Real Estate

LONDON / Reuters Fosun International is set to close a deal worth about £300 million ($426.4 million) on Wednesday to buy the Thomas More Square complex in London in its biggest real estate transaction in Europe.The office complex on the edge of the City of London would add another landmark estate to Fosun’s portfolio which already includes London’s Lloyds Chambers ...

WASHINGTON / AP U.S. renters saw their monthly leases rise at a significantly slower pace in February, a sign that new construction may be starting to limit housing costs for apartment dwellers. Real estate data firm Zillow said on Wednesday that median rent rose a seasonally adjusted 2.6 percent from a year ago. The median rent nationwide was $1,383 a ...

Bloomberg St. Patrick likely wasn’t much of a partier , even as the day we celebrate him is full of indulgences. That said, if traditional Irish-American-style corned beef and cabbage aren’t enough of a fête for you, perhaps you’d like to pick up the ultimate party spot: an Irish castle. Glin Castle, in west County Limerick, sits on 380 acres, ...

WASHINGTON \ AP More Americans signed contracts to buy homes in February, with purchases surging in the Midwest ahead of the traditional spring buying season. The National Association of Realtors (NAR) said that its seasonally adjusted pending home sales index rose 3.5 percent to 109.1, rebounding from a 3 percent decline in January. The index has reached its highest level ...

ROME / BLOOMBERG There are plenty of castles for sale across Europe, but few provide the opportunity for prospective owners to play the role of a feudal lord. It’s the difference between living like a prince and living as a prince. Now a castle has come onto the market to let you do the latter. The Umbrian Castle di Sismano, ...

Bloomberg Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. received a higher $14 billion takeover offer from a group led by China’s Anbang Insurance Group Co., raising the stakes for Marriott International Inc. to counter a second time to salvage a merger that would create the world’s biggest hotel operator. The takeover battle pits a 12-year-old Chinese firm with aggressive ambitions to ...

WASHINGTON \ AP Consumer spending and home construction are helping sustain modest U.S. economic growth despite problems caused by a strong dollar, low oil prices and an excess of business stockpiles. The economy, as measured by the gross domestic product, grew at a 1.4 percent annual rate in the October-December period, the government said. That was better than the 1 ...

MUSCAT \ Reuters Oman will encourage households to generate electricity with solar panels and feed it into the national grid, Qais al-Zakwani, executive director of the Authority for Electricity Regulation, said on Monday. The policy could put Oman in the forefront of Middle East nations promoting widespread use of solar power. Its finances severely damaged by low oil prices, the ...

Seoul / AFP A South Korean constructor that jointly won a $20 billion housing deal with Saudi Arabia said on Monday it was confident the project would go ahead despite the impact of slumping oil prices on the Gulf nation’s coffers. Under the deal, for which a memorandum of understanding was signed in Seoul last week, a three-party consortium will ...

Calif / AP Canadians are no longer flocking to California’s sunny Coachella Valley to buy homes since their currency has weakened, and many are putting properties they own up for sale, real estate experts said. The move coincides with a decline in the Canadian dollar since oil prices have plummeted, the Desert Sun newspaper reported on Sunday (http://desert.sn/1RCkkPj ). After ...