MSN.com - Real Estate

Mortgage lenders will begin making cash payments to homeowners harmed by wrongful foreclosures of anywhere between a few hundred dollars to as much has $125,000 beginning in April, federal bank regulators said Thursday.

A measure of the number of Americans who signed contracts to buy homes rose in January from December to the highest level in more than 2 ½ years. The increase suggests sales of previously occupied homes will continue rising in the coming months.

For sale: $1.77 million. Grand and imposing, this historic home has overlooked downtown San Diego and the Pacific Ocean for over 100 years.

WASHINGTON - Home sales and prices are rising briskly in those neighborhoods where the well-heeled like to plant their mailboxes: along Chicago's north shore, in the San Francisco Bay area and in the haute Hamptons. Sales of properties worth between $750,000 and $1 million are up 38.7 percent over a year ago; $1 million-plus property sales are up 25.7 percent, according to the National Association of Realtors.

Taxes are higher, gas prices are rising, and Washington is in budget gridlock again, but the nation's housing market is viewing the world through rose-colored glasses.

The celebrity real estate news this week is that country singer Leann Rimes and actor Eddie Cibrian bought a home in Hidden Hills and Matthew Perry sold his modern Hollywood Hills home.

So-called "strategic defaulters," some of them investors and some owner-occupants, are coming back to the housing market, despite damaged credit, and apparently the market is welcoming them back.

An estimated three more years of construction lies ahead to finish the modern palace dubbed “Versailles’’: a 90,000-square-foot mansion that will include a 30-car garage, 10 bathrooms,  roller rink and bowling alley.

The Wave House in Goleta, Calif., was engineered to not only look like a wave but to capture the sound as well.

The price for what could be called the ultimate Bruce Springsteen collectible is $349,000.

If this is a housing recovery, then it’s a ‘recovery’ in name only. The patient remains pretty ill, and it’s going to be a long road back to health after one of the worst housing busts on record.

Groundbreaking to build new U.S. homes fell in January but new permits for construction rose to a 4 1/2-year high, reinforcing expectations the housing market will support economic growth this year.

This week in celebrity real estate, Pamela Anderson lists her Malibu home and Ethan Hawke puts his New York townhouse on the market. Pamela AndersonMalibu home: $7.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. home-builder confidence in the market for single family homes eased slightly in February from last month's seven-year high as builders faced higher material costs, an index showed on Tuesday.

Dick Clark’s home fits into a category of houses that are so customized and unusual, they appeal to a certain subset of buyers — such as people who like "Flintstones"-esque architecture. Clark’s Malibu home was listed in March 2012 for $3.5 million and just received a $250,000 cut in price, bringing it down to $3.25 million.

Take a tour through some of the love nests of celebrity couples. They all have a few things in common: They're beautiful, spacious, expensive -- and extremely private.

Jason Bateman and his wife, Amanda Anka, recently spent $3 million on a new home for the family — the Beverly Hills compound formerly owned by actor Ernest Borgnine.