What’s Next for Business After ‘Brexit’?

By PRASHANT S. RAO In the run-up to Britain’s vote to leave the European Union, the two sides of the referendum debate had diametrically opposing views of the economics. Was voting for “Brexit” casting a ballot in favor of recession, or a vote for financial freedom? More than a month on, little is clear. Britain’s

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Strip Clubs Open, Neighborhoods Shrug

By Adam Bonislawski Do strip clubs bring down property values? A study by economists at West Virginia University and the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse suggests they don’t. Surveying 317,056 residential sales in Seattle between Jan. 1, 2000, and Dec. 31, 2013, researchers found little evidence strip clubs influenced the prices of nearby homes. This, note

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How to Win a Bidding War

By LISA PREVOSTJUNE 17, 2016 Coming up with a winning bid requires foresight. Here are some tips for navigating a fast-moving market. Get preapproved for a mortgage. Not to be confused with a prequalification, preapproval from a lender is a pretty strong indicator of your ability to obtain financing. Without that assurance, sellers may discard

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Follow first steps to ‘sprint’ into home-buying process

By Dana Dratch, Bankrate.com Homeownership is a marathon, but home buying is a sprint. Maybe you came up short in previous attempts. Maybe you just weren’t “ready.” But if you’ve decided that now is the time, here are ways to get a lead right off the starting block. 1. Gather financial information Too many potential

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5 hidden costs of owning a brownstone

There are few buildings more iconic in New York City than the classic brownstone, a type of building that emerged in the 1830s, when a new urban middle class of New Yorkers sought a home that looked fancier than brick and was more durable than wood. Brownstone, which is a type of sandstone that gets

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In Real-Estate, ‘Love’ Hurts and ‘Sexy’ Sells

Homes for sale with ‘sexy’ and ‘seductive’ in the property description have higher listing prices than homes with ‘love’ and ‘loving,’ an analysis finds. By Stefanos Chen In luxury real estate, love is cheap and sex sells. An analysis of roughly 1.6 million home listings found that lower-priced homes were most likely to have the

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The ABCs of FIRPTA

COMMERCIAL OBSERVER The ABCs of FIRPTA BY LAUREN ELKIES SCHRAM JAN. 20, 2016, 11:15 A.M. We all know that foreigners have been snapping up real estate in the United States for a while, but are they taxed the same way? Since the introduction of the Foreign Investment in Real Property Tax Act, called FIRPTA, in

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How to Finance a House—With Everything in It

Will mortgage lenders finance furnishings when buyers want the house and all the stuff inside? By Anya Martin You want to buy the house—but only if it comes with the boat out back. The owner may agree to the deal, but your lender probably won’t include it in the mortgage. In New York’s tony Hamptons,

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What they’re reading now

By: Adam Warner November 1st, 2015 Insights from the desks of Richard Grossman, Steven Hidary and Bertrand de Soultrait Richard Grossman Executive vice president and senior managing director, Halstead Property What book did you recently finish? I recently finished “The Three Laws of Performance” by Steve Zaffron and Dave Logan. What spurred you to read

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