Cell Phone Numbers Going Public on May 24

Just when we thought were safe from telemarketers!

If you haven't heard...ALL CELL PHONE NUMBERS are being released to telemarketing companies today, May 23, 2008, and you will start to receive sale calls if your number is not registered on the National Do Not Call List. You should keep in mind that you will be charged for these calls (as per your individual cellular plan).

To prevent this from happening, call the following number from your cell phone:
888-382-1222

This number is for the National DO NOT CALL list. It will only take a minute of your time.It blocks your number for five (5) years. You must call from the cell phone number you want to have blocked. You cannot call from a different phone number, unless of course you want to block that number as well.

Spray Park for Kids to Open at Willis Tucker Park in Snohomish/Mill Creek

Throw on a pair of shorts or swimsuit and join the kids dodging the Tricky Soaker, Silverflow Cannon, Aqua Dome, Water Jelly, Aqua Jumper, Power Spinner, Power Volcano, Water Domes, and Splash Palace at Willis Tucker Park's spray pad.

Ribbon Cutting Ceremony & Opening Day, May 23, 2008.

Snohomish County's Willis D. Tucker Community Park

Wow! The First Billion Dollar Home

by Matt Woolsey, Forbes.com

While visiting New York in 2005, Nita Ambani was in the spa at the Mandarin Oriental New York, overlooking Central Park. The contemporary Asian interiors struck her just so, and prompted her to inquire about the designer.

Nita Ambani was no ordinary tourist. She is married to Mukesh Ambani, head of Mumbai-based petrochemical giant Reliance Industries, and the fifth richest man in the world. (Lakshmi Mittal, ranked fourth, is an Indian citizen, but a resident of the U.K.)

Forbes estimated Ambani's net worth at $43 billion in March. Reliance Industries was founded by Mukesh's father, Dhirubhai Ambani, in 1966, and is India's most valuable firm by market capitalization. The couple, who have three children, currently live in a 22-story Mumbai tower that the family has spent years remodeling to meet its needs.

Like many families with the means to do so, the Ambanis wanted to build a custom home. They consulted with architecture firms Perkins + Will and Hirsch Bedner Associates, the designers behind the Mandarin Oriental, based in Dallas and Los Angeles, respectively. Plans were then drawn up for what will be the world's largest and most expensive home: a 27-story skyscraper in downtown Mumbai with a cost nearing $2 billion, says Thomas Johnson, director of marketing at Hirsch Bedner Associates. The architects and designers are creating as they go, altering floor plans, design elements and concepts as the building is constructed.

The only remotely comparable high-rise property currently on the market is the $70 million triplex penthouse at the Pierre Hotel in New York, designed to resemble a French chateau, and climbing 525 feet in the air. When the Ambani residence is finished in January, completing a four-year process, it will be 550 feet high with 400,000 square feet of interior space.
The home will cost more than a hotel or high-rise of similar size because of its custom measurements and fittings: A hotel or condominium has a common layout, replicated on every floor, and uses the same materials throughout the building (such as door handles, floors, lamps and window treatments).

The Ambani home, called Antilla, differs in that no two floors are alike in either plans or materials used. At the request of Nita Ambani, say the designers, if a metal, wood or crystal is part of the ninth-floor design, it shouldn't be used on the eleventh floor, for example. The idea is to blend styles and architectural elements so spaces give the feel of consistency, but without repetition.

Antilla's shape is based on Vaastu, an Indian tradition much like Feng Shui that is said to move energy beneficially through the building by strategically placing materials, rooms and objects.

Atop six stories of parking lots, Antilla's living quarters begin at a lobby with nine elevators, as well as several storage rooms and lounges. Down dual stairways with silver-covered railings is a large ballroom with 80% of its ceiling covered in crystal chandeliers. It features a retractable showcase for pieces of art, a mount of LCD monitors and embedded speakers, as well as stages for entertainment. The hall opens to an indoor/outdoor bar, green rooms, powder rooms and allows access to a nearby "entourage room" for security guards and assistants to relax.Ambani plans to occasionally use the residence for corporate entertainment, and the family wants the look and feel of the home's interior to be distinctly Indian; 85% of the materials and labor will come from outside the U.S., most of it from India.

Where possible, the designers say, whether it's for the silver railings, crystal chandeliers, woven area rugs or steel support beams, the Ambanis are using Indian companies, contractors, craftsmen and materials firms. Elements of Indian culture juxtapose newer designs. For example, the sinks in a lounge extending off the entertainment level, which features a movie theater and wine room, are shaped like ginkgo leaves (native to India) with the stem extending to the faucet to guide the water into the basin.

On the health level, local plants decorate the outdoor patio near the swimming pool and yoga studio. The floor also features an ice room where residents and guests can escape the Mumbai heat to a small, cooled chamber dusted by man-made snow flurries.

For more temperate days, the family will enjoy a four-story open garden. In profile, the rebar-enforced beams form a "W" shape that supports the upper two-thirds of the building while creating an open-air atrium of gardens, flowers and lawns. Gardens, whether hanging hydroponic plants, or fixed trees, are a critical part of the building's exterior adornment but also serve a purpose: The plants act as an energy-saving device by absorbing sunlight, thus deflecting it from the living spaces and making it easier to keep the interior cool in summer and warm in winter. An internal core space on the garden level contains entertaining rooms and balconies that clear the tree line and offer views of downtown Mumbai.

The top floors of entertaining space, where Ambani plans to host business guests (or just relax) offer panoramic views of the Arabian Sea.

Seattle - Recession Proof?

America's Recession-Proof Cities

Joshua Zumbrun

Nationally, home prices are falling, unemployment is on the rise and the economy is expected to grow slowly--or even contract--in the first half of the year. But some cities are doing just fine. Take Oklahoma City, Okla. With falling unemployment, one of the country's strongest housing markets, and solid growth in agriculture, energy and manufacturing, it looks best positioned among the nation's largest metropolitan areas to ride out the current crisis.

San Antonio is right behind. It also features solid employment figures and affordable home prices that continue to rise. Its industries are growing; it can't hurt that the new AT&T (nyse: T - news - people ) was formed when San Antonio-based SBC Communications swallowed the old AT&T Corp. and BellSouth.

The others holding steady or improving include Austin, Texas; Houston; Charlotte, N.C.; Dallas; San Jose, Calif.; Raleigh, N.C.; Salt Lake City; and Seattle.
Behind The Numbers To find them, Forbes.com examined the country's 50 largest metros and looked at several key measures.

We examined unemployment data supplied by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics for the year ending in February 2008 to see which areas are most adding or subtracting jobs. Next, we looked at the BLS data on job growth in non-farm payrolls, through February 2008, for construction, education and health services, financial activities, information, leisure and hospitality, manufacturing, natural resources and mining, professional and business services, trade, transportation and utilities, and the BLS's catch-all category, "other services."
We also took into account median home price data from the National Association of Realtors--from the fourth quarter of 2006 to the fourth quarter of 2007--to see which areas posted the largest annual gains. Our data don't account for the impact of declining sales in the first several months of this year.

Finally, our rankings were adjusted using data from a November 2007 report, "U.S. Metro Economies: The Mortgage Crisis," by the U.S. Conference of Mayors. It lists each city's estimated gross metropolitan product growth by projecting how rising foreclosures and falling home prices would affect overall levels of productivity in local economies.
Sunny Southern Skies Texas cities fared best under these measures. San Antonio, Austin, Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth have benefited from historically lower home prices, which have been affordable to a large segment of the population. The availability of land--and, in some cases, little zoning--helped keep prices in these cities low. Instead of competing for homes, Texans could move to a new subdivision a little farther out.

What's more, all four boast falling unemployment rates, with Austin dropping from 3.8% to 3.6% and San Antonio from 4.3% to 4%. Cities that are expected to see growth in non-farm payrolls include Raleigh, which is expected to see 7.4% growth in professional and business services and 6% growth in education and health. In Salt Lake City, where the median home price rose 2.5% and unemployment, at 3.1%, is below the 5.1% national average, growth in education and health services is expected to be 5.5%.

Some cities have seen increasing home prices but otherwise continue to struggle. Buffalo and Rochester, N.Y., have seen home price growth (from a low base) but still contend with high unemployment--around 6%--and slow-growing or shrinking industries.

And in the San Jose area, the median home sale price is over $830,000. That's 11% higher than it was in the fourth quarter of 2006, helping to land the area at No. 4 on our list. Problem is, that growth has since cooled, and it remains to be seen whether pricey homes coupled with a 5.3% unemployment rate will cause trouble for homeowners this year.

To be sure, even in the most resilient cities, the mortgage crisis has caused suffering. People everywhere got into bad mortgages. Similarly, even in the most battered cities, the majority of people are employed and making their mortgage payments. The extent of recession or resilience is very much in the eye of the beholder, and this list represents only one of many ways to take a snapshot of economies that are standing tall.

In his statements to Congress' Joint Economic Committee earlier this month, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke predicted the economy would possibly move into recession in the first half of 2008 but begin to rebound in the second half.

If you're tired of waiting, these might be the best places to go.

View the entire article at http://www.forbes.com/2008/04/29/cities-recession-places-forbeslife-cx_jz_0429realestate.html

Best Cities for Home Sellers

By Matt Woolsey, Forbes Magazine

Though luxury home buyers took a big bite out of the Big Apple last year--properties in the Plaza Hotel and condos along Central Park West sold for record prices and the city posted new highs in price per square foot and median sales price--2008 hasn't been as kind to sellers.

There is plenty of new construction, especially on the West Side and in the outer boroughs. But vacancies are on the rise. That's bad news, especially when the job market takes a pounding.A loosening market, job losses and new construction projects adding to an already growing inventory lands New York, typically a strong market, No. 21 on our list of best cities for home sellers.

"What happens is that people tend to look at prices as a barometer of the health of the market," says Jonathan Miller, president of Miller Samuel, a Manhattan appraisal company. "But it's really how many people are in the market, and what you're seeing now are people dropping out because of affordability or because they can't get credit."

West coast sellers are faring better. In San Jose, Calif., No. 1 on our list, tough regulatory measures make it difficult to overbuild. New home construction dropped 63% last year, while jobs grew by 1.2%. Home vacancies, which were already low at 1.6%, fell to a national bottom at 0.8%, helping make San Jose one of the country's tightest markets.

Farther north, San Francisco's conforming loan limit jumped from $417,000 to the maximum $729,750, which makes getting credit a simpler affair for many of the city's home buyers. In 2006, the market felt a softening that pushed vacancy rates up to 2.4%, but a 56% cut in construction has cut vacancy rates in half. The increased access to credit, thanks to the new Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac limits, and the lack of available properties plays to sellers' interests.

Behind The Numbers To find the other cities on our list, we looked at the country's 40 largest metro areas and assessed how friendly conditions are expected to be for sellers this year. Each city was ranked by its 2007 unsold vacancy rate, calculated by the U.S. Census American Housing Survey, and how much the market had tightened or loosened when compared with 2006 conditions.

Then we looked at construction starts, as tracked by the National Association of Home Builders, to see if building starts would compound or alleviate vacancy woes. Next was job creation, from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, as a way to measure the local economy's ability to absorb or offset housing losses.

Last, we factored in the degree to which new conforming loan limits from Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae will improve each market's lending conditions. When Freddie and Fannie get more involved, lenders get the implicit backing of the Federal Government, something that softens the risks that have slowed lending elsewhere, as jumbo, or nonconforming loans, can be expensive losses.

"There is still an unwillingness on the behalf of lenders to bear the higher risks of jumbos given the potential loss severity," says Anthony Sanders, a professor of finance at Arizona State University. "Recent price declines are scaring investors and lenders alike."

San Jose and San Francisco came out on top because they fit the profile of a sellers' market--low inventory rates that were still shrinking, good job creation, a large scale cutback in new home construction and a boost in the credit market from new Fannie and Freddie loan limits.

But one look at the rest of the spots on our list will remind you that the term "seller's market" is relative. Many, like Denver, have experienced consecutive quarterly price declines. Prices here dropped 6.3% last year, according to the National Association of Realtors. Seventh-place Denver also has a 3% unsold vacancy rate. Still a 2% jump in new jobs and a 49% cut in construction are reasons to be optimistic about the next year or two.

Seattle has experienced similar construction rate cuts. The city went through its own bust in 2002 and 2003, as the result of mass overbuilding. Since homes take a few years to finish, when construction rates plummet, as they did in Seattle from 2003-2005, it takes years before those adjustments are felt. By 2006, Seattle had the lowest vacancy rate in the country, and wasn't as prone to the price adjustments felt elsewhere, making it our 10th best sellers market today.

While job growth, new construction and vacancy rates and access to credit are important barometers, the bottom line is this: When there are more buyers chasing property than sellers looking to unload, that means a relatively quicker sale, which in this market is the best that can be expected, even if it's a small or flat price gain.

SOLD - Berkshire Home Built by Premier Communities

Congratulations Sarah & Kasey!

East phase begins for Redmond Ridge

Construction has begun at Redmond Ridge East, the long-delayed final phase of a 4,750-home urban village along Novelty Hill Road. Under a new developer, the project will feature high-end homes approaching $1 million in price.

The 800-home development east of Redmond will join Redmond Ridge and Trilogy as the third piece of a development that was mired for more than a decade in legal challenges over traffic and noise.

Construction is finished at Redmond Ridge and will wrap up within a couple of years at Trilogy. Redmond Ridge East was not approved until 2006, when Quadrant Homes, the original developer, reached an agreement with King County and Redmond to build there concurrently with road improvements.

Quadrant began preparing lots on the property last summer and then, in the fall, sold the land to Murray Franklyn, a Bellevue development company.

Quadrant officials say the current real-estate market supports higher-end homes, approaching $1 million, at Redmond Ridge East. Building for that market isn't Quadrant's specialty, said President Peter Orser, but it is for Murray Franklyn.

In an initial phase over the next 2 ½ years, the Bellevue company plans to build 224 homes. It began marketing them last month.

Even with a downturn in the housing market, the Redmond area has enough high-tech employees looking for higher-end homes to support the pricier development, said Steve Hiller, a partner at Murray Franklyn.

The Redmond Ridge developments have drawn complaints over the years because of the long traffic backups resulting on Novelty Hill Road.

Murray Franklyn is bound by a 2006 agreement that will limit how many homes it can build before contracts are signed to widen Novelty Hill Road, as well as the intersection of Northeast 124th Street and Woodinville-Redmond Road.

King County officials say construction is to start late next year to widen a part of Novelty Hill Road to five lanes, and probably create a new thoroughfare running along 196th Avenue Northeast and Northeast Union Hill Road.

The county is synchronizing signals along Avondale Road to improve traffic flow, and Redmond is set to widen the 124th/Woodinville-Redmond intersection next year. Murray Franklyn executives say these projects will improve traffic, even if delays aren't eliminated.

"I don't think you're going to ever take [delays] away, but is it going to ease pressure?" Hiller said. "Undoubtedly."

Redmond officials, who fought the urban village just outside the city for several years, said the 2006 accord addressed their biggest concerns, including the signal and intersection improvements.

"Actions are being taken to mitigate the growth, and we're satisfied that we have a deal that's fair to Redmond residents," Mayor John Marchione said.

Most Redmond Ridge East homes will sell for $550,000 to $900,000, but about 240 units — apartments, town houses or small homes — will be set aside for people making close to the King County median household income.