-style home no matter where you built it. Having it on more than 25,000 deeded acres and surrounded by the splendor of ... Continue Reading »