By KEVIN POST Business Editor Press of Atlantic City

Joel Naroff, of Margate and Holland, Pa., is president of Naroff Economic Advisors and this year’s most accurate U.S. forecaster, as determined by the National Association for Business Economics.

His clients include the Susquehanna and Metro banks, grocery giant Ahold USA, Cumberland Advisors, eMoney Advisors and Prudential Fox & Roach. Naroff discusses the economic recovery, government interventions, lasting effects of the downturn, and the future of the regional economy.

Joel Naroff, economist and president of Naroff Economic Advisors, discusses the economy, Tuesday Oct. 18, in Pleasantville.

Q: Is the popular perception of the economy accurate? Should we be worried more or less about the strength of the recovery?

A: For about a year and a half I’ve been asking people if they think the recession is over, and if I get 5 percent of the group saying yes, that’s a lot.

Yet the recession ended in June 2009. That perception is being driven by job numbers.

We seemed to be coming out of it in the first part of the year. There were several months where we had job growth in the 200,000 range. That was signaling that the economy was on the verge of changing gears.

Unfortunately, before the job growth could get strong enough and be self-sustaining, we had $4 a gallon gasoline. And that really cut the legs out of what was always going to be a tenuous recovery.

You could never get a really strong recovery with housing not going to rebound the way it did in the past. Housing used to lead the recovery, but we built almost twice as many homes as we needed in the last decade, so housing’s going to be weak.

But if you look at the details of the economy, the manufacturing sector is really good, the service sector has been expanding, exports are really doing very well. The details are better than the headline popular number, which is jobs, and I think that’s why people are depressed, and with very good reason.

If you can’t find a job or are worried about losing your job, that’s job insecurity, and that’s what a lot of people have right now.

Q: What are the strengths and weaknesses of the Jersey Shore’s economy?

A: Clearly the attractive forces in terms of the shore communities and the summertime are not going to go away and are only going to grow. But I think the key factor over the next 10 to 20 years is the slow but steady retirement, or whatever they call it, of the baby boomers.

Baby boomers are not retiring all at once, but that process has begun and over the next 10 to 20 years it will ramp up. Baby boomers are looking for different things than their parents’ generation looked for. They’re looking for what I call high-density amenity locations. Places where they can get to and do lots of different things easily.

That changes where they’re going to locate. Center cities become not really great places. Areas around colleges become really nice places. The shore becomes a wonderful area. If you think of Atlantic City in terms of all the cultural amenities that is has to offer — the music, the shows — it’s a really desirable place not just for the summertime, but for the baby boomers it becomes a desirable place to retire to.

I think we’re beginning to see that. A lot of the rentals over time will be replaced by retired baby boomers living there full time. That will change the face of shore communities because the services that go along with more and more full-time and reasonably well-off residents will have to be developed.

Atlantic City is obviously the linchpin, but Atlantic City is also the risk in that, for the longest period, it had relatively little competition. Now that’s not the case. There are casinos everywhere, and Atlantic City needs to define itself in a different way.

Outside of Atlantic City, clearly what’s happening in the airport and (William J. Hughes) Tech Center area is potentially a huge plus over the next 10 to 20 years because that’s so much of where the world economy is going.

Q: Will the region’s housing market benefit going forward from its substantial second-home and retirement-home segments?

A: If my thinking about the Jersey Shore being a retirement community and not just a tourism attraction is correct, that’s very good for the stability and growth of the housing market.

That demand will continue and grow to a major force as more baby boomers retire. To the extent it requires a more diverse and stable base to support the residents, that’s going to bring more workers, more incomes, and more demand for housing throughout the area, including offshore.

Again this is going to take a long time, 10 to 20 years, but it does have a really good implication for housing market outlook.

Q: What is the potential for Atlantic City to set itself apart from the convenience gambling competitors around it?

A: Atlantic City faces a major challenge right now to identify itself in a different manner.

It can’t be the same Atlantic City that it was 20 or 30 years ago, and it isn’t. It has been trying to wean itself off of the day-trip model and become more of a destination. That’s critical.

The challenge is figuring out precisely what that image is. It’s got to be something else that really sets it apart.

It’s got a large enough mass now, with the Revel hotel coming in, that even if it loses some of its casinos, it’s a different place than anything that exists on the East Coast. It has to make that clear and sell that. I’m not a marketing expert, but I think there’s an understanding that it’s a tourism place, it’s got the summers, but getting people down here in the fall and spring is really important as well.

Q: Is there anything that government can do to reduce unemployment and strengthen the weak recovery?

A: With this really, really disappointing recovery, I think everybody’s turned toward the magic bullet. Can’t the government do something? We’ve spent all this money, bailed out the banks, had stimulus plan after stimulus plan. Why isn’t the recovery stronger?

With fiscal policy being restrictive and state and local governments cutting back on their budgets and their work forces, and with housing and finance not adding in the way they used to, it’s very difficult to get things going.

That said, could the government be doing more? Well, the problem with fiscal policy is that it takes a long time. Even the so-called shovel-ready projects we started are still being worked on. We have construction just beginning or not yet finished and it’s nearly three years ago we started that.

The government can’t simply say, gee, we’ll cut taxes. Businesses have $2 trillion in cash on hand. That’s not what’s stopping them from hiring more people and investing more. It’s uncertainty about the economy.

Q: Are there things government shouldn’t do during this period of prolonged economic weakness?

A: There’s a lot of debate about that. You don’t want the government to put up hurdles to business. At the same time we’re in a special situation.

We had been letting the financial sector handle things on their own, and while there were plenty of regulations to deal with the excesses that occurred, the regulators didn’t enforce those regulations nearly to the extremes that they might have to prevent things from happening.

I’m not saying the regulators were at fault, but now the question we’re having is what’s the right amount of regulation and what’s too much or too little regulation. We’ve gone through a period of too little regulation and we may be going through a period of too much regulation, but we know there are costs involved with that. We need to make sure there’s not too much regulation.

We need to make sure there’s confidence coming out of Washington, coming out of the statehouses across the country, coming out of local governments, that people are dealing with the issues rather than fighting.

In a period where psychology matters, the chaos that’s going on in Washington is not particularly helpful.

So what government can’t do is send the wrong messages and create major hurdles that will prevent households and businesses from doing the things they need to do.

Q: What is the soonest and the latest the economy might return to what we’d consider normal?

A: This is one of those questions that if I knew the answer I’d write it down. I’d like to say it’s probably going to be at 2:30 in the afternoon of March 14, 2012. The reality is that we really haven’t had to go through a recovery where we were dealing with two of the most critical components of the economy, housing and finance, that were so badly damaged that it was taking a long time for them to recover and get things going.

These are conditions we really hadn’t seen in previous recoveries in the post-World War II era, really in the last 60 to 70 years. That makes it a very odd situation.

The economy is going through what I call a slow but steady grinding recovery. It’s going to take a while. By the time we get to next spring or summer, we will clearly see that things are back. Are they going to be normal? Maybe not fully normal but getting there. If you think back to last spring, when job growth was coming around, we hadn’t flipped a switch, we hadn’t shifted gears, we were getting to that point such that, if gasoline prices hadn’t shut the recovery down, by now we’d be in pretty good shape.

We’ve essentially pushed that recovery back a year, so by the spring we’ll probably be in the process of shifting gears and by summer we’ll see things getting appreciably better.

Q: Will the severe downturn have lasting effects and, if so, what might the new normal look like?

A: Whether it has as deep an impact as the Depression did on that generation that lived through that, which became extraordinarily cautious for a long time, is unclear.

But the longer this goes with this kind of slow growth, this kind of uncertainty, with this kind of job insecurity, the more that perceptions and attitudes are going to change.

It’s going to be a long time before we have another go-go housing market. People are going to look at jobs in different ways. Job security had been defined by a lot of people as simply the ability to get another job. If I don’t like this one, I’ll just go find another one. Well, they’re going to be looking at trying to keep their jobs.

In addition, a lot of people are being scarred by changes in income and spending, and so their spending habits are going to change. Shop ’til you drop will return, but it’s going to take a long time. Maybe it will be shop ’til you’re tired.

Then there’s the idea of what’s a normal economic expansion. We think of the last 20 years as having really strong growth, but what drove the ’90s? It was a tech bubble. That created a huge amount of wealth and that wealth drove strong growth.

Similarly, what happened in the last decade? A lot of people saw their housing prices go up, they spent as if their $250,000 home was really worth $2.5 million, and that extra wealth on paper drove the strong growth.

Unless we have another bubble that creates huge wealth, we’re not going to have that strong growth.

So the new normal, which is an old normal, a non-bubble-driven normal, is significantly slower growth than we had in the bubble periods.

Q: How will the jobs of the future be different, and how should workers prepare themselves for them?

A: The job of the future is just a continuation of the changes that we’ve seen the last 20 years. The days of being able to get a basic high school education, go into a factory and make a decent living are pretty much behind us. Factory jobs are much more skilled right now, and you hear stories every day about manufacturers who even in current circumstances are having trouble finding the right people with the right skills.

That’s in part a result of our perception that manufacturing is disappearing so we don’t have to train for it. It’s not necessarily that the education system went wrong, just that we told everybody they should be in software, rather than getting the kinds of technical skills that every firm requires right now.

It shouldn’t be that we have so many manufacturers looking for skilled workers and they aren’t out there at a time when we have unemployment above 9 percent in the state and nation. That’s a lack of understanding where the skills were going and setting up the training to match that.

Q: What are your business clients most concerned about this year?

A: In the beginning of this year, the question I was asked the most was: When are we going to get out of this and how strong will the recovery be?

Then as we moved through the summer and the chaos of Washington with the debt ceiling, budget cuts and the downgrade, the question became: Are we going to go into a double dip?

Businesses are uncertain and they’re not hiring because of that. They want to have some confidence that if they make an investment and hire some people, the economy’s not going to fall apart three months from now. And while no one can give them certainties, my forecast is that’s not likely to happen, at least not unless there’s another shock to the economy.

Jersey Shore Opportunities

This blog post for September 10, 2011 was to a question posed to me the other day asking is this a good time to buy a shore property? Let’s start out with some background by saying I worked with my first real estate company in Atlantic City in the spring of 1985. During that time the market at The Jersey Shore was showing signs of topping out and starting to rollover. The Atlantic City real estate market was being fueled by the massive speculation of gambling and was still on a tear because casinos and investors were still buying the dream. Also in this time period new high rise condos were being brought to market by some out of the area real estate developers that were probably late to the party but were in no position to back out at that point. With major marketing dollars and plenty of effort four residential high rise developments with approximately 1400 condominium apartments were sold and closed from January 1985 until July of 1988. The impact of these properties that entered the market was extraordinary bad. First most of these properties were sold in a vacuum meaning that the prices weren’t really the market they were the prices the developers asked for and got because of the hype. Many of the buyers were from New York or Northern New Jersey and didn’t get sticker shock like their friends from the south in Philadelphia. With the onslaught of closings about 20 to 25% of those properties were put back on the market which by then became a non market.

That short story was the Atlantic City story which had seen the amazing spikes from speculators and casino land grabbing. The casino stocks were flying and many people became multi-millionaires overnight. Let’s get back to the real world for a minute. Other parts of Atlantic County saw much growth from housing and indirect investment in the form of retail and commercial properties to keep up with the growth from the casino engine. Now sleepy Cape May County was feeling some growing pains from the exodus of some Atlantic County residents to Upper Township where the prices didn’t see the same increases and the taxes had not increased much either.

What happened to the other shore communities other than Atlantic City? Of course they went up, but not in the dramatic fashion as A.C. did.

So what happened to make one of the greatest advances in real estate prices fall? Probably to answer this question two fold, the first was greed. How fitting for the New York metro area and second is the easier answer. A market will eventually top out for what ever reason. There becomes a point in time when there is no one in the marketplace that will buy at those prices are there isn’t anyone left in the marketplace to buy. What happens next? It’s called a correction and it can last a long time or a short time depending on the increase of the advance and the longevity of the advance.

Historians have said that the end of the run up in the late 1980’s was from a few major events. First, the tax reform bill of 1986 which changed the status of rental investment properties that owners now either had passive or active income from their investment properties and then the stock market crash of 1987. These two events were the beginning of the end for the run up, on a financial front and then on a psychological front. This one-two punch put the economy and the real estate market in a correction that lasted until 1995 or 1996 depending on the regional economy.

Let’s go back and try to answer the question. When was the best time to buy shore real estate between 1987 and 1996? Let me point out the real estate market bottomed out 1992, 1993, 1994 which I call the muddy bottom. At that time buyers and sellers were trading deeds and the prices stayed generally fixed except the buyers that were buying the quality pieces made out much better in the long run. If you bought in 1991 did you not get a great price? If you bought in 1995 did you not get a great price?  All I can say in that if you bought in all five of those years you would have doubled or tripled the value of your investment.

Why did the real estate market just decide to go up then? Supply and demand is the usual factor. When the supply dips below the demand the prices will start to increase slowing because there is always addition supply waiting for the prices to increase. When do the prices really start to move? Now we go back to the opposite psychology, because when everyone is buying other people feel more comfortable to buy! Friends and family always try to keep up with the Smiths or Cohen’s.

Don’t many people say the market will never go as high as it did this time? Hell yeah. Most people have a memory problem and it starts as soon as times become comfortable. We hear the economy is better, we hear how wonderful the president is doing and we hear whatever we want to hear.

On a different concept when does the market finally go into hyper mode? This one took my much more time to figure out. Bingo! When the entire back inventory is cleared and the properties that were bought at the top of the market are either sold on the market or not returned the market is when the real estate marketplace has the opportunity to flow. Keep in mind timing, as the prices go up how much new inventory will be a drag on the markets. The quicker this happens the fewer properties will be out there since most of the buyers are holding for at least 3 to 5 years.

Now back to the story at hand. The Cape May County market from 1996 to 2000 was having a steady flow of buyers since the baby boomers were entering the resort second home market. I would say they were seeing a 5 or 6 percent increase year over year. Not bad right? The market was just plugging along until the first bump in the road and didn’t turn into a speed bump but a catalyst. The stock market had a nasty correction what was called the internet bubble. If you remember what happened, investors were back to buying stock in companies that never made money. Some people forget or it’s just a new generation of people that don’t know better. So what are people to do now? I got it! Let go back to buying bricks and sticks since they are way less volatile. Right? Well guess what happened next? Like it was yesterday, the World Trade Center came down on September 11, 2001. If you weren’t freaking out you must have been on the moon! For six months the whole country was in shock and many people had a new idea about life. Live for the day and enjoy the time you have with your family because we never know when life could be cut short. Seeing all of those young people in the twin towers and in the financial district it was so unspeakable and this brought on the next wave in my opinion.

One last flashback to 2003, I end up working as the President and general manager of The Landis Co., Realtors in Sea Isle City.  At the time I started having conversations with Jim Sofroney the Broker/ Owner of the firm who had been in the real estate business for 30 plus years. Our conversations were how to manage the risk for our clients since we managed 1000 rental properties and wanted to give the owners our best interpretation of the market twice a year. We were starting to feel a little concerned about the increase in prices already. By the end of the summer of 2003 the prices were holding and the inventory was not increasing and the economy was getting traction.

So where am I going with this story? If you aren’t familiar with the real estate market in Cape May County we have two strong buying seasons, the spring which would consist of February, March, April and May. Then our Fall season would be the end of August, September and October. When we hit the fall season of 2003 the prices were increasing at 1% to 2% per month. Everyone thought this was great, so we saw people that shouldn’t have been in the investor market or people were buying multiple properties at these scorching numbers. The prices were being driven up by the speculation from the builders and developers that were buying land and buildings to turn into townhouses and condos. The more buyers bought the more their friends and family wanted to buy. Human nature at its worst, the greed factor or the let’s keep up with the Jones’ syndrome was at work. We didn’t see this market not being able to digest the entire inventory until the fall of 2005 when things started to roll over. Prices didn’t go up or go down, so the premise was we were beginning to stabilize. That made sense since all we were doing was taking a breather from that frantic period. Right? No! Wrong the real estate markets were exhausted and the developers were still building which was putting even more pressure on the markets that the inventory was peaking out because many of the buyers were planning on flipping their property at the same time the builders were dropping their prices to meet the slowing market.

It became apparent that the real estate markets when the land costs dropped 35 to 40%. The most improved part of the market became the worst place to be. The lot costs probably came back to a reasonable price point but the actual condos and townhouses haven’t dropped that much. Over the last five to six years we watched the prices drift anywhere from 25% to 50% from the ultimate time depending on the town or property type which you might be researching.

Prices were drifting lower at a snail pace until the bad boys of the banking community decided to do lots of bad thing. Well let us say did. Knowingly selling bond portfolios of loans that were to have little or no equity to Main St and sell them as CMO’s (Collateralize Mortgage Obligations). Boy doesn’t that sound warm and fuzzy sitting in your brokerage portfolio? Guess what the executives decided to they owned a bunch of this stuff themselves and tried to figure out a way to cover their bet with derivatives (a financial product like an option to play the other side of the bonds). Well who do you call to help with this mess since this is a new fangled problem? Let’s drag the insurance companies in since they understand derivatives and insurance programs. They will come up with a solution so they thought. The first big insurance company that took a hit was AIG. AIG was probably the biggest insurance company at the time and now running as a few smaller companies. This brought on one of the worst financial crisis ever to hit the United States. The Financial bailout of 2009 was also the biggest blunder since the following year the banks and financial firms that we bailed out had the largest profits in history.

As the prices kept falling and more and more property owners were underwater by 2009 and 2010 it seemed that a lot of the investors were throwing in the towel after getting professional advice from either lawyers or accountants.

The outcome from the professionals was three basic ideas; hold the property for as long as you can. Rent it out, use it, sell it were their choices on scenario one. Then the tough stuff the lawyers would be involved with. If you can sell the property at a price less than the amount you owe the bank we can get you out of the property with out you losing the property in foreclosure. Its easy to do because the banks don’t want to the real estate back and it will even be a longer time before they get it back and if the markets drop further, lets do the deal now and move on to the next one. Back in the early 1990’s most professionals called this a “cram down”. It was a verb since it was being crammed down the banks thought. Today the term is a Short Sale. Aw, isn’t that nice? Since the bank is letting property owners do these they aren’t the victim they are getting what they want. Less bank owned properties and much less legal fees make it a win-win for both parties. The last is the do nothing and enjoy the property and when the bank finally takes the house just get there before and get your personal items out. This process could take anywhere from six months to 18 months depending on the financial ability of the owner and the type of property.

Let’s fast forward back to today September 10, 2011 the day before the tenth anniversary of 9.11.2001. For some reason we are still not comfortable with the local real estate market. We still not have a crystal ball and we are only past history to project the next one or two years out. Why do we even care? I’m not really sure but my blog essay is to show you that history does repeat itself and that where we are today is must closer to the bottom then we are to the top.

Let’s explore these simple questions that people like you might be asking;

Is this a good time to upgrade into a larger Jersey Shore property? Yes. The first question I would ask is how much equity do you have in your current property? The difference between the realistic values of the property and any loan or debt amount attached to the property would be your equity amount. This has nothing to do with any profit or loss you might have experienced. Either way we are looking at a snapshot of today to decide our next move. Psychologically no one likes to take less on an investment but that is irrelevant in deciding to upgrade into a bigger or better property. In the long run the objective is to leverage to down market to your advantage by buying the more expensive property now. On a percentage basic if all things were equal the dollar lose would be substantially more on the larger property than the small property.

As long as you have 20% for your new down payment from funds from the old property or new funds the transition is a go. This is how people with money have been upgrading all the way to the beachfronts or bay fronts. You can’t imagine how many people have asked me “how did those people buy on the beach?” In most cases it was their second or third property at the beach. If you have additional questions about this awesome timing opportunities please email me or call to discuss.

Is this a good time to invest in a Jersey Shore home? Yes is the answer. If you are like most people who are trying to catch the bottom of this cycle well we are in it right now. I would consider being within a 10% margin of the top or the bottom as a good reference point. Why do I say that? No one has a crystal ball from what I been told. Then all we can do is our very best to identify the bottom. First of all I like to call this next two years as the muddy bottom. Properties will come up and be sold at similar prices in the period of time. This is where an experienced real estate broker will come in handy. What was the first thing you were told about real estate? The three most important components to buying real estate are location, location and location. Then I heard the experts say buy the smallest home in the best neighborhood. So my final word of advice when buying in the soft market is do not let the price be your guide. Still buy the best piece of property you can comfortably afford and jump in enjoy The Jersey Shore with your family and friends because that’s what me and my fellow Realtors are really selling. This is the greatest opportunity to enjoy the nature and the shore lifestyle for you and the most important people in your life.

So go out there and don’t get caught up in the greed of vacation property ownership and do what millions of people have done for generations. Live The Jersey Shore lifestyle. Namaste ~ Ian

Ian Lazarus

Broker Associate

Team Leader – The Lazarus Team

The Landis Co., Realtors

4201 Landis Avenue

Sea Isle City, NJ 08243

609.457.0258

ian.lazarus@mygo2realtor.com

www.AvalonRealEstateBlog.com www.BuyCondosOnTheBeach.com www.BuySeaIsleCityCondos.com www.CondosOnTheBeach.net www.FindaShoreHome.com www.FindaShoreHome.tv www.MySeaIsleRealEstate.com www.OceanCityShortSaleBlog.com www.SeaIsleCityBeachBlockHomes.com www.SeaIsleCityBayfrontHomes.com www.SeaIsleCityBeachHouses.com www.SeaIsleCityCondosForSale.com www.SeaIsleCityRealEstateOnline.com www.SeaIsleTownhouses.com www.StoneHarborRealEstateBlog.com www.TownsendsInletBeachHomes.com www.TownsendsInletRealEstate.com

Welcome to the bottom of the real estate market. Might as well get used to it because we’ll probably be here a while.

One of the two units in this duplex on Coolidge Avenue in Margate, with three bedrooms and two baths, sold for its asking price of $349,000 on Aug. 30.

One sign of the bottom is that home-price surveys are starting to show small and perhaps fleeting increases. Another is that houses are selling near their listing prices. And different surveys are picking up improvements in different places, the way boats drift in different directions in calm winds.

The calm of the real estate bottom is that the four-year fall in prices is ending, and that the stream of distressed properties hitting the market has been reduced — for now.

“We’re still heading toward bottom-end stabilization, and I think it will remain at that bottom end for two years, and will take three to five years before we see an uptick in the market in general,” said Carlo Losco, president and owner of Balsley Losco Real Estate in Northfield, the region’s largest independent agency.

Federal Housing Finance Agency second quarter home prices for the region support the trend seen earlier in figures from the National Association of Realtors, but less robustly.

FHFA said its housing price index dropped 2 percent in Atlantic County in the quarter, leaving prices 4.6 percent lower in the past year. That’s in line with a U.S. decline of 1.9 percent for the quarter and 4.5 percent for the prior four quarters.

Cape May County, however, was one of the few metro areas covered by FHFA to post an increase, up 1.1 percent for the quarter (but still leaving the price index 3.3 percent lower for 12 months).

The Realtor survey for the quarter had found a 5.6 percent rise in the median home price for the combined Atlantic, Cape May and Cumberland counties region — with prices rising 9.3 percent in Cape May County and 1.7 percent in Atlantic County.

Both surveys saw prices falling, but a bit more slowly, in Cumberland County. FHFA’s limited coverage there showed a one-year decline of 5.7 percent as of the second quarter, compared to 6 percent in the prior survey.

“I would like to think we’re bouncing along the bottom here,” said Brian Groetsch Jr., president of the Cape May County Association of Realtors.

Groetsch said southern county Multiple Listing Service figures showed a 5 percent gain in home prices in line with the Realtors survey, and a 3 percent rise since the first quarter.

“What’s encouraging is the volume of sales, which are up 12 percent year over year,” he said. “I pulled a report showing all the different areas within our market and what jumped out at me was a marked increase in sales in higher-value areas such as the barrier islands, which could be the reason for the bump in the median sales price.”

After years of steep home price declines — the FHFA said New Jersey prices are down 18 to 27 percent from their peak, depending on its survey methodology — stabilization is welcome.

“At least I can see the bottom. That’s all you can hope to garner out of this right now,” Losco said.

He said there’s a considerable advantage to the market bottoming out for real estate professionals: Pricing homes effectively becomes easier.

“I can tell someone today that if the price is at a certain point it will sell, where that wasn’t the case a year or two ago when we were heading for the bottom,” Losco said. “So you can give people accurate advice.”

That better pricing of homes and the stabilizing market are resulting in houses selling much nearer their listing prices.

“The actual MLS records (for Atlantic County) show that the houses that are selling are getting 97 percent of their asking price,” he said.

That asking price, though, often has been reduced significantly from what the seller originally hoped to get. Losco said there are many Internet-savvy bargain hunters tracking houses and their prices, even getting automatic alerts when homes have reached a target price.

He said he’s seen houses languish with no offers and then, after another small drop, multiple offers suddenly appear and you wonder “where did all these people come from?”

Market stabilization has been helped by the slowdown in foreclosure processing due to legal challenges and questions about paperwork, especially in New Jersey and the 20 other states where foreclosures are handled by the courts.

Nationwide, foreclosures sales were up 6 percent in the quarter and down 11 percent from the year before. In New Jersey, foreclosure sales fell 25 percent in the quarter and are down 46 percent from 2012, said RealtyTrac, which gathers and markets foreclosure information.

Atlantic County’s 117 foreclosure sales were a third less than the first quarter and half the number from the second quarter a year ago.

Cape May County’s 50 sales were a 6 percent increase from the prior quarter, but still down 57 percent from last year.

The 31 foreclosure sales in Cumberland County were a 19 percent increase for the quarter, but a 46 percent drop from the same period in 2010. And Ocean County’s 258 sales were up 9 percent for the quarter, but down a third from a year ago.

Losco said the processing delay of foreclosures has helped with the biggest challenge for home sellers — appraisals.

He said getting loan appraisers to value a home high enough for a sale agreement to work amounts to having to sell the home twice for real estate agents.

As a certified general appraiser himself, Losco said he understands the pressure on appraisers. “I see a lot of bulletins to appraisers, and in most cases they’re mandated to state how many bank-owned properties are in the area, and sometimes ordered to put three bank-owned properties in their appraisal report.”

One group that doesn’t need to worry about appraisals or financing is cash investors, and Groetsch said he’s seen “a staggering increase in cash transactions.”

Cash home sales are up 48 percent from a year ago in MLS data, he said.

“Most cash transactions are on the barrier islands,” said Groetsch, who is also broker associate with Century 21 Gilmartin & Co. in Cape May. “Second home and investment buyers are looking for alternatives to invest their dollars versus the stock market, which is very volatile right now.”

With the processing slowdown, foreclosure sales accounted for 17 percent of sales in Atlantic County, 7 percent in Cape May County, 15 percent in Cumberland County and 13 percent in Ocean. In the U.S., they still make up a third of all home sales.

The building backlog in bank-owned properties in New Jersey is one reason why Losco and others don’t expect a rebound soon.

“I don’t see an upward trend because once the banks start releasing properties, in a small market like this that could have a huge impact,” he said. “When they turn the valve on, that’s definitely going to be something we have to contend with.”

Groetsch said the current signs are encouraging, but the industry needs to see more buyers obtain conventional and FHA-backed mortgages — which requires administrative or legislative action at the federal level.

“Hopefully we’ll all be better off for the time we spend on the bottom,” he said.

By MICHAEL MILLER Staff Writer press of A.C.

Pete Patrizzi runs a home security check business in Ocean City, making weekly checks to clients homes along the sea shore throughout the winter. Patrizzi checks the doors of a home on Wesley Ave.

OCEAN CITY — Pete Patrizzi opened the door to the million-dollar beach house and checked that the alarm was functioning.

Inside, the home was still as a museum. Nobody had lived here in several months, and the air was slightly stale. The temperature was a cool but comfortable 60 degrees as the furnace whirred to life in a low hum.

“I spend more time in this house than the owners do,” said Patrizzi, general manager of Resort Residential Services.

His business keeps silent watch over Ocean City, Ventnor, Longport and Margate summer homes in the long off-season and repairs any minor damage caused by storms, leaks or — occasionally — burglars.

Patrizzi checked to ensure the front and side doors were locked. Then he ventured to the sliding-glass doors facing the panoramic ocean view that gives this oceanfront neighborhood its name: the Gold Coast.

Patrizzi stepped out onto the deck. The beach was deserted in both directions as far as he could see. He stepped back inside and relocked the doors, slid the deadbolts in place and set the alarm.

Burglars have been busy in the south end of Ocean City this year, where they have ransacked 20 homes, mostly for high-end electronics. The south end is the quieter side of Ocean City, where block after block sits empty for most of the winter. Some years these burglaries can go virtually unnoticed until spring, when the owners return to the shore to reopen their homes. But lately second-home owners have been spending more winter weekends at the shore, police Lt. Steven Ang said.

“People would go south and forget about their seasonal home through March or April. But in Ocean City, because of all the activities we have through New Year, we have a pretty good volume of weekend clientele,” Ang said. “Up until the first of the year, we’re seeing people use their houses on the weekends.”

So the reports have been trickling in about break-ins, especially on the 4100, 4400 and 4800 blocks of Central Avenue.

The burglars have been brazen, breaking down doors by shattering their frames to gain access to the beach side of the homes, Ang said.

“They have to be making noise,” he said. “They’re picking these isolated neighborhoods. It’s obvious someone has taken the time to stake out and watch the properties for a few days.”

Once inside, the burglars have taken their time, disconnecting home-theater components and flat-panel televisions, he said.

“They’re being more cautious removing the equipment. They’re not rushing when they’re inside these properties,” he said.

Vacation homes are annual targets of burglars in resort towns and seasonal campgrounds.

In one memorable case in 2003, a homeless man took up residence in a vacant West Avenue summer cottage, pawning some of the home’s antiques, decorations and furniture for food money. The homeowner grew suspicious when he got a high electric bill in the mail.

Ocean City is hardly alone in seeing numerous winter burglaries. The Cape May County Prosecutor’s Office is investigating two dozen home burglaries in Sea Isle City, Middle Township, Stone Harbor and Lower Township dating to October.

“We generally do see criminal activity like this in the wintertime, when the barrier islands are vacant,” Prosecutor Robert Taylor said.

There is less foot traffic on the south end, since many businesses there close for the winter. And a loud bang or crash is a common enough sound on an island where contractors are rebuilding beach homes, despite a wintry economy.

Burglars are targeting the plasma televisions, often leaving behind DVD players, tuners and audio components, Ang said.

Patrizzi has filled out police reports on behalf of clients whose homes were burglarized. Some of his clients in Atlantic and Cape May counties spend the winter as far away as Singapore. When the burglar or fire alarms go off, he is the contact for police and fire departments.

“We had a house that someone tried to break into last year. They threw an umbrella stand through a sliding-glass door,” he said. “The alarm system stopped them.”

Patrizzi said he knows if something is amiss the moment he sets foot in one of his clients’ homes.

“It might be a funny odor or the little noise of wind from a popped window,” he said.

On Dec. 10, he checked on a home at 35th Street to find the TV remote control out of place on a coffee table next to condensation marks from a carelessly placed drink. He phoned the homeowner and learned his family had paid a recent visit.

Once, he checked on a home after one of southern New Jersey’s famously punishing northeasters to find a 6-foot skylight had been blown off the roof of the house.

But it’s the little things that keep him busy — jiggling the handle on a running toilet, lowering or raising the thermostat in accord with the clients’ wishes, and making sure the home weathers another New Jersey winter.

“Some of these houses have five bedrooms and four baths with Jacuzzis. These are elaborate homes. We can’t take a chance to have damage,” he said.

Police said they will check on more properties looking for signs of disturbance to give the burglary suspects a shorter window of opportunity to strike.

Properties on the 4100 block of Asbury Avenue in Ocean City are being offered for rental. Real estate agents and brokers say more winter rentals are available as the number of renters has stayed the same.

By STEVEN LEMONGELLO Press of A.C.Staff Writer | Sun, November 21, 2010

As the weather gets colder and the summer visitors pack up and leave, they leave behind hundreds of empty apartments and houses in shore towns — but while the number of “winter renters” has stayed steady, the number of available units has only grown.

“It has changed,” D.J. Gluck, the broker/owner of Soleil Sotheby’s International Realty in Margate, said of the market for winter rentals, “and it’s changed for economic reasons.”

A large number of summer rentals went unrented during the summer season, Gluck said, and now Absecon Island is seeing a “huge” number of winter rentals on the market.

“That’s because there’s more landlords and more new construction of houses that didn’t sell,” Gluck said. “There’s (just) more people willing to do winter rentals.”

“They’re under the gun,” said Ken Marshall, of Grace Realty in Ocean City, about why more owners are willing to rent their properties. “Everybody is.”

Typically, Gluck said, only 20 percent of units on the market as winter rentals actually get rented — “And maybe it’s actually close to 10 percent,” he added.

In all four communities on Absecon Island, Gluck said, there were 502 active rentals as of early November, including year-round, winter rentals and seasonal rentals. He estimates that only about 300 are currently being rented.

There’s also a disparity among the towns. Gluck said that there are 161 rentals in Margate alone, while Jerome DiPentino, of Premier Properties, said that there were fewer than 10 in Longport.

“Winter rentals are also a little tricky,” Gluck said, “because there’s a lot of landlords with very nice, expensive houses, who are very particular about who would move into (their house).”

The ideal, low-occupancy tenant, he said, is a person “who is really going to take care of a place — and they’re challenging to find. … If you run into a good winter rental tenant, you can get a good deal.”

Gluck recently rented out a second home, assessed at about $650,000, to a tenant paying about $900 a month over a seven-month period.

“That’s going to generate more than $6,000, and the landlord was thrilled to offset taxes and homeowner’s insurance. They were very, very concerned about the quality of the tenant.”

Claire Cotney, a broker at Marketplace Realty in Margate, said that there’s always been more inventory than people interested in renting — but the lack of new construction also leads to fewer renters.

“There are not that many people coming in to work this year (on construction projects),” Cotney said. “When there’s new construction, you certainly have a lot more winter renters.”

Other winter renters, said Re/Max broker/owner Linda Novelli, do so because they’re renovating a house and need a place to stay in the meantime.

“Taking a winter rental also gives them the gift of time,” Novelli said. “They can keep it a few years while they look for an apartment or buy a home.”

Marshall, whose company handles many properties in the south end of Ocean City, said availability is down overall.

“I’ve been doing this for 35 years, and when I started there were a lot of winter rentals,” Marshall said. “I even started out living in a winter rental myself. But today, they’re few and far between. It’s a hassle getting renters for the summer when you have a winter tenant sitting there.”

Of course, they’re still a good deal for everyone if it works out. In fact, the offices of Grace Realty have apartments above them, he said, “and one of them has a winter renter.”

Anyone who has a good grasp of their local market and has been in Real Estate for more than 10 minutes recognize who are the big players in their area.

You will never be able to buy at the absolute bottom of the real estate market. But the next best thing is buying as the market emerges from the bottom. Buying as the market gains momentum you are gaining equity the moment it closes and are riding it up again.

Back to the signals: Who is buying development land? People with vision and a business plan…is there a risk- If you expect a reward you bet there is a risk? But if you are convinced a location is perfect for your application , you’ll never be able to buy it for less…and you don’t want to be competing with someone else for failing to pulling the trigger first (it is time to buy before everyone else realizes it).

This buyer never stops thinking- he is a mover and a shaker…he is the go to guy, when he calls to ask about a property you can guarantee the value is about to jump.

Think about the buyer who always bought and sold at the right time, watch when he starts buying, as all the investment companies say in their disclosure “past performance is not a guarantee of future profits” But it is a very good bet. I am seeing the signals clearly, buyers who have never lost on a property are looking…what does that tell you?

If this piece of land doesn’t become a crucial part of a future business success I’ll be very surprised. Watch the past performers and see what they are doing. I’ve been marketing and selling real estate for 26 years, my gut is telling me things will be very different a year from now and if you aren’t willing to work hard now you’ll be missing some great opportunities when the market improves.

Search for some excellent Jersey Shore deals at www.FindaShoreHome.com for Cape May County or www.AtlanticCityRealEstateBlog.com for Atlantic County.

Atlantic County

ATLANTIC CITY

500 Grammercy Place, North Mass Ave Development LLC to Atlantic City Housing Authority & Urban Redevelopment Agency; 7/28/2010. $220,000

2019 Magellan Ave., Atlantic City Housing Authority and Urban Redevelopment Agency to Delores Tolbert; 7/28/2010. $189,900

3817 Ventnor Ave., Raviv Turner & Liraz Turner to Assaf Maliniak; 7/29/2010. $60,000

100 Berkley Square Unit 19A, George Beppel & Linda Pearl & Andrew Pearl & Ida Pearl to Gary S Master & Barbara G Master; 7/26/2010. $450,000

2721 Boardwalk Unit 107, Val Mats & Lyudmila Glazman to Todd Golish & Myra Golish; 7/27/2010. $100,000

2 Texas Court, Federal National Mortgage Association to Ayan Group Inc; 7/28/2010. $42,001

BRIGANTINE

300 W. Brigantine Ave. Unit 103, Donald M Taylor & Elizabeth A Taylor to Steven Taylor; 7/27/2010. $100,000

713 W. Brigantine Ave., Robert A Hicken & Anne J Hicken & Nancy Hicken & Howard A Hicken to Stephen T Matthews & Rhonda Jacobson Matthews; 7/29/2010. $300,000

42 Cummings Place, Barbara Sanders & Mark Sanders to Robert J Sooy & Sally A Sooy & Steven P Sooy; 7/29/2010. $235,000

LONGPORT

19 S. 36th Ave., William H Curtis to Maurice Torjman & Mindy Torjman; 7/26/2010. $567,038

MARGATE

30 N. Haverford Ave., Paul R Damato & Damato Grace Anselmo & Grace Anselmo Damato & Emil Damato to Leo Plonsky & Barbara Plonsky; 7/26/2010. $526,750

9502 Atlantic Ave., Samanda Properties I of NJ LLC & Michael Pouls to Andreas C Pavlides & Shereen Pavlides; 7/28/2010. $990,000

3 S Brunswick Ave., Adele Gravitz to Robert Gravitz & Deborah Astrove & Janet Gravitz & Judith Gravitz; 7/27/2010. $189,000

109 S. Franklin Ave., Marjorie S Katz & Solomon Katz & Ruth J Katz to David L Colman & Nancy K Colman; 7/29/2010. $3,475,000

308 N. Mansfield Ave., William R McCaughin & William R McCaughin & Mary M McCaughin to Richard H Walker & Millicent Walker; 7/28/2010. $320,000

SOMERS POINT

423 Bay Ave., Michael Markman to Ignacio Morales & Maria Castillo; 7/30/2010. $169,000

VENTNOR

5200 Boardwalk Unit 5A, Edward P Lipeles & Theresa Lipeles to David P Malamut & Marcella Malamut; 7/26/2010. $320,000

412 N. Cornwall Ave., Federal Home Loan Corp & Goldberg & Ackerman Zucker to Son Bach; 7/28/2010. $165,000

18 S. Richards Ave., Bank Sterling to Douglas G Arch & Elaine M Arch; 7/28/2010. $565,625

Cape May County

AVALON

262 26th St. Unit 262, Carlo Civitella to Ps Shore Properties LLC; 7/27/2010. $706,000

NORTH WILDWOOD

115 E. Sixth Ave., Catherine Hartner-Hall and Joseph Hall to Colleen Boucher and Seth Boucher; 7/28/2010. $250,000

OCEAN CITY

2710 Asbury Ave. Second Floor, Carmela Synder and James Synder to Felice Macera and Joke Bradt; 7/26/2010. $420,000 ;

Atlantic County

ATLANTIC CITY

1512 Emerson St., Charles Bridges & Bessie Bridges to Anthony A Cicchini & Albert H Vessella; 8/3/2010. $130,000

2809 Denny St., Kokilaben P Bhavsar & Pravinbhai M Bhavsar to Phi Nguyen & Leona Nguyen; 8/3/2010. $27,000

4709 Ventnor Ave., HS Family LP & Leon E Schwartz & Debra Schwartz to Harry Furman & Victoria Furman; 8/4/2010. $330,000

3801 Boardwalk Unit 108, William J Dougherty to Rachel E Haddad; 8/4/2010. $155,000

3903 Sussex Ave., B&B Zion LLC & Robert Goldstein & Bonnie L McCabe to Luis Alex Meneses; 8/4/2010. $239,000

1300 N. Ohio Ave., Federal National Mortgage Association to Geovanny M Davila; 8/5/2010. $130,000

2628 Atlantic Ave. Unit 402, US Bank NA to Tina Nguyen; 8/3/2010. $33,000

1800 Atlantic Ave., LM&C Company Inc to 1800 Atlantic LLC; 8/2/2010. $475,000

212 N. Morris Ave., Cheong M Chan to Marleny Zapata & Benjamin Zapata; 8/6/2010. $181,000

BRIGANTINE

45 Ocean Drive, Izak Farbiarz to Leonard J Gatti & Donna Z Gatti; 8/6/2010. $687,000

835 W Shore Drive, Timothy J Robb to John S Horchos; 8/2/2010. $302,500

810 Sterling Place, Thomas Lapera & George Economides & William E Reynolds to Matthew J Maguire & Donna Maguire; 8/3/2010. $233,000

335 39th St. South, Lester B Newhall & Gail L Newhall to Joseph Rickard & Erin Rickard; 8/5/2010. $349,000

4609A Atlantic Brigantine Blvd., Litton Loan Service LP & HSBC Bank USA NA & Fremont Home Loan Trust 2006 C to Anthony Dambra; 8/5/2010. $375,000

722 Sheridan Blvd., John Rynkiewicz & Renata Rynkiewicz to Quinn Harbright; 8/6/2010. $310,000

215 Fourth St. South, Hal Marinaro & Gail Marinaro to Michael Hopkins & Cheree Mancuso Hopkins; 8/4/2010. $710,000

123 11th St. South, Daniel Clifford & Jonathan Weinhold to James Sorkin; 8/4/2010. $315,000

LONGPORT

2927 Longport Drive, Erica Strafella & Elizabeth Eble & Janet Szilgi to Blaise A Cona & Jeanne M Cona; 8/4/2010. $625,000

39 N. Overbrook Ave., Nancy A Fannan & John Clark Fannan to Max Reif & Joy R Reif; 8/4/2010. $480,000

MARGATE

310 N. Vendome Ave., Elizabeth T Colaneri & Christi M Andrews to Donna Baudo & Jason E Cohen; 8/4/2010. $225,000

9600 Atlantic Ave. Unit 707, Robert A Hackel & Marci L Hackel to Debbie L Zumoff & Marc S Zumoff; 8/5/2010. $350,000

115 N. Brunswick Ave., Charles Sherman & Roslynn Averbook to Martin Buchalski & Debra Buchalski; 8/6/2010. $258,000

28 S. Benson Ave., David Mermelstein & A Pro Realty Service Ltd & M&M Realty Partners LP of Pa to Mitchell D Toren; 8/6/2010. $610,000

2 E. Gilmar Circle, John A Mcelwee to Matthew D Marootian & Amy P Marootian; 8/6/2010. $260,000

7605 Atlantic Ave., Gary T Grabar & Joyce M Grabar to Adam S Goldman & Emily Kane Goldman; 8/6/2010. $701,000

130 N. Adams Ave. Unit F, Gapcindy LLC & Cynthia Sparacio to Therese Antoinette Heimbold; 8/3/2010. $120,000

11 S Barclay Ave., Joseph Connor & Julia M Loftus & Julia M Connor & William E Connor to Jeffrey A Cohen & Stephanie D Cohen; 8/2/2010. $535,000

8607 Winchester Ave., Martin B Buchalski & Debra Buchalski to Evan Krisch & Susan Krisch; 8/2/2010. $940,000

SOMERS POINT

557 Seventh St., Lena Robertello to R Russell Corona & Virginia C Corona; 8/5/2010. $47,050

221 W. Dawes Ave., Philip M Kelsey & Rosalind C Kelsey to Michael Layton & Linda Layton; 8/6/2010. $137,000

219 W. Meyran Ave., John A Ridgway & Wanda A Smith to Kathleen Nagel & Raymond Smith; 8/3/2010. $195,000

3 Princeton Road, George Molnar to Rose Marie Giostra & Barbara Kedziora; 8/4/2010. $186,500

718 Bay Ave., Samuel Krantz & William Sternberg to Tracy Chan & Wai Chan; 8/5/2010. $375,000

VENTNOR

109 S. Victoria Ave., Philip Kramer & David J Kramer to Linda Clouser; 8/4/2010. $150,000

112 N. Melbourne Ave., Joseph T Murray & Ann M Murray to Eric Poppel & Lisa Poppel; 8/4/2010. $317,000

201 N. Dudley Ave., Wells Fargo Bank NA & Wachovia Mortgage FSB to Raven Wilson; 8/6/2010. $160,000

17 S. Vassar Square, Carlo W Andreoni to Jeffrey M Kahn; 8/5/2010. $75,000

414 Berkshire Drive, Stanley Orlinsky & Bernice Orlinsky to Lucio Angelo Privitello & Meghan Privitello; 8/5/2010. $225,000

23 S. Vassar Square, Federal National Mortgage Association & Phelan Hallinan & Schmieg PC to Jimmy Tse; 8/5/2010. $97,900

5600 Monmouth Ave., HSBC Bank USA NA & Fremont Home Loan Trust 2006 C & Litton Loan Service LP to Pasquale Aulicino; 8/5/2010. $125,000

229 N. Somerset Ave., Such Kahn & Fein Shepard PC & Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp to Danielle Tursi; 8/2/2010. $129,900

Cape May County

AVALON

6732 Ocean Drive, Jean Nazarow and Michael Nazarow to Leigh Kane and Michael Kane; 8/6/2010. $655,000

CAPE MAY

817 Columbia Ave. Unit A, C Eastern Property Management Ll to Kevin Gilroy and Rosemary Gilroy; 7/31/2010. $960,000

LOWER TOWNSHIP

22 Heron Way, Janet Willse to Kathleen Brody and Michael Brody; 8/4/2010. $215,000

311 Delaware Ave., Jack Stone and Josephine Stone to Reinih Botros; 8/6/2010. $305,000

5115 Shawcrest Road, Karen Pinardo to Elmer Kingkiner; 8/6/2010. $280,000

12 Folsom Road, David Gleeson to James Penzi and Joseph McMenamin; 8/2/2010. $245,000

4 E. New York Ave., Bonita Mulligan to Richard Burke; 8/2/2010. $70,000

NORTH WILDWOOD

415 E. 23rd Ave. Unit 201, Jeffrey Stippick and Joan Stippick to George Fiedorowicz and Josephine Fiedorowicz; 8/2/2010. $350,000

642 W. Pine Ave Unit 1, Mary Chandler and William Chandler to James O’Donnell and Jennifer O’Donnell; 8/2/2010. $150,000

OCEAN CITY

112 Limpet Drive, Carol Schoenewald and Steven Schoenewald to Carmela Snyder and James Snyder; 8/5/2010. $330,000

1 36th St. Unit 1, Marian Laffey and Thomas Laffey to James Plousis; 8/3/2010. $205,000

336-338 Bay Ave. Unit 304, Donald Lulejian and Gail Lulejian to Christopher Binder and Lisa Binder; 8/4/2010. $375,000

4 Victoria Lane, Karen Mathern and Michael Mathern to Charles Arnold and Sandra Arnold; 8/4/2010. $375,000

50 Waterway Road, Michael Cornwell and Rosemary Cornwell to Rosemary Cornwell; 8/3/2010. $417,001

117 Bartram Lane, Marcia Kooker and Michelle Simons to Dean Adams and Lenore Teitler; 8/4/2010. $200,000

SEA ISLE CITY

4009 Landis Ave. Unit 4, 4009 Landis Avenue LLC to Anthony Lisi and Lisa Lisi; 8/6/2010. $395,000

7610 Pleasure Ave. North Unit A, Thakar Singh to Kathleen Puleo; 8/6/2010. $650,000

6406 Central Ave. Unit 1, Cheryl Stark and Michael Stark to Patricia Dominach and Richard Dominach; 8/6/2010. $370,000

STONE HARBOR

241 109th St., George Harbaugh to Elisabeth Kalogris and Michael Kalogris; 8/5/2010. $995,000

WEST CAPE MAY

438 Third Ave., Francine Cassizzi and Nicholas Cassizzi to Jane Robinson; 8/2/2010. $405,000

WILDWOOD

224 E. Magnolia Ave., James Reilly and Linda Reilly to Miklos Vajda; 7/31/2010. $192,000

205 E. Bennett Ave., Frank Gramaglia and Janice Gramaglia to Lou’s South Philadelphia Cheese Steaks; 8/2/2010. $397,500

WILDWOOD CREST

450 E. Nashville Road Unit 102, Pelican Development Inc to Kellar Korp LLC; 8/2/2010. $654,500

450 E. Nashville Road Unit 304, Pelican Development Inc to Gary Napierkowski and Lori Napierkowski; 8/4/2010. $451,000

450 E. Nashville Road Unit 306, Pelican Development Inc to Rowena Festa and Steven Festa; 8/3/2010. $434,500

450 E. Nashville Road Unit 502, Pelican Development Inc to Kim Aufiero and Thomas Aufiero; 8/2/2010. $396,000

450 E. Nashville Road Unit 305, Pelican Development Inc to Elaine Puzio and Jacob Puzio; 8/6/2010. $495,000

450 E. Nashville Road Unit 501, Pelican Development Inc to Sara Jackson and Simon Jackson; 8/3/2010. $990,000

450 E Nashville Rd Unit 307, Pelican Development Inc to Jeffrey Rosenberg and Melanie Rosenberg; 8/4/2010. $444,000

July 17-23-2010

Atlantic County

ATLANTIC CITY

3101 Boardwalk Unit 1609 Tower 2, Rita Gottlieb & Gottlieb Tr Rita to Dingyou Zhang & Debbie Ng; 7/20/2010. $272,500

16 S. Mansion Ave., Mooring Tax Asset Group LLC & Mooring Financial Corp to Movid LLC; 7/20/2010. $13,000

812 Adriatic Ave., Dekbon Community Dev Corp to Edwin Valazquez; 7/20/2010. $124,000

237 N. Texas Ave., William Hengeli & Bernez C Warren to Abdus Chowdhury & Farhana Zaman; 7/20/2010. $112,000

29 N. Boston Ave., Teresa D Neville & Teresa R Earl & Thomas J Neville to Liem Luong & Tu Luong; 7/21/2010. $140,000

2721 Boardwalk Unit 1116, Arnold H Carter & Edwin Carter & Donald Carter to Stephen A Iatarola & Denise M Iatarola; 7/22/2010. $135,000

247 S. New York Ave., Coba Inc to Mohammad Aslam Khan; 7/23/2010. $325,000

633 N. Harrisburg Ave., Federal National Mortgage Association to Ngoc Pham; 7/23/2010. $85,000

BRIGANTINE

17 Macdermott Place, Jason A Klemm & Luanne Klemm & Louanne Klemm to Brian Acunto; 7/23/2010. $500,000

4313 Atlantic Brigantine Blvd., Mary Ann Melone to Noel Joseph & Cheryl Joseph; 7/22/2010. $283,000

352 33rd St. South, Anthony Rizzo & Margaret M Rizzo to Babak Zenouzi & Kara L Svendsen; 7/23/2010. $1,165,000

404 23rd St. South, Sue Tillman Landis & Ronald Landis to Yoganand Deendyal & Surujdai Deendyal; 7/21/2010. $1,950,000

1335 Quimet Road, Maryellen Sacks to Linda O’Donnell; 7/22/2010. $400,000

318 43rd St. Unit 1, Raymond G Lobo & Alexis D Lobo to John P Miller & Felicia R Miller; 7/22/2010. $260,000

LINWOOD

11 E. Ocean Heights Ave., Jerry Lee Waldo & Joann Waldo to John F Pifer & Shannon L Pifer; 7/21/2010. $163,000

MARGATE

27 N. Delavan Ave., Karen F Heffler to Allen Heffler & Ruth E Heffler; 7/23/2010. $445,000

227 N. Clarendon Ave., Lila Buchalski & Martin Buchalski to Marc Meketon & Naomi Sussman; 7/23/2010. $382,000

3 S. Frontenac Ave., Alfred Pappalardo to Surmukh Singh & Bhullar Inderdeep Singh; 7/20/2010. $300,000

217 Hanover Ave., Nettie Meil to Chris A Hornig & Lisa P Fineran; 7/20/2010. $204,000

404 N. Clermont Ave., Bonnie Fisher & Ethel Leah Herman & Saul L Herman to Patricia A Connor; 7/23/2010. $340,000

NORTHFIELD

4 Northfield Plaza, Gary Battistini & Michelle Battistini to Kimberly Dirusso & Victor Dirusso; 7/22/2010. $333,000

SOMERS POINT

3 Cooper Drive, Craig M Troilo & Cindi R Troilo & Cindi Fermane to Michael Hinchman; 7/22/2010. $209,250

7 W. Cedar Ave., Shane V Falls & Holly K Falls to William H Rush; 7/23/2010. $229,000

16 Village Drive, Joanne F Dougherty & Denise Speranze & Paul Dougherty to Shelly Jones Opferman; 7/20/2010. $195,000

VENTNOR

5000 Boardwalk Unit C20, Jason Cutler to Reuben Winitch & Deborah Wintch; 7/21/2010. $12,500

127 N. Wissahickon Ave., Margaret Murphy & Daniel S Revallo & Daniel Revallo to William Rueblinger & Kathleen Rueblinger; 7/20/2010. $245,000

5200 Boardwalk Unit 10 C5200, Ruth A Wolff & Sharon E Gans to Sharon E Gans & Sheldon T Wolff & Robyn L Kramer; 7/20/2010. $160,000

102 N. Swarthmore Ave., Robert E Peifer & Patricia Davis & Marianne Peifer to Matthew Bourdon & Kristy D Bourdon; 7/20/2010. $215,000

4800 Boardwalk Unit 1709, Allen Ross & Betty W Ross to Helenmarie R McLaughlin; 7/22/2010. $375,000

707 Dorset Ave., Wells Fargo Bank NA & Wachovia Bank NA to Chris Lichon & Jadwiga Lichon; 7/22/2010. $71,000

106 S. New Haven, Herbert E Cohn & Natalie B Cohn & Shirley S Meyer & Morton K Meyer & Robert E Meyer to Harry R Stainrook & Judith Swann Stainrook; 7/21/2010. $999,000

Cape May County

AVALON

46 W. 32nd St., Stephen Greb to La Salle University; 7/23/2010. $149,600

CAPE MAY

29 Harbor Cove, Elizabeth Hand to Mary Perillo and Salvatore Perillo; 7/20/2010. $750,000

402 Mystic Terrace, Holly Simpkins to Matthew Viall; 7/21/2010. $275,000

NORTH WILDWOOD

225A Allen Drive, Kathleen McHugh to Eileen McElroy and Timothy McElroy; 7/22/2010. $113,000

OCEAN CITY

1727 West Ave., BF Ventures LLC to Ann Harley and John Harley; 7/20/2010. $505,000

443 West Ave., Connie Meng and Robert Meng to Robert De Lellis and Robert Delellis; 7/20/2010. $260,000

SEA ISLE CITY

10-86th St. North, Patricia Patnaude and Ronald Patnaude to Rita Handa and Satish Handa; 7/21/2010. $845,500

126 71st St., James Grogan to Anthony Dain and Regina Dain; 7/21/2010. $557,000

WILDWOOD

405 W. Leaming Ave. Unit 200, Leaming Avenue LLC to Marcy Mickus and Steven Mickus; 7/21/2010. $230,000

336 W. Andrews Ave., Barbara Preston to Lynn McGlynn and Thomas McGlynn; 7/23/2010. $260,000

4911 Susquehanna Ave. Unit 206, Rio Marina LLC to Heng Jiang and Jonathan Lee; 7/23/2010. $182,234

4911 Susquehanna Ave. Unit 306, Rio Marina LLC to Jing-Sheng Zheng and Jing-Tao You; 7/23/2010. $206,250

WILDWOOD CREST

5501 Atlantic Ave. Unit 212, Holiday Developer Inc to Larry Liu and Lili Wang; 7/23/2010. $395,000

July 10-16-2010

Atlantic County

ATLANTIC CITY

12 S. Elberon Ave., Isak Stibel & Molly Stibel & Brenda Halperin to Tung Tsz Cheng; 7/16/2010. $215,000

112 S. Bellevue Ave., Miliwin LLC & Linda A Winett to Teresita Seguritan; 7/16/2010. $51,000

2102 Grant Ave., Fannie Mae & National Mtg Assn Federal to Jai M Washington; 7/15/2010. $65,000

417 N. Harrisburg Ave., Aurora Loan Serv LLC & First American Default Information Serv LLC & American Reo Serv First to Thuan Q Pham & Nhuan Pham & Anh Lee; 7/14/2010. $91,000

210 N. Florida Ave., Patricia Lee & Catherine Hamid & Barbara Edwards & Smith Marian King & Marian King Smith to Mohammed Chiddique; 7/14/2010. $50,000

2721 Boardwalk Unit 1714, Victor Cohen to Nghia T Phan & Chinhan Phan & Danthu T Phan; 7/12/2010. $92,000

2423B Pacific Ave., W Mark Hinkel to Associates Gm; 7/13/2010. $47,500

1024 Mediterranean Ave., City Housing Auth and Urban Redevelopment Atlantic to City Board Of Education Atlantic; 7/12/2010. $154,000

534 Atlantic Ave., Richard C Day to Schoffer Enterprises LLC; 7/16/2010. $110,000

BRIGANTINE

1001 E. Beach Ave., Beach Street LLC & Beach Street Alaska LLC & Genevieve Schok & Genevieve Schok to Paul Krajnenko & Ani Krajnenko; 7/16/2010. $290,000

124 Fifth St. South Unit A, Norma A Sellers to Shawn Resch & Lucia Resch; 7/12/2010. $155,000

4901 Harbour Beach Blvd. Unit S11, Federal Home Loan Mtg Corp & Goldberg and Ackerman Zucker to Kusumben Patel; 7/14/2010. $97,000

212 W. Brigantine Ave. Unit 313, James R Catalano & Charles W Gabage to Dorothy Nemzer Sandler; 7/14/2010. $180,000

1302 Sheridan Blvd., Nathan Balakirsky & Debra Balakirsky to Edward J Mannery & Amanda M Mannery; 7/14/2010. $289,000

LINWOOD

500 Pierce Avenue, David J Schenck & Eileen M Schenck to Khalil Haddad & Reem Haddad; 7/15/2010. $190,000

LONGPORT

116 N 36Th Avenue, Ajl & Kc LLC & Ken Cassallo & Arthur Lallo to Stephanie Grabell; 7/13/2010. $715,000

MARGATE

400 North Essex Avenue, Anthony Disalvo to Joseph P Pignitor & Patricia A Pignitor; 7/14/2010. $435,000

119 North Osborne Avenue, East Shore Dev Co LLC & Vasserman Ilya & Jacob Yoel to Judith R Weinberg; 7/14/2010. $990,000 ;

105 N Harding Avenue Unit A, Patrick Ulrich & Mary Ulrich to Paul Siderio; 7/14/2010. $190,000

13 S Knight Ave, Davco Construction Inc to Elaine G Halpern & Joel B Cooper; 7/16/2010. $995,000

102A N Washington Avenue, Stephen P Field & Michelle B Field to Peter Spitzer & Wendy Spitzer; 7/12/2010. $626,000

7802 Atlantic Avenue, Landmark Development N 4 LLC & Karl E Senseman to Marc Weintraub & Kira Weintraub; 7/12/2010. $1,350,000

101 South Vendome Avenue, Sol E Harrison & Sydria Harrison to Steven H Muchnick & Judy Muchnick; 7/12/2010. $1,325,000

NORTHFIELD

2511 Cedarbridge Road, Ruth Bortner & Milton Bortner to Sarah E Foltz; 7/13/2010. $175,000

6007 Roosevelt Avenue, Hcc Properties LLC & Gary Higbee & Sandra Costanzo to Charles W Leeds & Nancy L Leeds; 7/13/2010. $197,000

680 Pasadena Drive, Joseph D Guerrier to Craig A Gill; 7/14/2010. $180,000

SOMERS POINT

30 W Pierson, Hallinan & Schmieg & Hallinan & Schmieg to Hallinan & Schmieg; 7/13/2010. $100

1808 Pleasure Avenue, Harbour Cove N LLC & S Todd Scarborough to Frank F Law & Michele Mcdonough; 7/14/2010. $850,000

VENTNOR

808 N Surrey Avenue, Sara Chickelero & Eileen Robinson to William R Stalberg; 7/14/2010. $130,000

415 N Harvard Avenue, Joel Cooper to Joseph G Lerario & Ellen Jones; 7/14/2010. $375,000

722 N Victoria Avenue, Alex Bonavitacola to Joyce M Garozzo; 7/13/2010. $250,000

111 South Surrey Avenue Unit 312, Eileen Shernoff to Stephen P Gensel & Regina Gensel; 7/12/2010. $195,000

Cape May County

AVALON;

318 42Nd St, Maureen Rodenhiser and Thomas Rodenhiser to Daniel De Luca and Ursula De Luca; 7/16/2010. $775,000

700 Ocean Dr Unit A3, Margherita Vaughan to Joy B Mc Gowan Revocable Trust and Mc Gowan Joy B Revocable Trust; 7/12/2010. $600,000

CAPE MAY

1341 C Vermont Ave, Phyllis Bocelli and Phyllis Keenan to Joann Maisto; 7/16/2010. $295,000

501 Beach Ave Unit 115, Nancy Hofer and Randal Hofer to Beth Grant and Christopher Grant; 7/11/2010. $195,000

DENNIS

13 Baywyn Dr, Robert Stryker to Maryann Bove-Migliore and Michael Migliore; 7/16/2010. $265,000

LOWER TOWNSHIP

3311 Bayshore Rd Unit B-2, Anthony Alosi and Virginia Alosi to Joanne Cavalier; 7/12/2010. $70,000

3311 Bayshore Rd Unit B-8, Anthony Alosi and Virginia Alosi to Rebecca Chamberlain; 7/16/2010. $70,000

17 Bayberry Rd, Mark Chamberlain and Richard Chamberlain to Lisa Crugnola; 7/14/2010. $160,000

MIDDLE TOWNSHIP

3-5 Matthews St, E Valley Inc Shore Management Co Of Delawar to Andrew Hill and Holly Hill; 7/15/2010. $128,900

32 Lochalsh La, Albert Cerasoli to Patricia Zelnik; 7/12/2010. $380,000

NORTH WILDWOOD

324 E 17Th Ave Unit 101, Clifford Rossner to Kristi Andrescavage and Stephen Andrescavage; 7/15/2010. $280,000

407 E 22Nd Ave Unit 201, George Bowley and Judith Bowley to Jacqueline Melnick and Steven Melnick; 7/15/2010. $415,000

1703 New Jersey Ave, Joseph O’Brien to Francis Casper and Patricia Casper; 7/16/2010. $275,000

1406 Seaboard Circle Unit F4, Barbara Segrich and Thomas Segrich to Carol Lagowski and Joseph Lagowski; 7/16/2010. $715,000

1111 Ocean Avenue, Pamela Masone and Ronald Masone to Anthony Morelli and Richard Morelli; 7/15/2010. $428,000

217 East 12Th Avenue, Paula O’Leary to Barry Bresnan and Christen Bresnan; 7/16/2010. $390,000

2510 Atlantic Ave Unit 109, Mark Finley to Maria Golashovsky and Richard Golashovsky; 7/16/2010. $90,000

526 E 2Nd Ave, Carl Short and Melinda Martinet to Leonard Capone; 7/13/2010. $470,000

OCEAN CITY

915-917 Second Street Unit A, Richard Patterson to June Shaffer and Robin Shaffer; 7/16/2010. $815,000

615 E 16Th Street, Eustace Mita to Santa Rosa Investments LLC; 7/14/2010. $1,347,000

827 Fourth Sr Unit B, C Coastal Investment Partners Ll to Lisa Corning and Michael Corning; 7/16/2010. $775,000

SEA ISLE CITY

4601 Landis Ave Unit A, J F Builders Inc to Edward Partridge and Marie Partridge; 7/16/2010. $450,000

UPPER TOWNSHIP

110 Margate Ave, Deborah Herbert and Susan Herbert to John Vaughan; 7/14/2010. $205,000

60 Evergreen Dr, Joanne Duffy and Patrick Duffy to Atlantic Cape Builders; 7/12/2010. $290,000

516 Rt 9 Unit B-24, Kenneth Leslie and Lori Leslie to Christine Lorenzon and Robert Lorenzon; 7/13/2010. $60,000

WILDWOOD

237 E Montgomery Ave Unit B, Federal National Mortgage Assn and Jeanette Frankenberg to Farnaz Fallahnejad and Paul Holl; 7/15/2010. $225,000

616 W Burk Ave #200, Jeffrey Dunst to Angela Lista and Ugo Lista; 7/15/2010. $190,000

201 E Roberts Ave #201, Nc New Jersey Home Construction I to David Kehoe and Kathleen Kehoe; 7/14/2010. $169,900

WILDWOOD CREST

114 E Stockton Road, Alice Covitz and J Wagner to Alice Covitz; 7/13/2010. $100,000

214 E Preston Ave, Pamela Viehweger and Ronald Viehweger to Mary Ehly and Thomas Ehly; 7/14/2010. $381,500