The Herald is reporting that the record-breaking pending sales numbers reported for May – showing an 83.6 percent spike – may have been inflated by use of new MLS stats.

It then goes on to quote others who suspect the Massachusetts Association of Realtors may have been a little too bit eager to show a booming home market.

Then again, why did the MAR release a statement on June 13, the day after it initially put out the May report, warning about the mistake and apologizing for it? That statement came out five days ago. The statement is now prominently placed above the original press release on the front page of its web site.

It’s not like the MAR is trying to hide the error.

Maybe we’re being too trusting. The error is embarrassing and proves the need for accurate stats. But …

File under: Roswell

Interest rates are still historically low. But they’ve been starting to head back up recently, perhaps never again reaching the lows we saw earlier this year.

You’ve been warned.

Ah, percentages, percentages, percentages.

File under: Hello 4 and 5 percent rates?

This story is depressing, with a lead sentence that says it all: “Many of the 11,000 or so Massachusetts consumers who are getting $1,480 checks this week from a well-publicized foreclosure settlement weren’t victims of illegal foreclosures at all.”

You might logically be thinking: How is this possible?

It’s possible because it was slapped together as more of a PR stunt than as an actual attempt to right possible wrongs. As one lawyer involved put it: “This is more political, look-what-I-did-for-you grandstanding.”

The Druker Company wants to build a new 11-story office building, with ground floor retail and a restaurant, at the corner of Washington and East Berkeley streets, where there’s now a parking lot and auto-repair shop in the South End (see photo).

It’s just around the corner from where the new Ink Block development (i.e. the old Herald Building) and a separate residential project will be built by Normandy Real Estate on an old Teradyne parking lot.

The Ink Block and Normandy projects combined will have 850 residential units, so maybe it’s not that necessary for the Druker project to have apartments.

That whole area of the South End is transforming right before our eyes. It’s pretty amazing.

Meanwhile, in Jamaica Plain, the BRA has approved a new 195-unit apartment complex at 105 South Huntington, at the site of a former Native American center.

Ah, Boston. Another day, another development.

File under: More, please

The IRS was expecting, or hoping, to get $250,000 in the auctioning off of two tandem parking spaces at 298 Commonwealth Avenue in the Back Bay.

After a bidding war between neighbors, the two spaces went for $560,000, which is considerably higher than the median cost of a home in Massachusetts.

Well, at least the previous owner of the spaces just paid off a large chunk of his $900,000-plus overdue tax bill.

File under: Have you any Grey Poupon?

(Click on Grey Poupon link to watch the commercial’s hilarious “lost footage.”)

Photo via Compfight.com, Flickr

The Massachusetts Association of Realtors is reporting that pending homes sales went through the roof last month compared to a year ago, hitting levels not seen since 2004.

Bottom line: We’re in a uber-seller’s market, folks.

From the MAR release:

“May was a tipping point as increasing prices and interest rates pushed qualified buyers to make offers that sellers accepted in great numbers,” said 2013 MAR President Kimberly Allard-Moccia, broker-owner of Century 21 Professionals in Braintree. “However, we still need more homes on the market and hopefully this activity will spark potential sellers to list their homes to help meet the demand.”

The number of single-family homes put under agreement in May was up 83.6 percent compared to the same time last year (9,075 homes in 2013 from 4,944 homes in 2012). This was the most homes that have gone under agreement in any month that the Association has available data (starting in January 2004). This was also the first time that pending home sales went over the 9,000 home mark and the biggest monthly year-over-year increase ever recorded. On a month-to-month basis, single-family homes put under agreement were up 58 percent compared to 5,738 homes put under agreement in April 2013.

So it looks like people were snapping up homes no matter how few were out there — and putting down the money.

File under: Seller’s market, extraordinaire

The owners of the proposed “Eva’s” gourmet sandwich shop at 120 Charles Street on Beacon Hill cleared a major zoning hurdle this week.

“Eva’s,” which would be a primarily a take-out eatery, would go into the Charles Street space previously occupied by Dakota Puffin Doug Boutique.

File under: Welcome, “Eva’s”

Above is a chart showing New England home-price trends. There’s still a way to go before full recovery (and that doesn’t necessarily mean back to pre-bubble prices, though in some towns and neighborhoods that’s indeed happened), but we’re getting there.

Chart via the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. Click on link to see larger version.

Speaking of the Federal Reserve, here’s its most recent Beige Book conclusion about the New England housing market:

Contacts anticipate that single-family home and condo prices will continue to rise over the next several months, with inventory levels a significant factor determining the degree to which sales can grow. Overall, contacts say they feel optimistic about the trajectory of the housing market and believe the market will continue to recover as general economic conditions improve.

At first glance, this photo gallery of home décor from ‘Gatsby to Mad Men’ seemingly had a lot of fun potential.

But it was ultimately a lazy effort. Though they included some true blasts-from-the-past items (such as tin ceilings and those ugly glass blockwalls), do A-frame homes and outdoor carports really fall into the category of ‘home décor’? C’mon. Might as well include outhouses and bungalows if you’re going down that road.

Still, it got us to thinking of that craziest decade of all crazy decades – the 1960s – and its often hilarious attempts at being cool and hip, especially after Madison Avenue tried to glom onto the hippie culture and the ad men of Mad Men ad men strove to come across as groovy as their kids.

We found one excellent site on Pinterest highlighting ‘60s home décor. We especially liked the shots of the mod-looking fireplaces.

But there’s still so much more: Shag rugs, waterbeds, electric-coil stove ranges, rounded plastic chairs, yellow kitchen cabinets, Beatles floor beds, Formica countertops, bong tables (or was that the ‘70s?).

If you remember other ‘60s home-décor items of note, please pass ‘em along. And, please, no cheating by taking notes while re-watching Austin Powers.

How did we miss this? Gisele Bundchen and some loser guy she’s married to have officially closed on their purchase of land from Pine Manor College in Brookline for a new home, the BBJ has reported.

We vow this to our readers: Never again will we be so late to jump on a story that allows us the opportunity to shamelessly run photos of Gisele on this site. Photo via Wikipedia Creative Commons.