Condo inventory detailed in new report

Developers have sold 85 percent of the condos built in South Florida during the building boom beginning in 2002, according to a report released this week by Bal Harbour-based consultancy Condo Vultures. The report, which studies condo markets from South Beach to West Palm Beach, found that developers have sold 41,258 condos in the last …

New real-estate sales tax is on the way Realty Q&A

Question: I am one of those anal-retentive people who starts working on his tax returns before the tax year even comes to an end. But forget about 2010. I have heard that there is a new real-estate sales tax for 2011. What do you know about that? —K.J.S., Laurel, Md. Answer: Not a lot, if …

The Best And Worst Cities For Home Values In 2011

Poor Florida. The state that is home to Disney World, key lime pie and the Daytona 500 hasn’t had much to crow about when it comes to real estate in recent years. Sorry to break it to Sunshine Staters, but they shouldn’t be expecting a rebound anytime soon either. That’s according to Local Market Monitor …

Big foreclosures that few knew about

Take, for instance, last year’s second- biggest foreclosure. There were no headlines when General Electric Credit Corp. took title to Serenoa Golf Club over a $4.3 million debt. While other courses have had financial difficulties and some, like those at Forest Lakes, have been well publicized, Serenoa is the only golf course in Sarasota County …

Ferreting out mortgage fraud

Attorney General Pam Bondi wisely intends to continue the work started by her predecessor to investigate foreclosure malpractice in Florida. Banks, loan servicers and their law firms like to complain that the reason for all the faulty paperwork in foreclosure cases is due to the high volume of cases. In fact, corners often were purposely …