Out and About: Rare foreclosure not an easy sale

There’s nothing like pink in a living room, the highlight of a foreclosed co-op on the Upper West Side.

So few are sales of foreclosed apartments in Manhattan that they rarely appear on the open market, as opposed to foreclosure auctions on the courthouse steps.

One such apartment surfaced recently between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue in the mid 90s.

This one-bedroom co-op in a pet-friendly 1948 low-rise that has a part-time doorman along with bike, storage and laundry rooms needs a total renovation.  That means

Weekly Roundup: Latest stats leave future murky

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.

ONETIME CLUB IMPRESARIO WHO’S NOW INTO HOTELS UNLOADS 3,900-SF CONDO FOR $11 MILLION

TIGER’S TIGER BURNING. . . HOPEFULLY

RENTAL FIT FOR A PRINCESS GETS ONE (2nd item)

SHE’S GOTTA LOVE HIS TOWNHOUSE AT $27,000 A MONTH

HE TOPS LIMIT MORE THAN A YEAR EARLIER FOR THE SALE PRICE OF A MANHATTAN CO-OP

VIOLINIST SAYS HE EITHER PLAYS ONE THING OR SLEEPS IN ANOTHER, NOW IN A NEW PLACE

BECAUSE HIS ESTATE HASN’T SOLD, DANCER/ACTOR ACKNOWLEDGES THE LIKELY NEED TO TAKE STEPS (2nd item)

CASE-SHILLER REPORTS THAT

Have we reached light at the end of the tunnel?

The latest statistics indicate growing signs of a housing recovery, but mark any recovery as tentative.

Increasing  strength could be undercut in a number of ways.  Among the uncertainties are unemployment, mortgage rates, the condition of both the U.S. and global economies, and consumer confidence.  Also to be considered is the so-called “shadow inventory.”

Still, new information suggests that perhaps we are not only seeing the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel, but possibly our journey through the tunnel has ended.

Trulia finds inventory plunging and percentage of price cuts trending down.

The news in the last day or two is, of course, conflicting.  There is evidence that the supply of housing has dropped dramatically (in the chart above); builder confidence is inching up; home construction of new homes jumped in January; the Conference Board said today that its index of leading indicators ticked up by 0.3 percent; today’s inflation measure shows an unexpected rise; it could take up to 33 more months to dispose of the supply of homes facing foreclosures; and some economists foresee another dip in the housing market.