Weekly News (May 1, 2019)

This week’s Interest Rate

     30 Y Rate: 4.125%/  15 Year Rate:3.750%/ 10 Y Treasury: 2.533%/ Prime Rate:5.5%

 

Westfield Garden State Plaza mall becomes downtown of Paramus, NJ

(The Record  5/1)

  • The owners of the mall will a brand-new downtown, equipped with luxury, mixed-use residential development where mall-lovers can live a stone’s throw from their favorite stores.  The project right now is in it’s planning phases and mall officials anticipate unveiling their proposal in detail by early 2020.
  • The development plans come on the heels of a recent two-year major renovation of the mall such as interior remodeling, new roofs, some not-seen improvement with oilers and chillers, and $20M worth of technology upgrades.
  • The residential complex will be completed by 2022, anticipated officials.

 

NJ Palisades Park town budget approved with tax increase of average $230-$250

(The Korea Times/The Korean Daily  4/25)

  • 2019 approved budget was increased by 4% to $24,124,741.  Among this budget, tax portion will be $17,238,251 which was increased by 5% from last year.   Accordingly, property tax will be increased by average $153.  With this property tax, if increased portion of $75 for education budget increase, total property tax increase would be average $230-$250 per family.

 

 Palisades Park NJ will adjust parking meter operation hour for helping business.  

(The Korea Times  4/25)

  • Town council member Andy Min mentioned they are reviewing plan to change the meter parking operation hour from 10:00am – 9:00pm to 8:00am – 7:00pm in order to help business owners.  Many visitors complaint about parking meter hours because neighboring towns parking meters stop much earlier.

 

Queens NY Real Estate market is cooling down for two consecutive quarters.  

(The Korea Times  5/1)

  • Both price and sales was down starting from 4th quater 2018 and continued to down in 1st quater, 2019.   According to Elliman, median price for Queens NE area (Flushing, College Point, Whitestone, Bayside, Douglaston, Little Neck, Oakland Garden, Beech Hurst) went down by 9.9% to $679,000 from last year.  Also sales in 1st Qt went down from 734 to 578 by 21.3% from last year (24.2% down from the last quarter).
  • Other area such as Forest Hills, Jamaica Estate, Rego Park, Que Garden, Jamaica Hills, Queens Village, Hill Crest, etc shows median price up by 8.2% to $462,932.
  • LIC is booming area and median price went up by 20.9% to $1,017,350, but sales went down 55.8% to 46.

 

NJ Government is helping foreclosure houses

(The Korean Daily  5/1)

  • Governor Phil Murphy signed off a law package (S 3411) which will give some hope to families facing foreclosure.  According to this law, seller mortgage bank cannot send a sheriff sale notice prior to 180 days of a sheriff sale foreclosure schedule. It used to be only 30 days notice was acceptable.  Currently in NJ, 1 out 100 houses is foreclosure case.
  • Foreclosure houses become social issue. Families lost hope and vacant houses becomes abandon places.
  • This law especially will help Atlantic City, Camden, and Trenton area where residents are facing more economic difficulties.

 

The Palisade Church’s sheriff sale was adjourned to 7/12/2019

(The Korea Daily 5/1)

  • The church is located at 236 Old Tappan Rd, NJ.  The sheriff sale was scheduled on 5/10.  The court accept it’s application to delay to 7/12.  The court once rejected it’s application for the chapter 11.  PCUSA tried to dissolve the church, but it was rejected by voting.
  • The church officers/elders are trying to save the church with bit more time till 7/12.

 

NY Metro/Northern NJ area ranks 10th-worst air quality for lung-damaging ozone

(The Record  4/25)

  • According to the annual report issued by American Lung Association released on Wednesday, NY Metro area, including Northern NJ ranks poorly, 10th-worst air quality in the nation in terms of elevated levels of lung-damaging ozone between 2015 and 2017.  The Philadelphia region, including Camden and parts of South Jersey was ranked 21st-worst nationally for ozone in the survey.
  • High-ozone day are brutal for children, the elderly and anyone with a chronic respiratory disease, such as asthma. Ozone can cause shortness of breath, damage airways and aggravate lung diseases such as asthma, emphysema and chronic bronchitis.
  • President Barack Obama had proposed a Clean Power Plan that would cut the emissions from coal-burning power plants in the Midwest, which would also have improved air quality in the Northeast. The rule never went to effect and president Trump has sought to replace it with opposite effect.

 

US 1st Qt GDP growth is 3.2%, announced Department of Commerce

(The  Korea Times  4/29)

  • As 1stQt growth, this record is highest hike in 4 years.  This growth came as surprising because 1) usually 1st Qt growth is low  2) forecast was about 1% due to government shut down.  Director of the US National Economic Council, Larry Kudlow mentioned that US economy is not loosing momentum, and US is gaining momentum in booming cycle.
  • He said in spite of that growth that Federal Reserve should be able to lower the RI rate due to steady low inflation. He also mentioned this growth is credited to president Trump.

 

Tech/Other News

          Tesla announced that they will make 1,000,000 robot taxi on the road by 2020.

The company is collecting vital data from currently running self driving  vehicles under testing and also they are developing Xavier chip by joint venture with SamSung.

 


 

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