by Roberta Murphy We’ve written about luxury closets in the past, but these days some are spending up to $500,000 for a luxe master closet that might include a champagne refrigerator, sound system, glass-enclosed display cabinets, wet bar or even a breakfast area. Gone are the simpler days of a luxurious dressing room. The master closet area has become a destination room. The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday on four…
by Roberta Murphy We once lived in Big Bear Lake and had a redwood-stained deck that meandered as a set of platforms through the pines. During the warm summer months, we would dine outdoors and savor the quiet setting. The only problem with those decks and the harsh winters that buried them in snow is that we had to have them refinished every couple of years. It was no easy…
by Roberta Murphy The luxury real estate market in Paris is beginning to bulge with inventory, as wealthy business tycoons prepare to leave France and its looming tax rate of 75 percent of annual income above 1 million euros. According to France 24 , around 400-500 residences worth more than one million euros ($1.3 million) have recently hit the Paris market–and other French cities are being affected as well. But…
by Roberta Murphy It’s interesting to study living costs in the most expensive cities in the world–at least as tabulated for 2009. According to Mercers, who tabulate these statistics for expatriate living, the 10 most expensive cities (based on housing, food, entertainment, clothing and transportation) are: 1. Tokyo 2. Osaka 3. Moscow 4. Geneva 5. Hong Kong 6. Zurich 7. Copenhagen 8. New York 9. Beijing 10. Singapore Mercer’s, in…
Soak the Rich? Yesterday, the Associated Press reported that millionaires are fleeing their luxury homes in New York to establish residency in less-taxing states. As a result, New York is receiving far less revenue than was expected from the wealthy since these wealth taxes were enacted last April. Call it the law of unintended consequences. To be fair, many of these losses come from scaled-back salaries and layoffs on…
by Roberta Murphy We are seeing luxury scaled down on many fronts, and luxury hotels and timeshare resorts are taking it on the chin as well. For the first five months of this year, according the the Wall Street Journal, U.S. hotel occupancy has declined 53 percent. This is the lowest drop in occupancy since 1987, when Smith Travel Research began tracking these numbers. While both luxury and budget hotels…
by Roberta Murphy According to Forbes.com, now may be the best time to make some of those major purchases wise shoppers have been putting off for so long, particularly if one has the luxury of capital. The Forbes list: 1. Homes. Low prices fueled by foreclosures and short sales, coupled with low interest rates and possible income tax credits, make this an opportune time to shop real estate. 2. Cars….
by Roberta Murphy Magic must be in the air. Even our middle son Eric — who has never, ever cottoned to bagged lunches — packed one the other day and probably saved at least $5. This college student works part time, but last week discovered the agony of having to pay $1,800 or so for a new bumper and rear quarter panel that met a brick wall when he was…
by Roberta Murphy If I could be President Obama’s Mortgage Czar for just one week, the first thing I would mandate is that all existing mortgages become assumable. When starting my real estate career in Houston, Texas during the last century, it was not uncommon for buyers to assume or take over existing financing. In fact, it was a perfect way for the self-employed or those with dinged credit to…
by Roberta Murphy One Can Modify Luxury Home Loans, too? Not all clients took my conservative mortgage advice over the years, and some ended up with home loans that have turned downright nasty. In one case, a client and dear friend was persuaded to take out a Negative Amortizing Adjustable Rate Mortgage (Neg Am) along with a HELOC (Home Equity Line of Credit) a few weeks after the purchase of…
