It is the week of the cupcake on the Martha Stewart show!  She will have different recipes all week.  I know it doesn't have much to do with real estate, but I do use my real estate earnings to support my cupcake addiction.  The cupcakes in the picture look like the ones that come from one of my favorite places in New York city - The CUPCAKE CAFE located at 522 Ninth Avenue (39th Street) New York, Ny 10018.  I found this place while on my quest for the perfect cupcake.  Cake and buttercream frosting with a beautifully piped flower is what we found on 39th St.  A steady stream of people coming in and ordering boxes of these cupcakes let us know that our new found confection was not a secret.  Try to make time for a cupcake this week!

Sitting here today at the computer catching up on work and keeping an eye on the up to the minute news of the real estate industry I thought I could use a dose of good news!  I went to www.google.com and googled 'good news'.  I found a website www.goodnewsnetwork.org devoted to, yes, Good News!  Positive news and acts of kindness dominate this website.  It was a refreshing change to the articles that I see daily  dealing  with the misfortunes related to our current real estate market.  Drop by the website and see what good news you can find.

Want to live where the air is sweet, the water is pure and the streets are clean? Try the country. But what if you don't like the sticks? Then try Florida.

Led by Miami, the Sunshine State dominates our 2008 list of America's Cleanest Cities with four metro areas in the top 10--Jacksonville (No. 3), Orlando (No. 4) and Tampa-St. Petersburg (No. 8) all make appearances. Clearly, a state that relies so heavily on tourism and part-time snow-bird residents knows the value of keeping itself spruced up for company.

With the built-in advantage of weather patterns that blow out smog, these large metropolitan areas, together with No. 2-ranked Seattle and No. 5 Portland, Ore., top our 2008 list. But it's more than just sea breezes pushing these metros up the list. These big cities are also reaping the rewards of investing in efforts to keep clean, even as their populations boom.

In Pictures: America's 10 Cleanest Cities
In recent years, Florida's Department of Environmental Protection has launched programs aimed at providing power plants with the equipment needed to scrub out harmful emissions before they're discharged. The agency has singled out the Tampa Electric Co. (other-otc: TAECM - news - people ) for going beyond federal and state requirements on emission reductions.

On the water side, the agency has aimed its budget not only on fighting direct discharges into public waters but on indirect spillage from things like storm drain runoff.

The same is true elsewhere. Portland, for example, is 10 years into a 14-year, $2 billion investment aimed at cleaning up the Willamette River. In addition, the city's added more light rail, sidewalks and biofuels to its bus fleet. It's gone a long way toward reducing air pollution in the region.

"The investments we've made on land use and transportation over the past two decades are paying off," says Portland city council commissioner Dan Saltzman.

Air quality is a huge health factor for urban dwellers, so we made it a very big deal in our study. To determine the cleanest major cities in the U.S., we initially measured the rankings for air pollution and ozone levels among all 49 U.S. metro areas with populations exceeding 1 million, using data from the American Lung Association. After eliminating those areas that ranked poorest in air quality, we measured the remaining 29 cities on the additional but less-weighted factors of water quality and per-capita spending on Superfund site cleanup and solid-waste management. From this list, we drew our top 10.

All figures were based on Metropolitan Statistical Areas (which include the city and surrounding area) with the exception of waste-management spending, which was based exclusively on the city proper.

Forbes Magazine

Happy Easter to you and the ones you hold dear!

There will be an Easter egg hunt on Saturday March 22, 2008 at 10:00 a.m. at the 9A/Baymeadows Regional Park.  You can hunt for candy filled Easter eggs on Jacksonville's newest park.  The park is located on the southside of Jacksonville with proximity to St. Johns Town Center.  Follow the link for directions:

http://maps.yahoo.com/#mvt=m&lat=30.226835&lon=-81.507432&mag=1&q1=8000%2520Baymeadows%2520Road%2520East%2520Jacksonville%2520FL

Wishing you a joy filled Easter!

Instead of "Planes, Trains, and Automobiles," which is the title of a 1987 Steve Martin and John Candy movie, relocation is a new adventure which most often involves "Planes, Moving Trucks and Automobiles."

Many newcomers to the First Coast begin their introduction to the area by invitation from an employer and often arrive by plane at Jacksonville International Airport for a job interview. Other newcomers develop an interest in relocating to Jacksonville because of a drive to, or through, the area for business or pleasure. Either way, once the individual or family has discovered the extraordinary quality of life in the Northeast Florida area, many decide to relocate and the moving trucks are scheduled.

Despite the slowdown in the nation's real estate market, Northeast Florida continues to be one of the nation's most popular choices for relocation. New corporations are choosing the First Coast area to relocate their businesses and employees, as evidenced by the Jacksonville Regional Chamber of Commerce's business recruitment activities through its Cornerstone Regional Development Partnership.

Due to the area's favorable business climate, many existing businesses are strategically choosing Northeast Florida to expand their operations, such as Merrill Lynch's recent initiative to relocate hundreds of jobs to their Jacksonville campus from their New York and New Jersey facilities.

Also, retirees who may have once chosen South Florida as a retirement location have found that the climate, the overall cost of living and the reduced hurricane risk make Northeast Florida a much more favorable retirement location.

Jacksonville continues to be the final location choice for military retirees, as well. Recent college graduates are finding wonderful employment opportunities in Jacksonville, as well as the quality lifestyle that Generation Y employees demand.

Moreover, with the weak dollar, the area is seeing more international buyers for second homes.

Within the next year, Mitsui O.S.K. Lines' new terminal at JAXPORT will be complete, and this facility will create more than 1,600 new direct jobs and approximately 4,000 indirect jobs throughout Northeast Florida. Hanjin, Korea's largest shipping container carrier, is expected to begin operations at JaxPort in 2011. Therefore, Jacksonville is quickly becoming one of the largest port cities on the East Coast. As a result of the port's growth, Bridgestone Firestone chose Cecil Commerce Center for its new distribution center, and other companies, including Unilever, Sears, ICS Logistics, Samsonite, Coach and PSS World Medical, expect to expand their distribution operations in the area.

In addition, approximately 2,000 military members from NAS Brunswick (Maine) will be relocating to NAS Jacksonville beginning late 2008 through 2010. Cecil Commerce Center has been designated as a Megasite, making it ready to receive new corporations.

With this number of newcomers arriving soon, it may not be a buyer's real estate market for much longer. But what should sellers do in today's market? According to Joan Rudolph, director of corporate-owned homes at Prudential Network Realty, homes are selling that are in pristine condition and are priced competitively.

"Buyers are out there, and we are still seeing multiple offers at times," Rudolph said. "Buyers are educated and realize that now is the best time to buy, with low interest rates and with sellers' willingness to negotiate."

According to the Employee Relocation Council's most recent relocation statistics, the average cost to corporations to relocate an employee is $62,185, and the average cost to move the employee's household goods is $10,342. With relocation expenses of this magnitude, corporations sometimes struggle to balance the need to recruit the best talent in this competitive labor market with the costs required to successfully relocate an employee and his or her family.

Corporations have found that the support and resourcefulness provided by a trusted relocation provider can make or break a recruiting and relocation initiative. Out-of-town job candidates need assistance from relocation experts to address the needs and concerns of the family, including an area orientation tour.

The First Coast is fortunate to have such a diversified business community, helping keep our local business economy strong and with positive growth. Northeast Florida has a wonderful quality of life as well as a strong business environment. The economic pipeline for Northeast Florida is going strong.

Linda Lindenmoyer, CRP, GMS, is director of relocation and business development for Prudential Network Realty, and manages a full-service relocation department. Her relocation team is experienced and highly trained in managing all the details of relocation, supporting both the needs of the relocating family as well as assisting corporations in managing their recruiting and relocation program costs and needs. For more information, contact me through this website

By LINDA LINDENMOYER/Prudential Network Realty
source: The Jacksonville Times-Union Saturday March 15, 2008

A new report released by Attorneys' Title Insurance Fund Inc. and posted on www. MyRealEstateStory.com finds that Florida's housing market slowed in 2007 in nearly every county analyzed. The report also shows that real estate markets flattened out in spring 2007, before the subprime mortgage crisis in August knocked markets down another 10 percent across the state. Since then the housing market has flattened and is expected to begin to recover during the next several years. The 2008 Fund Real Estate Forecast, commissioned by Florida-based Attorneys' Title Insurance Fund's Consumer Education Campaign, was created by economist Hank Fishkind, Ph.D. of Fishkind & Associates Inc., using The Fund's extensive online system of deed data for more than 30 Florida counties. The report provides a snapshot of the national economic outlook and 33 county-specific forecasts for 2008 through 2010, as well as a section detailing how actual 2007 data compared to projections that were made in last year's Fund 2007 Real Estate Forecast report. "Florida is one of the leading states for job creation and outperformed the rest of the country despite the housing market meltdown," Fishkind said. "The state's population growth also slowed, but is still nearly greater than all of the other Southeastern states put together. Florida has a very large and powerful economy that has gone through a cyclical downshift, but it is still outperforming compared to the rest of the nation." The Fund's 2008 Real Estate Forecast shows that Orlando continues to be the strongest residential real estate market in the state because of its large share of fast-growing industries, such as tourism, health care, education and defense manufacturing. Not all markets in Florida mirror Orlando's resiliency, however. Miami-Dade currently is going through the worst condominium bust cycle that Florida has seen since 1975. Additionally, significant excess supply of single-family homes in the Fort Myers and Cape Coral markets will not begin to be absorbed until 2010. "With Florida's real estate market, it is important to maintain some perspective as recent reductions in home prices come after a very lofty and unsustainable peak, and prices are still up considerably compared to 30 years ago," Fishkind said. "Florida has created a tremendous amount of wealth and, despite many of the problems that loose lending practices and subprime mortgages have caused, the state now has the highest level of homeownership ever. The market has some indigestion now, but housing markets will return to normal during the next few years. The damage for some is significant, but in the aggregate, Florida still had some significant economic gains."

source: The Jacskonville Times-Union Saturday March 15, 2008

 Tell your spouse, your children, your neighbors, your parents,
  your Dr's office, the check out girl at the market, everyone you
  run across.
 
  Put your car keys beside your bed at night. If you hear a noise
  outside your home or someone trying to get in your house, just
  press the panic button for your car. The alarm will be set off,
  and the horn will continue to sound until either you turn it off
  or the car battery dies.

  This tip came from a neighborhood watch coordinator. Next time
  you come home for the night and you start to put your keys away,
  think of this:

  It's a security alarm system that you probably already have and
  requires no installation. Test it. It will go off from most
  everywhere inside your house and will keep honking until your
  battery runs down or until you reset it with the button on the
  key fob chain. It works if you park in your driveway or garage.
  If your car alarm goes off when someone is trying to break in
  your house, odds are the burglar rapist won't stick around...
  after a few seconds all the neighbors will be looking out their
  windows to see who is out there and sure enough the criminal
  won't want that. And remember to carry your keys while walking
  to your car in a parking lot. The alarm can work the same way
  there . This is something that should really be shared with
  everyone. Maybe it could save a life or a sexual abuse crime.