Rob Käll is a ‘technopreneur’, who in 2008 founded Bookt, a provider of search engine optimization, as well as marketing and other professional services to the global vacation rental industry. He has over 12 years of experience in developing and implementing real estate and property Web sites. He is knowledgeable about emerging Web technologies, especially as they are applied to the travel industry, as well as behavioral targeting and engagement, deciphering marketing trends into widgets and applications, and online distribution hubs beyond the GDS.Käll talks to MHN Online News Editor Anuradha Kher about trends in the vacation rentals industry, how…

Carrollton, Texas–MyNewPlace, one of the largest apartment Internet Listing Services with more than 6 million apartment listings nationwide, has joined the OpsTechnology Supplier Community to enable eBilling for its customers. With the OpsTechnology invoice management solution, customers will receive eBills from MyNewPlace, eliminating the paper handling associated with invoice processing to improve accuracy, and save money and time.”We were immediately excited at how it expedites the pay cycle,” says Kenneth Cluff, vice president of technology and co-founder of MyNewPlace. “With this solution, we send one electronic file directly to OpsTechnology. The system routes the invoices to each property, which guarantees…

By Anuradha Kher, Online News EditorWashington, D.C.–The latest starts figures are out, and multifamily starts for March are down again after a slight uptick seen in February. Starts, which were 119,000 units in January, went up slightly to 202,000 in February and are now down to 116,000, according to the latest report released by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).This is a 42 percent drop from February 2009 and a 55 percent drop when compared year-on-year. “From the supply side, this is exactly what we wanted,” Tobey Price Hubbard, managing principal at Blackstar…

By Anuradha Kher, Online News EditorNew York–NCB has arranged over $57 million in new loan originations during the month of March for 24 New York area properties. The financings included $41.8 million in mortgages and $15.3 million in lines of credit.  Some of the loans were:$11 million first mortgage for Midland Avenue Owners Corp. a 404-unit co-op located at 1296/1300/1304 Midland Avenue in Yonkers, N.Y. $4.5 million first mortgage and a $1 million line of credit for a 113-unit co-op located at 120 Central Park South in Manhattan$3.1 million first mortgage and a $900,000 line of credit for a 78-unit…

By Erika Schnitzer, Associate EditorDenver—Vacancy increases in the Denver metropolitan area are on par with the market’s employment rate, according to Grubb & Ellis’ Multi-Housing Market Trends report for first quarter 2009. The approximate 2 percent rate of vacancy increase was closely correlated to the 2 percent increase in unemployment.“In terms of strength of the apartment market, Denver is relatively strong compared to most other medium to large markets in the country,” notes Steven Rahe, senior vice president of Multi-Housing Properties, Grubb & Ellis Co. In the first quarter of 2009, vacancies increased 112 basis points—up to 8.2 percent. While…

Chicago–RealEstateJobs.com and IREMJobs.org, both job sites focused on real estate, have now come together to enable employers who post jobs on one site to receive duplicate coverage on the other at no additional cost. The collaboration benefits each of the company’s advertisers, giving the positions posted exposure to a significantly larger and more diverse pool of potential job candidates.Candidates visiting either site can post their resumes confidentially, respond to job postings, and receive related services free.IREMJobs.org was created in 2004 by the Institute of Real Estate Management (IREM) specifically for the real estate management industry and is powered by RealEstateJobs.com….

By Anuradha Kher, Online News EditorMarlton, N.J. –The first phase of Janie’s Garden, a new, mixed-income multifamily community part of the Newtown Redevelopment plan in Sarasota, Fla. recently opened nine of its 86 units.The project is developed by the Sarasota Housing Authority and Michaels Development Co., and managed by Interstate Realty Management. Both Michaels Development Co. and Interstate Realty Management are affiliates of the Michaels Organization.  The 86-unit, garden-style community, featuring both apartments and townhomes, is the first of the Sarasota Housing Authority’s multi-phase, multi-million dollar redevelopment of the former Janie Poe public housing project. The Janie Poe project had…

By Anuradha Kher, Online EditorBoston– Cap rates increased by approximately 150 basis points, on average, from May 2008 to March 2009, according to the CB Richard Ellis (CBRE) 2009 Multi-Housing Annual Market Report, which surveys 35 U.S. markets. March 2009 results show that higher cap rate increases were reported for Class A assets compared to Class B and Class C, and value-added compared to stabilized deals. Previously, Class B and Class C cap rates moved upward further and sooner than Class A cap rates. In a third of markets cap rates increased by well over 150 basis points since May…