With inventory tight and prices climbing, sales of new condos plunge
Recent law change could make maintenance-free apartments less rare
New Yorker magazine lets you click on subway stops to gauge wealth
Beachfront homeowners in Southampton building ramparts against storms
No, says New York magazine, it’s not a bubble again
Manhattan agents confident about city, but Wall Street’s labor pains may hit suburbs harder
The Edge tops list of new developments with most condo sales in first quarter
New listings search site is nice to users
Refusing to hear case, Supreme Court ensures continuation of rent stabilization
The bind that renters endure is tie that’s tight or liberating
Way back in the dark ages, when I was in graduate school getting a master’s in communication, the subject of opinion research so interested me that I developed and conducted a survey for my master’s project.
The result of that intense effort has been my enduring interest and unmitigated skepticism about polls and other studies that are disseminated by the news media.
Although the news media have grown more sophisticated, especially about political polls, I find myself to be continually astonished by how much evidently shoddy research finds validation on the Internet, in newspapers and magazines, and on radio and television.
Regular readers no doubt recall my recurring rants about research on the nation’s housing market, none of which is entirely — or, for that matter — even mostly accurate. Case-Shiller is my favorite target, a great example being in Sunday’s New York Times, when Shiller cited his research based on 407 and 296 respondents in different years as if they represented a national sample of home buyers. Impossible!
For that matter, how could 407 and 296 responses each reflect national sentiment? If 296 is sufficient, why poll 407? Conversely– you get the idea.
If only Shiller were alone. But none of the others — not Trulia, not Zillow, not RealtyTrac, not CoreLogic, not Radar logic, not the federal government, not one — reveals the true story.
Findings may be out of date, Continue reading
Here’s your chance to catch up with news included to inform, enlighten and perhaps even entertain you. To read about The Big Apple, check out the other of today’s posts and look for Out and About early next week.
Actress joins others in firing bullets into landlord’s market-value rents
Her purchase in Greenwich Village proves that it pays to have friends
Fated forever to be “daughter of,” a lesser light sells her apartment for a pretty penny
Big Apple deserter and football Hall of Famer puts Dakota co-op on the market
Jeans heirs seek to sell $60 million summer place, and loud mouth takes a loss in Connecticut
A community’s social offerings, its physical beauty and its openness to new and different people are most important to making residents love where they live, according to a Gallup study of 26 U.S. communities completed last fall. It found that the worst economic crisis in decades is not a key factor in attracting and retaining residents.
After interviewing close to 28,000 respondents over two years, the study learned that social offerings such as entertainment venues and places to meet were the top factor in 21 of 26 communities. That quality was followed by how welcoming a place is and the area’s aesthetics – its physical beauty and green spaces. Continue reading
I, on Cambodia 