By Teresa O’Dea Hein, Managing Editor Being scared is socially acceptable this week, with Halloween creeping up fast. But with job losses and fewer households being formed and tighter credit, even multi-housing executives are wise to be nervous. FDR’s famous phrase about “the only thing to fear is feat itself” has taken on new life, to the point where one of the New York daily newspapers printed it on its cover a few weeks ago after one of the stock market’s big declines. Plus, we should remember that many aspects of property management are controllable. For example, addressing maintenance/service needs…

"Why, its getting so a man can't earn a dishonest living no more!" Yosemite Sam, (c) Looney Tunes 1949 In a rare misstep in an otherwise brilliant career, former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan, who probably thought he was still on his book tour for the newly released "Geez, I had no idea and if I did, I wasn't aware of it," appeared before a Congressional Committee and gave his version of the subprime events showdown. In what was performance art, reminiscent of Yosemite Sam and Bugs Bunny, Greenspan maintained his composure in front of the moron squad, headed by Henry…

It’s clear California supports green building. Starting Nov. 1, all new San Francisco buildings will be required to meet the city’s new green building standards, which were developed by the Green Building Task Force. Two weeks ago, San Jose, Calif., adopted mandatory green building standards for all new construction. The state of California also has general green building standards designed to increase energy and water efficiency, material conservation and air quality. The currently voluntary building code alterations—which Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger called a move “to ensure that when we break ground on all new buildings … we are promoting green building…

Start Spreading the News, They’re Leaving Today… I have been engaged in conversations with a variety of people very familiar with the New York metropolitan real estate market and they’re worried. Rightfully so, it seems as New York and the surrounding employment corridors are about to make history again, this time for job loss. Our estimates for the Manhattan-Northern New Jersey-Connecticut region show a loss of over 155,000 jobs, and for the first time, a very probable spike in apartment vacancies. The unemployment rate will probably vacillate between 5.8% and 6.8% (you know I think the household survey is inaccurate,…

I Love the Smell of Cactus in the Morning In what can only be described as an economic calamity meets public policy overload, today we travel to sunny Phoenix, where the cactus is in bloom, the temperature is a very modest 86 degrees and lots of apartments are empty. If you listen closely, you can hear the sounds of cars leaving Phoenix and not coming back. Phoenix, once the dominant poster child for institutional investment has achieved some level of notoriety lately since the city government, in their infinite wisdom passed a law suggesting that it was unlawful to hire…

The markets have whipsawed over the past weeks, with the Dow index seeing its  worst stretch ever–an eight-day plummet of 2,400 points which wiped out some $2.4 trillion in market value–only to be followed by a record gain of 936 points. Recent days, though, have seen a stepping up of efforts around the world to deal with the financial crisis. Some details of the government’s $700 billion financial rescue program have now been revealed, and the government announced plans to invest some $250 million into preferred stock equity positions in a number of banks. Across the Atlantic, 15 European nations…

By Keat Foong It was certainly hair-raising to watch the stock market in the past week. By Friday, the Dow Jones industrial average had fallen from 9,955.50 on Monday to 8,451.19 points—a drop that was reportedly even worse percentage-wise than the 17 percent plunge in the week ending July 22, 1933. Part of the current panic has to do with the suspended financing markets—which one would think at its worse can lead to economic collapse. In this regard, the Treasury’s announcement this week of the plan to inject $250 billion into banks, guarantee inter-bank lending and backstop the commercial paper…

With the current press coverage of the $700 billion taxpayer financed bailout firmly taking hold in the minds of most owners and developers, we’re now facing a very unique situation. Typically, in most economies, the Fed takes the lead. With the capacity to move markets, the Fed actually only has two primary responsibilites: set the short term rates most typically affecting interbank transactions and second and most importantly, manage expectations on Wall Street. One of the most disturbing aspects of our current monetary policy now unfolding in a market near you, is that Bernanke has essentially been made ineffective, losing…

As the national housing market continues to slow down, a number of condo projects in major cities are being reborn as luxury apartment developments. Take, for example, Chicago. The overall housing market in Chicago hasn’t suffered the big dips areas like California and Miami have seen. While the single-family market has tanked in parts of California, and overall U.S. single-family home prices fell a record 16.35 percent in July compared to 2007 levels, according to the Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices, Chicago prices only fell 10 percent. However, credit is still hard to come by pretty much everywhere in…

Last week, sales began at the first green development in New York City’s Murray Hill neighborhood. The 128-unit project, being built by Toll Brothers Inc. and The Kibel Companies, has been designed for LEED certification and features water-saving fixtures, bike storage and reduced parking rates for residents with energy-efficient or hybrid cars. Construction is expected to be complete in the summer of 2009, by which time New York will be just six years away from its big greenhouse gas emission reduction goal—and likely even more invested in green building. The Big Apple isn’t alone in its sustainable thinking. Across the…