The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "real estate brokers" ...
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Broken Markets: The Panic of 2008
How the credit crisis caused by Wall Street giants Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch and American International Group brought the financial market to its knees
Tags: stocks; economy; market; financial firms; credit crisis; brokers; traders; real-estate holdings; executive pay
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Hillsborough County School District Land Investigation
The ninth largest U.S. school district, Hillsborough County (FL), in 2006 was "growing fast enough to fill five new schools" per year. To meet the demand, Hillsborough county used the services of 4 private real estate brokers, without using bids, in violation of its own regulations. Three of the four brokers have records of criminal, legal and financial problems. Some of those brokers simultaneously represented the sellers, or flipped the land themselves, resulting in land purchases often made substantially above appraisal values. Reporters from the St. Petersburg Times documented swampland purchases, and school sites surrounded by the homes of sexual predators.
Tags: land; school board; school district superintendent; real estate brokers; realtors; swampland; bidding practices; state FOI; land flipping; rezoning applications; condemnation; assessments; appraisals; financial investigations; land records; wetland maps; FBI investigation; Florida Department of Law Enforcement; Excel; Matthew B. Cox; Chester B. Luney; Fred Edmister; National Realty Associates; school planning; Wilson-Miller; Florida Real Estate Commission; 2606 East Caracus Land Trust; Laurence E. Fuentes; Fuentes and Kreischer Title Co.; Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation
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Home Costs Go North; The More Affordable Suburbs; Seeing a Hopeful Change
Hopkins used a database of average home prices in the Baltimore area, grouped by zip code, to show the increase in home-sale prices from 1999-2004. Part one of the series shows that Baltimore is slowly becoming a Washington suburb, and the changing demographic is pushing locals to move further away. Part two focuses on some of the older suburban communities in the area. Part three examines the real estate market to see who is benefiting from the changes.
Tags: real estate; property tax; Washington D.C; demographic; population; census; Computer-Assisted Reporting; data analysis; homeowners; mortgage brokers
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The Immigrant Express
The News-Journal sheds light on a real-estate scam in Palm Coast, in which brokers overcharged recent immigrants for local houses. Using fake job ads in foreign-language newspapers, the brokers steered Russian, Chinese and Spanish-speaking immigrants into spending their life savings for high-priced homes.
Tags: fraud; property; discrimination; law; immigrants; immigration; Russian; Chinese; Housing and Urban Development
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Real-Estate Broker From Hell
Real Estate agent Thomas E. Chapman says he works to get money for his clients, but his strategies have left government officials with questions. "Chapman and the investors are legendary for spearheading real-estate deals involving private property inside or adjacent to federally protected lands, and then proceeding to develop the property until their price is met." Richard Miniter reports more on this issue.
Tags: real estate; national parks; money; developments; Wilderness Act of 1964; land
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From the Manor Torn: Amid High-Tech Boom, A Fight Breaks Out Over Eviction of Latinos
"Junior Leaguers Join Nuns In Effort to Thwart Silicon Valley Landlord." Skyrocketing housing prices and gentrification are reaching into East Palo Alto, once a no-man's land down in Silicon Valley. "Carriage Manor," Benyam Mulugeta, a self-made real estate broker who emigrated from Ethiopia in 1972, owns a grungy apartment complex that houses close to 50 Latin immigrant families. Mulugeta is asking market value -- $5 million -- for the place but the most Sister Trinitas and the Daughters of Charity can muster is about half that amount. Even the Junior Leaguers can't tap into wealthy benefactors who say the housing issue is a "government problem." Mulugeta says he's about to finalize a deal with a local developer for his asking price who says that he was "once in their shoes."
Tags: housing; gentrification; immigrants; eviction; high rents; Silicon Valley; Junior League; Daughters of Charity.
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Rethinking Malone
The story is about a neighborhood that is still carrying the stigma of its past identity. Malone used to be the area of town that racist real estate brokers and bank loan officers segregated blacks into, in the pre-civil rights days. The area today is still considered a poor, crime-filled, minority dominated area by many in Lincoln's largely white community. Using computer-assisted reporting techniques and public records, The Daily Nebraskan was able to disprove most of the commonly held perceptions. (December 12, 1996)
Tags: Waite CAR Rethinking malone Contest entry 13 pgs. Student entry WINNER
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No title (id: 12529)
The New York Observer looks at the possiblity of a real estate war between Bear, Sterns & Company and British developer Howard Ronson. Ronson's contract to buy 383 Madison for a reported $57 million may be snatched away by Bear Sterns. (Jan. 29, 1996)
Tags: Bagli Bear Sterns Takes Whole City Block From Jittery Brit First Boston Banks Brokers Business 3pgs.
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No title (id: 9914)
KGO-TV (San Francisco) examines how a mortgage broker and his company made money by lending excessive money to home-owners he knew would default; he then repossessed the homes, got investors to lend money with the homes as collateral, let them fall back into foreclosure and never paid the investors back; an audit by the California Department of Real Estate a year before failed to detect the irregularities, Nov. 10, 1993.
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No title (id: 7422)
Milwaukee Journal reveals that a member of the State Investment Board was also employed by a real estate broker doing business with the board; his votes earned the broker $277,000 in fees, September - October 1990.
Tags: WI Edward E. Hale