Florida home insurer Argus will fold

Argus Fire & Casualty Insurance Co. will cancel its roughly 9,000 home insurance policies within 45 days, as part of a deal to be taken over by the state on Tuesday.

Policyholders will have to scramble to find a new insurer during hurricane season, which started Wednesday.

Regulators have “decided that it is in the policyholder’s best interest to cancel all of its existing policies,” Argus wrote in a letter that is going out immediately to policyholders, agents and mortgage companies.

via House Keys | Sun Sentinel Blogs | Florida home insurer Argus will fold.

Local governments banned from restricting short-term rentals

Gov. Rick Scott has made official a controversial new law that prohibits local governments from restricting short-term vacation rentals.

The law, signed by Scott yesterday, is one of the first of its kind in the country to enforce the rights of residential property owners who want to rent by the day or week, a practice that has grown in Florida with the downturn in the housing market as owners try to rent property they cannot sell.

Under House Bill 883, pushed through by the growing vacation-rental industry, counties and cities that do not already have rules against residential vacation rentals — defined as those that are rented for 30 days or less more than three times a year — will lose the ability to regulate them.

via Local governments banned from restricting short-term rentals.

W South Beach’s David Edelstein’s Hangout

When he’s at his South Beach home, David Edelstein loves to lounge outdoors, under some trees in a garden decorated as if it were in Provence. But this sunny day he was hanging out by the 120-foot long swimming pool, fringed with white umbrellas and palm trees. “There’s Jamie now,” he said, as actor Jamie Foxx strolled over.

The two chatted, paying no notice to the several hundred people around them, many gawking at the pair.

Mr. Edelstein, 56, isn’t just the developer behind W South Beach, the 408-unit hotel/condo here, he’s also a resident—he said it’s the first time he’s lived in one of his developments. Slight, deeply tan, his crisp John Varvatos shirts unbuttoned a tad more than the average businessman’s, Mr. Edelstein is the W’s unofficial ambassador, treating the public areas of the hotel as if they’re his own. Coming here several times a month from his new $12.9 million New York townhouse, where he lives with his wife and kids, he regularly eats at the hotel’s restaurants and enjoys greeting guests as they pass by.

via W South Beach’s David Edelstein’s Hangout.

Edzell Castle, long a jewel of Sarasota Bay

Much of Florida’s shoreline is lined with mansions, especially in Sarasota. Large homes of 8,000 square feet or larger have replaced, or taken their place alongside, smaller houses of 4,000 or 5,000 square feet — a testament to the explosion of wealth here.

Any trend has to start somewhere, and in Sarasota, the mansion-building began with Thomas Martin Worcester, a retired Cincinnati wire goods manufacturer, and his wife, Davidella (Davie) “Dido” Lindsay Worcester. They are the first developers of Bird Key, an island off downtown Sarasota that has many large homes now. Then, it had but one — and the Worcesters built it.

via Edzell Castle, long a jewel of Sarasota Bay

Falling condo prices in Grand Rapids draw wave of homeowners downtown

Eleven years ago, Paul Becker and Eve Rogus got married, raising their blended family of five children in a large house in East Grand Rapids.

But those children grew up and moved out. And the couple, both in their 50s, no longer needed the five-bedroom Cape Cod or the maintenance that came with it.

Enter River House, the tallest residential tower in the state and the highest point in the Grand Rapids skyline.

via Falling condo prices in Grand Rapids draw wave of homeowners downtown.

Home inspections help assure buyers

Home inspections can help buyers decide whether they’ll walk away from a deal or head to closing.In some markets across the country, inspections also serve as key negotiation tools. In Philadelphia, for example, inspection results more frequently are providing leverage for buyers as they attempt to whittle down price or get the seller to complete repairs, according to a recent report in The Philadelphia Inquirer.Not so in Southwest Florida, real estate agents say. Deep discounts in this area don’t leave much room for haggling over blemishes.

via Home inspections help assure buyers.