Apartment Choice

Coast to coast, the housing industry currently favors the home seller as prices are rising, sales surging and inventories dwindling -- which leave the residences on the market more valuable. Take Seattle as a caffeinated example. The northwest city of 3. 5 million people boasts the hottest housing market in the country since last fall, according to the Case- Shiller home price index and reported this summer in the Seattle Times. The typical single-family house in metro Seattle cost 12 .9 percent more in April than a year ago, the report notes. Other fast-rising markets are Portland, Oregon; Dallas; Denver; and Detroit, up 9.3 to 7.4 percent respectively. Those totals compare with a 5. 5 percent national price growth rate . What's good for owners and well-off buyers can be doubly troubling for at least one group: lower income property shoppers including first-time homebuyers who can't afford average and midpoint home prices or apartment rents . According to studies, the na...

The 155- unit Ann Arbor City Apartments is under construction on West Washington and South First streets in downtown Ann Arbor . Daniel Brenner | AnnArbor.com Editor's note: The number of parking spaces to be held by Village Green has been corrected. Related story: Rent comparison : What can you get for $2,500 a month around Ann Arbor? Luxury apartments in downtown Ann Arbor are no longer just for students. The under-construction Ann Arbor City Apartments on the southeast corner of West Washington and South First streets is the first luxury apartment project built downtown in years that doesn’t cater to students. It’s designed for young professional renters as well as corporate relocation. "It's midway between the YMCA and the core of downtown where U-M jobs are," said Susan Pollay , executive director of Ann Arbor's Downtown Development Authority . "I think it feels like, from what I saw, exactly one of the things needed in this marketplace." ...

Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler promised during his 2016 campaign that he would tackle the city's affordable housing crisis if elected. His second day in office, he took over the housing bureau , putting himself in charge of its big decisions on top of his already ambitious workload. But eight months into his term, the mayor has little to show for it. No groundbreakings. A single deal to bring an affordable apartment complex to Northeast Portland . A key policy position on his staff vacant five months after his housing expert quit . He has yet to tell developers what the city will fund if they work to put roofs over needy Portlanders' heads. Wheeler's insistence on painstaking public involvement and the lack of housing expertise on his staff have hampered progress on what he said was an urgent priority. The mayor has also made no decisions about how the city should spend the largest pool of money ever available to address Portland's affordable housing shortage . Wheeler ...