News digest: Deal or no deal?
HOMEOWNERS: The Washington Post reports today that a developer wants all 60 homes in the Sacks neighborhood of Bethesda to assemble the land for a project, "potentially turning many residents into millionaires."
The possible sale could be more lucrative than what the residents, some of them elderly and thinking about selling anyway, could get on their own. Many were excited by an offer of more than $3 million a home. That was taken off the table and replaced by lower offers, but they're still higher than what many homes would bring on the open market.AFFORDABLE: The Washington Business Journal reports that D.C. "is considering a fee on new commercial construction to fund more affordable housing." The nation's capital is so pricey that many people who work there live elsewhere -- in the Baltimore metro area, for example.But the sale also poses a dilemma: How do you assess the value of a rare cluster of single-family houses so close to high-quality shops, restaurants and condominiums? How best to calculate the less tangible sense of a community that could be flattened in days by a bulldozer?
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