Housing

“Change of ownership, key to reassessment, is cut-and-dried for homeowners but not businesses. It means a loss of tens of millions of dollars a year in tax revenue,” according to an investigation by the Los Angeles Times.

A Star Tribune investigation of 1,330 Twin Cities real estate transactions known as contracts for deed reveals that they are beset by inflated prices, high interest rates and other terms that almost guarantee the buyer will default. In hundreds of cases, records show, sellers failed to provide mandated home inspections that would have revealed code…

“The greatest income inequality in the state was in Philadelphia and Allegheny County from 2009 to 2011, according to recently compiled Census estimates that measure the gap between richest and poorest. The chasm between rich and poor can be seen near Pittsburgh in the boroughs of Fox Chapel and Sharpsburg, a wealthy bedroom community and…

“Thirty percent of claims sampled from for- profit homes were deemed improper, compared to just 12 percent from non-profits, according to data Bloomberg News obtained from the inspector general’s office of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services via a Freedom of Information Act request.”

“The low-income neighborhood of older wood-frame homes in West Dallas is a far cry from the suburb of newly built brick houses in Frisco 30 miles to the north. But the two North Texas communities share a bond: Both were contaminated by industrial lead for nearly half a century.”