“The only function of economic forecasting is to make astrology look respectable”– John Kenneth Galbraith, (1908-2006) Noted historian, economist and commentator. Presidents rise and fall with their public’s perception of economic progress. With the advent of personal computers, spreadsheet software and a few hours of instruction, the motivated executive can now construct a financial model and forecast that will ultimately provide the answer they need, with little regard for pesky things, like rules of logic, facts and an economic history that simultaneously flies in the face of reality while making the author of the worksheet look like a genius.  …

Earth Day is now Earth Week. News about climate change and the green movement—and what everyone is doing to advocate against one and promote the other—is everywhere this week. Last weekend, for example, The Tower Cos. held a “Recycling Day Festival@The Blairs,”—a 1,400-unit community in Silver Spring, Md.—collecting donations of clothing, electronics and furniture with participating sponsors. And Archstone is hosting a “Green Leasing Expo,” a four-day event in the West Region designed to encourage residents and prospects to conserve natural resources—and at the same time is offering a “Go Green and Get Green” savings of up to $500 in…

It is a balmy Southern California evening as I sit on the porch to write this post. The seasons are clearly changing as we slip further into spring, which definitely feels like the beginning of summer. The harbingers of change continue to abound for the housing industry, signaling the stirrings of a return to better health. Shaken and awakened as we are by the tumult of the last year, especially the last six months, all eyes are on the future: when the recovery finally takes hold in earnest, what will it look like for the multifamily industry? One thing is…

You don’t need to own or manage multi-housing units to see how effectively today’s high-efficiency conservation fixtures work. Even in a single-family unit, the results of retrofitting with high-efficiency products can be impressive. But when you begin to do math for the multiple units, the results can be downright awe-inspiring. If you are prone to green thinking at all, you can’t help but wonder what it would be like if everyone everywhere decided to conserve water. The beauty of water conservation is that it is really, really easy. And it can be very inexpensive, too. High efficiency toilets (HETs), of…

As concerned taxpayers around the nation take to the streets in “tea parties” to protest the federal government’s spending on financial rescue efforts, an eventual economic recovery still seems far away. But there are a few glimmers of hope on the horizon. Those aggrieved tea partiers can at least take some solace in the fact that the money they do have left after doling out to Uncle Sam will go a bit further these days. The Consumer Price Index fell in March by 0.1 percent and—more notably—registered its first annual decline since 1955, dropping 0.4 percent from March of 2008….

A couple weeks back I wrote about the travesty of the house next door, which had, under my unsuspecting nose, been transformed into an ultra-sophisticated hydroponic pot farming operation. This went on for nearly three years, with my wife and I suspecting nothing.   Not long after I posted that, I heard through the grapevine that the house had been sold. We waited, praying (admittedly, rather selfishly) that the new owners would be a good fit for us personally, and for the neighborhood. Yesterday, we got our first glimpse of the new reality. Shortly after the thirty cubic yard dumpster…

“Government has laid its hand on the health, housing, farming, commerce and education industries, and to an ever increasing degree interferes with the people’s right to know. Government tends to grow; government programs take on weight and momentum as public servants say, always with the best of intentions. But the truth is that outside of its legitimate function, government does nothing as well or economically as the private sector of the economy.”   President Ronald Reagan, 40th President of the U.S. (1981 to 1989) The housing markets are a mess. The massive fraud, perpetrated while the regulators were sitting on…

The effects of widespread single-family home foreclosures on American neighborhoods have received much media attention. We’ve seen light-hearted footage of enterprising teenagers skateboarding in abandoned swimming pools—as well as disturbing images of block after block of empty houses falling into disrepair.   Lately the media has been focusing on new opportunities created as a result of these foreclosed homes.  Americans who were previously unable to afford certain properties are now snatching them up at auction prices. This is good news for neighborhoods on the brink, but others will require more assistance to be revitalized. Multifamily and single-family specialists will need…

New apartment communities are being constructed with eco-friendly materials and processes, but older properties can also implement a green agenda. Whether your communities have laundry rooms or in-unit appliances, this is an easy place to start and one that’s sure to build resident awareness of environmental concerns. You can also use a green laundry project to generate interest in other eco-initiatives like submetering and recycling that require their participation in order to be successful. Gauging the energy and water efficiency of equipment used in common laundry areas is increasingly important to apartment owners and managers, whether the machines are leased…

When the ancient Vitruvius attempted to capture the essence of architectural quality many centuries ago, he arrived at a tri-partheit formula: “firmness, commodity and delight.” To very roughly translate that into today’s terms, every building or project should be evaluated on the basis of “Will it last? Will it work? Will it please?” Naturally, the first two criteria are by far the more objective. Has anyone yet placed a value on the ultimate life span of a wood-frame building (let alone a hybrid, such as today’s “podium” style multifamily dwelling)? Clearly there are specimens of eighteenth century wood frame buildings…