Standardized Credit Score Is Unveiled

Standardized Credit Score Is Unveiled

The nation’s three biggest credit-reporting firms said Tuesday that they would standardize how they calculate consumer credit scores, with the goal of making the numbers easier for lenders and borrowers to understand.

The joint move by Equifax Inc., Experian and TransUnion also amounts to a competitive challenge to Fair Isaac Corp., the developer of the well-known FICO credit-scoring system.

Credit scores are three-digit numbers used by banks, auto dealers, landlords and others to assess consumers’ willingness and ability to pay their debts.

Young developer bets millions on S. Fla.’s real estate boom

Young developer bets millions on S. Fla.’s real estate boom

A developer is paying a bold $46.5 million for the two-acre parking lot just west of Miami’s Bank of America Tower at International Place. But perhaps even more surprising: He’s never constructed a building before.

Jeremy Green, 32, is buying the parcel pinched between Southeast 2nd Street and the Metromover line for nearly double the price paid less than two years ago, in a bid to turn it into office towers. It’s part of a development spree by Green that includes four condominium projects in Miami’s Design District and two recently purchased downtown Miami properties for future office projects.

Vicarage sells for $7.35M [South Florida]

Vicarage sells for $7.35M

The Vicarage at 448 N. Lake Way — so-named because an unknown architect built it in 1897 for the vicar of The Episcopal Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea — has sold for $7.35 million in a deal that closed Tuesday.

The island’s third-oldest house and the first residence in Palm Beach to be landmarked, it was renovated in 1929 by architect Howard Major and was the 1990 winner of the Ballinger Award for historic preservation.

Beverly sale closes; execs retire [Northwest Arkansas]

Beverly sale closes; execs retire [Northwest Arkansas]

Beverly Enterprises Inc. Chief Executive William Floyd and others retired Wednesday, a day after the company was sold, and the new owner continues to mull over the business’s future.

Fort Smith-based Beverly also said Wednesday that Randy Churchey will become the new chief executive of the nursinghome company, the second-largest in the country.

Beverly was acquired by Pearl Senior Care LLC, a subsidiary formed for the purchase by San Francisco-based Fillmore Capital Partners LLC, a private equity firm.

I-Drive to land region’s first InterContinental luxury hotel [Central Florida]

I-Drive to land region’s first InterContinental luxury hotel [Central Florida]/a>

A Fort Lauderdale developer announced plans Wednesday to build a 1,260-room InterContinental hotel on Lake Bryan about four miles from the Orange County Convention Center.

The luxury hotel, which would be the largest InterContinental in the world and the first in Orlando, will be called Palazzo del Lago. Hospitality Development Group, the developer, plans to begin construction this fall.

The 14-story hotel is expected to open in early 2009 at a cost of $800 million. The resort also would contain 994 units in five 18-story towers called the Villas at Palazzo del Lago, condominiums with prices starting at more than $300,000.

Developer follows new blueprint [ South Florida]

Developer follows new blueprint [South Florida]

Terry Stiles is shifting his company’s focus to retail and mixed-use projects.

Terry Stiles joined his father’s construction company in 1968. He didn’t make much of an impression on the office staff.

“We had two carpenters, one laborer — that was me — and a 94-year-old receptionist who didn’t know who I was,” Stiles said Thursday, drawing laughs at the start of his annual employee meeting at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts in Fort Lauderdale.

Nearly four decades later, people across South Florida know who Stiles is.