by Al Heavens
|
 |
On the House: Few bargains for Phila.-area house huntersMegan Garvey and Jim Mooney scoured just about every block of Northeast Philadelphia last summer and fall before finding what she calls "the perfect house."
By the time they settled on a $223,000 detached home in Fox Chase on Dec. 30, Garvey, 30, and Mooney, 29, had walked through 124 others - primarily twins, the initial focus of their search and their $200,000 price ceiling.
After looking at too many overpriced twins in need of costly renovation, "we expanded our horizons to single homes," said Garvey, who works for Temple University Health Systems.
It was the right move. They found a three-bedroom, two-bath split-level with a large Florida room, a parking pad, and a full finished basement "the day after it came on the market," she said. A real estate agent had bought it from the elderly owner before she died, "and the agent did tons of work on it and flipped it."
|
by Marc Levy
|
|
Rendell sets $200 per household property tax cut from slots
HARRISBURG, Pa. - For a second straight year, Gov. Ed Rendell says the state will distribute enough slot-machine gambling revenue to cut next year's school property taxes by about $200 per household.
Millions of Pennsylvanians received tax cuts last year, the first time slots money was distributed.
The property-tax cuts apply to eligible home and farm owners outside of Philadelphia. In Philadelphia, the slots revenue also pays for a reduction in the city's wage tax rate in 2009.
|
