US real estate: Which floor has the door to US homes?

When BlackRock announced in May that it would be buying $15 billion of UBS’s sub-prime mortgages, for some market participants it signalled the bottom of the mortgage-backed securities market. But house prices are still falling. Is US real estate still too risky? Helen Avery goes doorstepping.

IOs – an alternative play on mortgages

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WHAT DO SANDY Weill, Lloyd Blankfein and Dan Loeb have in common with a Nascar driver, Sting and a cartoonist? There is a joke in there somewhere, for sure, but the less humorous answer is: they all bought apartments in 15 Central Park West, Manhattan. Known locally as 15 CPW, it is a “place to live graciously in New York”. With 210 apartments with views of Central Park, a 14,000 square-foot gym with lap pool, 20-seat cinema, a library, 30 climate-controlled wine rooms, suites for domestic employees, a club floor with a games room, terrace and meeting room, 15 CPW is the most prestigious apartment building in Manhattan, and in the spring the building was finally ready to be lived in.

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