A new feature to The Blue Blog – What We Learned This Week – will highlight some of the articles that were shared via the Blue Blog Bits. For all the articles that were shared, please visit this website or subscribe to this RSS feed.
Residential News
The WSJ says we don’t need to get worked up about Monday’s home sales report. Meanwhile, the ENR reports that while there won’t be a recovery in housing in the immediate future, one person believes that we’ll see 15%+ growth towards the end of the year and into 2011. In line with the weak housing numbers, Tom Royce reports that the Builders Confidence Index has dropped. Finally, not surprisingly, the WSJ reports that the number of subprime mortgages currently with negative equity is 6 in 10 borrowers on both the national and Atlanta level.
Commercial News
CIRE magazine highlights market trends for all sorts of markets and Atlanta is mentioned several times. The AJC summarizes the Atlanta office market. Finally, the WSJ thinks the worst is over for the commercial real estate market.
GA DOT
Lots of news on the transportation front this week for Georgia. Maria Saporta says that if we can’t do transportation funding right, then don’t do it at all. The ABC reports that DOT is changing its accounting practices in an effort to get projects moving. B King at Terminal Station comments on both the Saporta article and the fact that the statewide sales tax to fund transportation is dead. Finally, it what seems to be a never ending string of articles on ranking traffic, this week’s flavor ranks Atlanta a modest 22nd worst, which is actually pretty good.
Gwinnett Airport Privatization
A story that will probably be in the news a lot this year is the possibility of the privatization of Gwinnett County’s Briscoe Field. The Board of Commissioners is proceeding with studying the topic and reports on this can be found here, here, here and here.
Miscellaneous
Poverty is rising in Atlanta’s suburbs. A small business snapshot in the southeast. A look at a potential huge mixed-use project on Atlanta’s south side.
