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According to the figure released on Monday, the home sales rise on United State but the fall is continuing in Western North Carolina. The National Association of Realtors said, “National sales rose 6.5 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.74 million in December, up from a revised 4.45 million in November,” he also added, “Sales were up 1.1 percent over December 2007.”

However, according to the N.C. Association of Realtors, in Buncombe County, the number of homes sold in December fell 39.6 percent from December 2007. But not like national figures, local home sales figures are not adjusted for seasonal factors.

However, Haywood and Henderson counties also posted large declines over the same month a year ago at the same time as Transylvania County reported a 25 percent gain. The foreclosure sales increased national sales figures, and national analysts concerned that home prices are likely to keep falling through 2009. They said the outlook for home sales is highly uncertain, in spite of a boost from lower mortgage rates.

The Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) of Singapore said last Friday prices of residential properties in the country declined 6.1 percent in the fourth quarter (October-December period) compared to a 2.4 percent drop in the previous quarter. Additionally, price of office properties went down 4.9 percent, shop properties by 4.8 percent, as well as industrial property prices fell 6.5 percent in the fourth quarter.

For the last year 2008, prices of private residential properties dipped 4.7 percent, reversing a 31.2 percent raise in the previous year. On the other hand, office property prices dropped 7 percent, and those of shop properties decreased 1.9 percent. Nevertheless, worth of industrial properties increased 1.5 percent in the year. Businessmen expect this year property selling will be increased.

The Greater Houston Builders Association (GHBA) is fighting a residential building code change by Richmond, the capital of the Commonwealth of Virginia, in the USA. GHBA claiming that the revisions (new building code) can raise the cost of a new home by as much as $5,000 in Fort Bend County.

According to Adam Aschmann, vice president of the GHBA, the 2,100-member organization has asked Richmond city authorities to delay implementation of certain amendments related to wind and electricity until a joint task force is formed for review and discussion. His opinion is that code changes in swiftly growing Richmond could affect “thousands of families” in unincorporated regions represented by the regional GHBA. Aschmann says, “We believe that it is imperative that we address affordability issues.” However, the city officials do not give any response till now.

In the recent aggression of Israeli defense forces in all over the Palestine, most of the Palestinians have lost their home. Many of them become shelter less. They now live just under the open sky in a very miserable condition. Majority of them are children and women who are unable to survive in this tough condition. Day by day the situation is going to worse. In this circumstances, UAE President Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al-Nahyan and Vice President along with Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum have offered to build more than 1200 houses for Palestine’s people whose houses were already demolished during the Israeli aggression on Gaza.

According to state news agency WAM, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al-Nahyan has offered 600 new homes and Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al- Maktoum pledged another 600 units. For this purpose, a nationwide telethon to raise funds in support of Palestinian inhabitants in Gaza got under way yesterday afternoon and the live TV as well as radio campaign, which started at just 2:00 local time, already raised about Dh109.1 million by evening. The administration expects more money will be collected.

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Hopefully enough for Cubans, President Raul Castro recently announced, the citizens will be permitted to build their own homes and do so using private funds. It is the latest reforms to back off the hard line communism of the past five decades. The message comes just days after Cuba’s celebration of the 50-year anniversary of its 1959 revolution.

Home building in the country initially has been left to the Cuban administration. However, demand has outstripped supply and a terrible lack of housing has seriously frustrated the island of 11 million populations. Havana, capital city and top leading commercial centre of Cuba, has succeeded in building only roughly half its annual target of 100,000 new homes each year. On the other hand, the dearth of dwellings worsened previous year after it was struck in succession by three hurricanes that leveled about a half-million homes.

77-year-old Raul Castro, who got the presidency from his elder brother Fidel Castro February 2008, said the latest policy change would allow the very quick construction of hundreds of thousands of new houses. On a recent television program Castro said Cubans will be given clear guidelines about the dimensions of a proposed new dwelling. The former defenses minister said, they (Cubans) will be told: “OK, here you can build. I’ve given you this amount of space, that amount of room for a street, and that amount for a sidewalk. Now build your little home with whatever you can.” The remarks were made as when he visited the newly-built “La Risuena” neighborhood, a settlement of Venezuela-built homes erected with the support of oil money which has lessened, but not erased, the housing deficit.

During the past year, reforms initiated by the junior Castro brother have included putting vacant farmland in private hands along with increasing farmers’ pay, and allowing private contractors for example taxi drivers back into Cuba’s transport sector. So, concern Cubans says, the recent steps was a demand of time.