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Dennis Rodkin
Life in the Slow Lane: Get Used To It
By Dennis Rodkin
A new federal report has provided yet another sign that Chicago’s housing market is in the slow lane on the road to recovery. The report, issued last week with the government’s monthly housing scorecard, noted that, during the past year, the area saw a 1.5 percent increase in the number of homes at risk of foreclosure, rising from 125,400 homes in January 2011 to 127,300 homes in January 2012... Read more
Foreclosure Comes to Exclusive Woodley Road
By Dennis Rodkin
List Price: $1.549 million
Sale Price: $1.537 million
The Property: An 11,600-square-foot mansion on Woodley Road outside Winnetka has the dubious distinction of being the first foreclosure sale in that enclave of prominent families, high-level executives, and other eminent people... Read more
A Can-Do Condo Builder in Kenwood
By Dennis Rodkin
List Prices: $199,000 to $369,000
The Property: When work halted on a boom-years condo project meant to fill an unsightly gap in a block of historical homes in Kenwood, Lewis Korompilas spotted an opportunity... Read more
Federal Vouchers Will Help 100 Homeless Cook County Veterans
By Dennis Rodkin
About six months from now, 100 homeless military veterans in Cook County will have a place to live, thanks to a $760,872 grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Those 100 vets represent a 55 percent increase in the number of Cook County veterans helped into housing through HUD’s Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing program (VASH)... Read more
What Sold for $1 Million in March
By Dennis Rodkin
During the month of March, four homes each sold for exactly $1 million. There’s nothing magical about that number, but as benchmarks go, it has an undeniable appeal. So what is a million-dollar house?... Read more
From Bathhouse to Your House, in East Village
By Dennis Rodkin
List Price: $2.2 million
The Property: In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, working-class immigrants were pouring into Chicago, many of them into housing with little or no indoor plumbing. In response, the city built 19 bathhouses, where people could go to clean up... Read more
More Evidence That Blacks, Latinos Were Hit Harder by Housing Bust
By Dennis Rodkin
Positive signs in the housing market these days are outnumbered by negative ones—such as the data released Tuesday by Case Shiller that showed Chicago home values in January 2012 dipping back to January 2001 levels. And in neighborhoods that are largely African-American or Latino, the positives are even fewer... Read more
Bucktown’s Sunlight Store
By Dennis Rodkin
List Price: $935,000
The Property: On a quintessential Bucktown corner, several onetime storefronts have been converted into residences over the years. Among them is a one-story brick building that may have once been a furniture store and warehouse... Read more