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The U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH) has put forth its plan to end homelessness.   The USICH was mandated by the HEARTH Act, enacted by Congress in May 2009, to present a “national strategic plan” to end homelessness to Congress and the President. The plan puts forward strategies to end homelessness among veterans and the chronic homeless by 2015, and homelessness among children, family and youth by 2020. Sheila Crowley, president of the National Low Income Housing Coalition, said that her organization looked forward to working with the Administration this year to “identify funding sources” to help communities provide…

There is plenty of private funds seeking below-market properties to scoop up. Recently, GoldOller Real Estate Investments formed a new real estate investment fund to invest opportunistic and value added opportunities east of the Mississippi.

Almost 35 years ago, while still living a post-hippie lifestyle, I attended my first Earth Day in Los Angeles. I was working at one of the first 24 hour gas stations in California, where gas was 25 cents a gallon.  A couple of bucks would fill the tank of my, mint condition, 1955 VW Bug, almost to the brim. I was invited to attend the day in the park by a young woman who wrote for an ecological magazine, a “commie rag”, as my father would say.  She would come in late at night to get gas and we would…

Whether you are for or against it, would anyone be really surprised if President Obama tries to privatize social security, or impose regressive VAT taxation, down the road? For now, President Obama wants to privatize public housing. That is one interpretation of his Preservation, Enhancement and Transformation of Rental Assistance Act (PETRA). PETRA proposes to convert public housing—on a voluntary basis, it is emphasized—to project-based Section 8. This may be a boon to private multifamily owners and developers. Bankers also stand to benefit under the Act. Think of the immense, publicly owned, housing stock that is at stake. As they say,…

Everyone thinks Miami is overbuilt, right? But the latest report from Marcus & Millichap shows that Miami apartments may not be doing so badly. M&M research says that vacancy in Miami-Dade has already been flat for six months. “Some areas where the threat of shadow stock is not as significant continue to record notable results. The average vacancy rate in the Hialeah, North Dade and North Miami/Bayshore submarkets is around 5 percent,” states M&M. Given such trends, investors are returning in increasing numbers. There is currently about $1.7 billion in distressed apartment properties in Miami-Dade, says M&M. However, opportunities to buy at firesale…

No doubt, industry players wanted to hear what Carol Galante, deputy assistant secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) had to say.   Galante heads HUD’s multifamily housing programs, and if you want to know about the Obama’s Administration’s proposals to tighten the FHA multifamily insurance programs, Galante would have the answers.    Members of the audience packed a large conference room at the law offices of Nixon Peabody recently for the first-ever “Brown Bag Luncheon” event sponsored by the New York Housing Conference (NYHC).  Galante, for many years the president of BRIDGE Housing Corp. before she was…

Here is an advance look into what real estate executives think, according to DLA Piper’s annual State of the Market Survey. DLA Piperis bringing together the best minds in real estate for its ninth Global Real Estate Summit. Experts at the conference will diagnose each sector of commercial real estate and compare insights. In correlation with the event, the firm normally release the results of their survey.   Some of the findings for this year: -The majority of respondents (60 percent) believe that real estate markets have already reached, or will reach, bottom in 2010. -Six out of 10 respondents…

Interest in distressed properties remains high, among homebuyers and investors alike. Some CRE investors may even be holding off on acquisitions at the current ridiculously compressing cap rate environment in the expectation that more distressed properties will be hitting the market down the road. This month, attorney Stuart Saft, Dewey & LoBoeuf’s Global Real Estate chair and an authority on workouts and distressed assets, pointed out another reason to expect that more assets may be put on sale in the near future. He says that “Until now many workouts involved merely extending the term of the loans with the hope…