Homestead is getting a new City Hall thanks to $2 million worth of cancer-causing radon gas, pervasive mold and asbestos found in the existing structure, the Miami Herald reported. On Monday the City Council agreed to ditch the old hall for healthier digs – until then 38 of the city’s employees will work in approximately 10,000 square feet of temporary office space. However, the city has not yet announced where it will rent those offices. [more]

Donald Trump

Donald Trump and Miami-Dade County Commission Chairman Joe Martinez have proposed the construction of a film studio “city” in Homestead, the South Florida Business Journal reported. The so-called Trump Studio City would be built on 3.16 miles of county-owned land. “Many movies and TV shows have been filmed in Miami, but we’ve never been truly able to capitalize on the film industry as many studios opt to complete their work in Los Angeles,” Martinez said. According to Michael Cohen, executive vice president and special counsel to Trump, the industry could yield $262,000 per day in revenue to the area. The county attorney’s office has been authorized by the commission to publish a report on the land. [SFBJ]

The Card Sound

The Card Sound, a bank-owned property in Homestead, has sold for $4.55 million, according to CBRE Group, which arranged the sale. The 105-unit project was purchased from Community Bank of Florida by a foreign investment group known as 105 Units Homestead Investment. [more]

The Miami-Dade County property appraiser reported that the 2010 estimate of taxable value in the county is $192.48 billion, a decline of 13.4 percent compared to the 2009 figure of $222.14 billion, according to Eye on Miami. Taxable value refers to a percentage of the assessor’s appraisal according to a state-prescribed formula, after any exemptions are removed. In 2008, the value was $245.6 billion. The new construction taxable value in the county is estimated at $2.63 billion, a significant decline when compared to $8.379 billion the previous year. Homestead had the highest recorded decline in the
county with a 29.9 percent decrease from 2009. [Eye on Miami]

[more]

The city of Homestead has Miami-Dade County’s highest rate of foreclosure, with one in 49 homes at some stage of the process as of the end of September. In 2007, it was the fastest growing city in the country among municipalities of 50,000 or more, but it has lost an estimated 1,800 residents in the past year, a blow to its tax base. Over seven years, Homestead’s housing stock rose 59 percent, but today, many homeowners have loans far in excess of the value of their houses. [Miami Herald]

Two sites in Homestead and Boynton Beach will see new owners before they ever get a single house built, following foreclosures by lender Ocean Bank. The Miami lender will auction a 19-acre building site on the south side of Campbell Drive in Homestead on Dec. 2. It also foreclosed on a five-acre site owned by Miami-based Lyons Estates at Boynton Beach and guarantors Jose Paredes and Armando Rivero. A day after the foreclosures were announced, Ocean Bank also announced that it will lay off 78 of its own employees.

Anna Ramirez, of Homestead, made headlines as an accidental victim of
the housing crisis. While modifying her loan, lender Washington Mutual
accidentally auctioned her house, prompting her eviction. The bank had
already acknowledged its mistake and went to Miami-Dade County District
Court to reverse the order, but a clerical error never put the judge’s
order on file. The clerk of court’s office said it handles thousands of
cases, but a spokesperson said this was a human error and that Ramirez
would receive an apology. [more]

Condo Vultures’ principal Peter Zalewski appeared on the Miami Herald Business Show to talk about bargains in the South Florida real estate market. Zalewski said the best places to purchase property at a bargain right now are the western suburbs, including Homestead, Plantation, Kendall and Palm Beach Gardens. Zalewski said buyers will probably need to hold onto their properties for three to five years, or less for a bank-owned property, before prices recover. He also said few bulk deals are occurring because banks don’t want to take large losses on properties. [more]

Source: PropertyShark.com

There were 930 new foreclosures in Miami in May, a 6 percent drop from
April of this year but a 5 percent increase over May 2008, according to
the monthly foreclosure report for Miami, New York, Los Angeles and
Seattle from PropertyShark.com. Neighborhoods in Homestead occupied the
top two spots on the list of the 10 zip codes with the highest number
of foreclosure auctions scheduled. Miami Beach is eighth on the list. TRD [more]

Miami-Dade’s far southern suburbs, hit hard by foreclosure, are now
home to low prices and low occupancy. Property costs in Homestead,
Florida City and neighboring incorporated areas are down 53 percent
over the past 12 months, worse than the 30 percent drop seen in central
Miami and the Brickell district. There’s more inventory, too. At the
end of March, there were 65 percent more houses on the market in the
southern fringes than in the city core, said real estate analyst Craig
Werley. [more]