LOVE YOUR PETS? LOOK NO FURTHER… November 21, 2009

Lincoln Park is a virtual heaven for pet-owners, with neighborhood businesses surrounding the park catering to all sorts of amenities for your furry friends, from groomers to toy stores to high-end boutiques! The park itself wouldn’t be the same without a flurry of dog walkers making their way through the morning joggers and pleasant strollers alike.

But who would have thought that the most luxurious building to come to Lincoln Park in a generation would be pet friendly as well? Lincoln Park 2520 is the perfect home for fans of the pawfooted. Beyond the substantial beauty that the private park provides residents of this luxury condominium, the plans for the building grounds even include a sizable dog run and a special paw wash for Fido to clean up before he/she goes home. Where else can you find such a bounty of amenities for man and beast alike?

Love pets but don’t have one to move into your beautiful unit at 2520 North Lakeview? Do yourself a favor a check out Realtors® to the Rescue. Realtors® to the Rescue is an Illinois 501c3 Not For Profit organization dedicated to saving the lives of homeless animals in the Chicagoland area. Through their website, they strive to use the vast network of Realtors® to promote both the adoption of homeless animals and area animal shelter fundraising and education events.

This grass-roots initiative was established to:
• Promote the adoption of homeless animals
• Provide general guidance on the lost and found pet procedures
• Provide a resource for Chicago Realtors® to aid in the home search for their clients with pets, including:
• Comprehensive city-wide list of pet friendly rental and condominium buildings
• City-wide neighborhood pet-friendly areas and dog parks
• Open community on-line forum for recommendations

For further details, please visit their website: www.RealtorsToTheRescue.com

OH THE HUMANITIES… RIGHT OUTSIDE YOUR DOOR November 10, 2009

Lincoln Park 2520 is so perfectly situated to take advantage of all that the city has to offer. The best views you can imagine. The best in shopping and restaurants at your fingertips. The best schools one could ask for. And an ongoing stream of cultural events and activities that could make your head spin.

With the annual Chicago Humanities Festival in full swing, now is the time to step outside your home (or make a visit, if you are not a Lincoln Park resident yet) and come see why the neighborhood surrounding the future site of luxury condos and townhomes at Lincoln Park 2520 is the place to be!

One prestigious local school, Francis W Parker School, is hosting a number of events for the Chicago Humanities Festival continuing this week. What better reason could there be to jump on out and experience just one bit of the culture our own Lincoln Park has to offer this year?

The Helen B. and Ira E. Graham Family ASCAP Cabaret
Pianist Dave Frishberg, a perennial jazz standout, headlines the festival’s annual ASCAP Cabaret. Dubbed the “Woody Allen of song” by the London Daily Telegraph, Frishberg has penned pieces wry and witty, occasionally tender and bittersweet, that defy neat categorization. The man responsible for classics “Peel Me a Grape,” “I’m Hip,” “You Are There,” “My Attorney Bernie,” and “Heart’s Desire” shares the stage with fellow cabaret cats, including soloists Karen Morrow and KT Sullivan.
Wed, Nov. 11 7:30 – 9:00 PM

Four Women Talk About Being Funny
What do funny and feminine and feminist have to do with each other? Anything? A lot? Four influential women in Chicago’s theater scene talk about what they’ve learned about being funny. With experiences—some funny, some not—in writing, directing, improvising, and acting, their conversation may range far and wide in search of what role gender plays in delivering and receiving humor, or if gender plays a role at all. Martha Lavey, ensemble member and artistic director of Steppenwolf Theatre, will moderate the roundtable discussion, which will include Leslie Buxbaum Danzig, actor and director of 500 Clown; Tanya Saracho, writer, actor, and founding artistic director of Teatro Luna; and Lauren Katz, founding member of ED, a long-form improv group born in Chicago.
Sat, Nov. 14 10:30 – 11:30 AM

Paul Provenza & Katie Watson: Crossing the Line
Making searing and honest observations about people and the world around them is a comedian’s stock in trade. But are there times when comics go too far? Does it matter who, or how many, are offended by a joke? Does it matter who’s telling it? Paul Provenza joins Katie Watson for an incisive conversation exploring the volatile side of comedy. Provenza is an actor, comedian, and filmmaker. He directed the 2005 film The Aristocrats and is a regular on Chicago Public Radio’s Wait, Wait…Don’t Tell Me! Watson is an attorney, medical ethicist, and faculty member of The Second City. This program is not recommended for those who are easily offended. Really.
Sat, Nov. 14 12:30 – 1:30 PM

Ilan Stavans: The Riddle of Cantinflas
To American audiences, he was simply the devoted valet Passepartout in the 1956 film Around the World in 80 Days, but Mario Moreno “Cantinflas” was one of Mexico’s most prolific actors, appearing in more than 50 films. Ilan Stavans, Amherst College professor of Latin American and Latino culture, asserts Cantinflas was not just a popular entertainer but also a verifiable genius whose work redefined Latino humor. Designed as a journey through Cantinflas’s 60-year career with Stavans as guide, this program examines the indelible legacy of Cantinflas through film and archival materials.
Sat, Nov. 14 3:00 – 4:00 PM

Yuri Lane: From Tel Aviv to Ramallah, A Beatbox Journey
With a synergy of beatboxing and storytelling, Chicago-based performance artist Yuri Lane breathes new life and humanity into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In this hip-hop travelogue of peace, the lives of two young men, one Israeli and the other Palestinian, collide at a West Bank checkpoint against a soundscape of dance club beats, muezzin calls, and Tel Aviv traffic. Video disc jockey Sharif Ezzat provides amazing live visual backdrops for this tour-de-force play, written and directed by Professor Rachel Havrelock. The New York Times heralded the show as “vivid, heartening,” and the Chicago Tribune dubbed it “a coolly extraordinary 55 minutes.”
Sat, Nov. 14 7:00 – 8:30 PM

Commedia dell’arte: Managing Chaos
Why is commedia dell’arte, a 500-year-old Italian theatrical tradition, still relevant today? And, why does it still make us laugh?
Il Dottore (the Doctor), one of commedia’s classic characters and an unapologetic busybody and know-it-all, guides us through the rich history and delightfully silly machinations of commedia dell’arte—literally, the art of comedy.
With a lighthearted style, a band of merry pranksters define and contrast comedy and tragedy, shed light on the language of commedia, provide a history of the art form and its masks, and perform improvisations from the tradition. Thomas Simpson, senior lecturer in Italian at Northwestern University, Italian director and teacher Paola Coletto, and performers David Gaines and Sean Michael Kaplan, who trained at the legendary Jacques Lecoq School in Paris, collaborate on this original lecture-demonstration.
Sun, Nov. 15 1:30 – 2:30 PM

A Beckett Brouhaha Greg Allen, Danny Thompson, and Lucky Plush Productions
Nothing is funnier than unhappiness,” wrote Samuel Beckett in his great play Endgame. The Festival salutes this funniest of unhappy playwrights with a unique, collaborative program. Lucky Plush Productions performs Endplay, a vibrant dance piece inspired by one of Beckett’s short dramas, and Greg Allen of the Neo-Futurists and Danny Thompson of Theater Oobleck present a sequel to their award-winning original show “A Few More Last Lost Complete Works of Samuel Beckett As Found Even Deeper In The Envelope (partially burned) In A Dustbin In Paris Labeled “Never to be performed. Never. Ever. EVER! Or I’ll Sue! I’LL SUE FROM THE GRAVE!!!””
Sun, Nov. 15 3:30 – 5:00 PM

For more information and tickets for each event, either click on the headings for each topic or visit: http://www.chicagohumanities.org.

 

November 9, 2009 by lincolnpark2520

Aid for homebuyers clears Congress November 5, 2009

WASHINGTON (Reuters)

Article The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday voted to extend aid for jobless workers and broaden tax breaks for homebuyers and businesses in a bid to breathe life into the struggling U.S. economy.
The measure, which passed by a vote of 403 to 12, now heads to President Barack Obama to sign into law.

Tax break for buying a home
The legislation also would extend the $8,000 homebuyer tax credit to contracts signed by April 30 and closed by June 30. The controversial credit, which many say has boosted home sales in recent months, was set to expire after Nov. 30.
The Senate’s bill also creates a $6,500 credit for those who buy a home after living in their current house at least five years. That measure would apply to contracts signed by April 30 and closed by June 30. The current credit defines a first-time homebuyer as someone who has not owned a residence within the past three years.
The credit would be available only for the purchase of principal residences priced at $800,000 or less.
The Senate bill would raise the adjusted gross income cap to $125,000 for single filers and $225,000 for joint filers. The amount of the credit currently begins to phase out for taxpayers whose adjusted gross income is more than $75,000, or $150,000 for joint filers.
“It’s gonna put people back to work, the home builders, put people in the real estate business,” said Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn. “The kind of jobs that can make a difference.”
The extension will cost $10.8 billion over 10 years, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation.
Through mid-September, 1.4 million tax returns had qualified for the credit, according to the IRS. Some portion of those returns, which the IRS couldn’t specify, represents buyers who took advantage of an earlier version of the tax credit, which was only worth $7,500 and has to be repaid over time.
By the end of November, the credit will have been used by 1.8 million homebuyers, at least 355,000 of whom would not have bought a house without the tax break, according to estimates by the National Association of Realtors.
“The data on the present home buyer tax credit show that the credit has had its intended impact — sales have jumped in recent months to a projected 5.1 million for the year and housing inventory has been trimmed, thus stabilizing home prices noticeably,” said Ron Phipps, the association’s first vice president, in Senate testimony last month.
The credit, however, has also posed many problems. Critics say it’s a waste of money because most of those claiming the credit would have bought homes anyway.
It’s also been the target of fraud. Some 74,000 people claimed more than $500 million in credits even though they may not be first-time homeowners, according to Treasury officials. And more than 580 children, including some as young as 4-years-old, have claimed the credit.
“Some key controls were missing to prevent an individual from erroneously or fraudulently claiming the Credit and receiving an erroneous refund of up to $8,000,” said J. Russell George, Treasury inspector general for tax administration, before a House subcommittee last month.
CNN Radio Capitol Hill correspondent Lisa Desjardins contributed to this report.

A TOUCH OF GREEN ALL WINTER LONG November 3, 2009

November 3, 2009 by lincolnpark2520

Friends and future homeowners at 2520 North Lakeview know that even beyond the elegance of the building and its impeccable style in architecture and interiors, Lincoln Park 2520 sits on what is inarguably the most beautiful site in the city of Chicago. And it’s difficult to beat the convenience and sheer volume of shopping and restaurant offerings just moments outside your door. Spring and summer in Lincoln Park bring not only joggers and dog-walkers (although most Chicagoans are used to maintaining their stride even in the most torrential of winter weather), but also rare shopping opportunities for the gourmet at heart.
All summer long we have been happily spoiled by Chicago’s famous Green City Market, perfectly located just steps away from Lincoln Park 2520 on the south end of Lincoln Park  between Clark and Stockton. The only year-round farmer’s market in Chicago, the Green City Market promotes local, sustainable farmers, producers of food, and chefs through both an open air market and a series of educational events. The market has now moved inside for the remainder of 2009 until the Spring, so there is no need to go without a regular shopping visit for organic and locally grown food. The Green City Market can still be found at the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum, also our close neighbor at 2430 North Cannon Drive.

Meanwhile, have a taste for gourmet organic food but don’t want to make a mess in your kitchen? Lincoln Park has the answer for you in Sprout, a new-for-2009 restaurant, located at 1417 West Fullerton.  Sprout is a French-inspired organic restaurant, with high-end offerings of everything from freshly baked organic bread to meats, cheese and vegetables, and a fully organic wine and bar list. A truly decadent evening can be had with all the confidence that you’ve eaten the very best you can. With classic European fare, Sprout is just one of a plethora of restaurants surrounding Lincoln Park 2520, but definitely one you probably shouldn’t miss!!!
Reservations at Sprout can be made at  773-348-0706.

Mortgage Rates & the First Time Buyer November 1, 2009

The weekly average rate borrowers were quoted on Zillow Mortgage Marketplace for 30-year fixed mortgages decreased 10 basis points last week to 4.87 percent, down from 4.97 percent the week prior, according to the Zillow Mortgage Rate Monitor, compiled by leading real estate Web site Zillow.com®. Rates for 15-year fixed mortgages fell six basis point to 4.32 percent from 4.38 percent, and 5-1 adjustable rate mortgages fell seven basis points to 3.80 percent, from 3.87 percent the week prior.

The volume of mortgage requests last week fell 9.6 percent from the prior week. Of last week’s requests, 45 percent were for refinance loans, 53 percent were for purchase loans and 2 percent were for home equity loans. The prior week, 47 percent of requests were for refinance loans, 51 percent were for purchase loans and 2 percent were for home equity loans.

For first time buyers this is a great sign.  Buyers can get an affordable mortgage AND the first time buyer tax credit!  The catch?  The buyers have to hurry.  The exemption is set to expire at the end of the month.

For more information on the status of the first time home buyer tax credit, there is a great Bloomberg article here.

Check out my new listing at the incomparable Lincoln Park 2520.

The Ritz Carlton Residences July 10, 2009

Sales agents and brokers gathered at The Ritz Carlton Residences, Magnificent Mile to celebrate the groundbreaking of this soon to be iconic addition to Chicago’s skyline. Guests enjoyed champagne and hors dourves as they toured the sales center. Many had been there before and were reacquainting themselves with the 40-story building designed by Lucien Lagrange Architects. Only 88 units will be built in this unique residential building. The service level will be simply incomparable. The most notable amenity will be the Landmark Club, an exclusive private club for residents and their guests. As the Ritz Carlton Residences, Magnificent Mile tagline says, “Expect the Extraordinary”.

It is nice to see a developer moving forward. If you stand at the corner of Michigan and Erie you’ll notice that the construction activity is attracting the attention of all the passers by. This will be one of very few residential buildings in the city that can boast such a distinctive location right on Michigan Avenue. Residents will have the entire city at their fingertips!

The site is currently being cleared and soon drill rigs will be in place to start work on the footings. By October the steel frame will start to take shape. Deliveries in are set for 2011.

“This is a watershed event not only for The Ritz-Carlton Residences but also for Chicago as a whole,” according to Bruce Schultz, Principal of Prism Development Company, “In a time when there is so much concern about the business climate, it is a very positive sign for the economy of this city that a major residential development has sold 45% of the units, secured financing and is now under construction,” Schultz continued.

Rubloff is proud to be the exclusive marketer of this prestigious property.

Okay – not Real Estate – but great Lincoln Park video! July 10, 2009

Animated 1987 commercial from Kurtz & Friends for Lincoln Park Zoo, sung doo-wop style by the zoo’s residents. Designed and directed by Bob Kurtz, this is part of the Chicago lexicon and will bring a smile to many faces! Enjoy!

New Developments in Chicago?? Could it be true? July 2, 2009

With the economic downturn of 2009/2009, new developments seem but a memory.

Will the iconic buildings of the recent past be replicated in the future with new developments?  Will there be any new housing options from which to choose in the coming years?  Is the current economic environment so hostile to capital that developmers will run for the hills and not even attempt to evolve the skyline as movable, living pieces of art – changing, morphing, ever evolving?

NO!

I offer the following as testament to the continuation of the development market in the greatest city of the world!

The Residences of the Ritz

Aqua

The Elysian

Lincoln Park 2520

All these developments are moving forward – forging a new spirit of American will and capitalist determination!  On this weekend in which we celebrate all that is American – let us celebrate and champion the spirit of these developers.  May they all thrive and succeed!

Chicago City Hall Watch June 20, 2009

Originally compiled and published by the Chicago Association of Realtors (C.A.R.), it is a current tracking of several pieces of legislation that could impact the real estate community:

Elevator Inspections: An ordinance has been introduced amending the Municipal Code as it relates to elevators, escalators and similar mechanical lifts and their yearly inspections.

Real Estate Transfer Tax Web site: An ordinance has been introduced authorizing the execution of an intergovernmental agreement by the City of Chicago with Cook County and the State of Illinois regarding a real estate transfer tax Web application.

Weeds: An ordinance has been introduced amending the Municipal Code to increase the penalty for failure to control weeds on a property from between $100 and $300 to between $250 and $500.

Zoning Amendment—Planned Developments: An ordinance has been introduced amending the Zoning Ordinance to permit certain buildings to elect the planned development process even if the site area is smaller than 12,500 square feet.

Zoning Amendment—Accessory Uses: An ordinance has been introduced amending the Zoning Ordinance by setting forth additional restrictions on accessory uses, buildings and structures located within the rear yard and further regulating parking in the rear yard.

10 things to do this weekend | Crain’s Chicago Business June 19, 2009

10 things to do this weekend | Crain’s Chicago Business

Posted using ShareThis