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Tag: Housing Bulletin
What’s the Hemisphere’s Tallest Residential Building? (Hint: It’s Not Here)
By Dennis Rodkin
Chicagoans long ago got used to being snubbed by New York, but one thing that’s hard for New York to overlook is our enviable array of skyscrapers. In addition to having two of the world’s 15 tallest buildings, Chicago has five buildings over 1,000 feet tall—one more than New York. What’s more, three of the world’s 20 tallest buildings completed in 2009 were residential towers in Chicago... Read more
Foreclosure Crisis Sparks a Script
By Dennis Rodkin
Stephanie Walker lost a home to foreclosure, but in the aftermath, she found her voice. She has blogged about it and put out an e-book about it. And on Sunday, a group of actors at Victory Gardens Theater performed a staged reading of American Home, her play about it... Read more
Rockford’s Only Frank Lloyd Wright House Up for Auction
By Dennis Rodkin
In 1948, Kenneth Laurent, a young man from Rockford who had lost the use of both his legs during his World War II service, wrote to Frank Lloyd Wright to ask if the architect would design a home for him and his bride, Phyllis. The couple had $15,000 to spend from federal and state grants for paralyzed veterans. By 1952, when their new home was completed, they had spent about $31,000 to build the two-bedroom house... Read more
Jennifer Hudson Buying in Burr Ridge
By Dennis Rodkin
Jennifer Hudson, the Oscar- and Grammy-winning singer and actress who got her start on American Idol, has a contract pending on a 12,000-square-foot home in Burr Ridge that was for sale at $2.795 million... Read more
Aid for Illinois Homeless Programs Is Running Out
By Dennis Rodkin
An Illinois program that has a solid track record of preventing families from becoming homeless due to temporary crises in their finances is about to run out of money. The Illinois Homeless Prevention Program provides small grants to families that help them weather short-term financial problems that threaten to force them out of their homes. In 2010, the average grant was $916—which shows just how thin the line is between being housed and being homeless for many Illinois families... Read more
Former Tribune CEO Randy Michaels Sells at a Loss
By Dennis Rodkin
List Price: $889,000
Sale Price: $810,000
The Property: On Friday, the former Tribune CEO Randy Michaels sold his top-floor condo at 240 East Illinois. Michaels initially listed the 1,637-square-foot condo for sale in January, asking $989,000... Read more
Going Green Made Easier
By Dennis Rodkin
In 2008, Laura Reedy Stukel set out to do an environmentally sensitive rehab of her Elmhurst home. “I spent two hours a night for months researching windows and whatever,” she recalls. “It was impossibly complicated...” Read more
Chicago’s Haunted Real Estate
By Dennis Rodkin
These are scary times in real estate, with the ghosts of our homes’ lost value spreading gloom. But a few houses around Chicago are rumored to be truly haunted. Here’s a look at four of them, only one of which is still a residence... Read more
US99’s Drew Walker Puzzled by His Cook County Property Taxes
By Dennis Rodkin
Late this summer, when Drew Walker and his wife, Jill, got the latest installment of the bill for their 2011 property taxes, they noticed that the assessment on their house had gone up 17 percent from the year before. “I don’t get it,” says Walker, the afternoon host at US99. “My home’s value has done nothing but nose-dive since ’07...” Read more