By Carlo Calma Founder and Chairman of Sho-Deen, Inc. Kent Shodeen has made the announcement that Craig Shodeen has recently rejoined the company, and will serve as president of ShoDeen Residential. Craig is no stranger to the Sho-Deen, Inc.

Real estate appraisals are among the more consistent topics that we cover here at Chicago Agent, and for good reason – though real estate, after a prolonged slumber, has been posting some of its best numbers in years, the most

For the second month in a row, Chicago home prices rose strongly in the Case-Shiller Home Price Indices from Standard & Poor’s, rising 4.6 percent from May to June. Chicago was the talk of the real estate community last month, when

By Peter Ricci Instagram, the free photo-sharing social network that allows users to snap photographs with their mobile devices and share them with fellow Instagram users, is the latest darling on the technological scene, and naturally, users are beginning

By Carlo Calma Chicago-based Koenig & Strey Real Living has announced that its Gold Coast office once again holds the top luxury market share position for the first half of 2012 in an issued press release. According to Koenig

By Peter Ricci Shadow housing inventory and government-held REO inventory have both been on a steady decline the last couple years, and if new short sale guidelines from the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) fulfill their aims, they’re a

Chicago Agent sent out a comprehensive survey to find out the truth about agents, and to compare the results for the year 2011 to our results from 2010. We received an overwhelming number of responses (special thanks to our

By Peter Ricci This week, Chicago Agent is proud to unveil a new editorial feature, one that just about every real estate professional should be familiar with – a collection of truly, horribly, awesomely bad MLS

By Peter Ricci The National Association of Realtors (NAR) did some serious political flexing this week with the GOP and its stance on the mortgage interest tax deduction. The Republican Party boldly excluded the deduction – long the third

By Ian McKendry Agents who want to work more efficiently are often turning to technology solutions to help them be more productive. Cartavi, a real estate technology company that teamed up with electronic signature provider DocuSign in January and

By Carlo Calma, Peter Ricci On account of rising mortgage interest rates, mortgage applications fell 7.4 percent for the week ending August 17, according to the latest Weekly Mortgage Application Survey from the Mortgage Banker’s Association (MBA). And indeed, rates

By Peter Ricci New residential home sales increased 25.3 percent year-over-year in July to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 372,000, according to the latest joint report from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban

By Carlo Calma Chicago-based mortgage lending company, Guaranteed Rate, has been recognized by real estate publications Banker & Tradesman and The Commercial Record, according to an issued press release. The company was listed as “one of the 50 fastest

By Peter Ricci Existing-home sales reversed recent declines in July, rising 2.3 percent from June and 10.4 percent from July  2011, according to the National Association of Realtors. Median existing-home price was equally optimistic for the month, increasing yearly

By Peter Ricci Home sales in the nine-county Chicago area increased 29.1 percent year-over-year in July, according to the latest data compiled by the Illinois Association of Realtors (IAR). For the state of Illinois and City of Chicago, home

By Carlo Calma Chicago-based real estate firm @properties has been listed among Inc. magazine’s  2012 “Inc. 5000″ list of the nation’s fastest-growing private companies, according to an issued press release. Listed for the sixth year in a row, @properties