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Carteret towns recognized as prettiest N.C. small towns
CARTERET COUNTY — Two Carteret County towns were recognized in a recent poll picking the prettiest small towns in North Carolina.
The Town of Beaufort made the top 10 while neighboring Morehead City also received votes, according to a news release on the poll results.
“For Beaufort to come in third is wonderful and having Morehead City on the list is great,” said Carteret County Tourism Director Carol Lohr. “Both are charming towns and have a lot to offer.”
Blowing Rock is North Carolina’s prettiest small town, according to the poll of 32 in-state journalists. The Blue Ridge mountain community won out in a close race with the village of Pinehurst in the scenic Sandhills area.
Blowing Rock amassed a total of 206 points to edge runner-up Pinehurst, with 193 points. Beaufort followed in third place with 109 votes.
The writers selected their top 10 from a list of 45 nominated towns with a population fewer than 15,000. The poll was conducted by Bill Hensley of Charlotte, a writer and former state director of travel and tourism. Read Entire Story
Carteret County High School One of the Best In Nation
BY: SUZANNE ULBRICH
For the second year in a row, Croatan High School was among public high schools recognized as one of the best in the country.
U.S. News & World Report in collaboration with School Evaluation Services, a K-12 education and data research and analysis business that provides parents with education data, analyzed academic and enrollment data from more than 21,786 public high schools from 48 states and the District of Columbia to find the very best. Top schools were placed into gold, silver, bronze or honorable mention categories.
Of the 440 schools reviewed in North Carolina, 314 were found eligible for full analysis. Of those, 44 received a bronze or better award — 11 received silver and 2 received gold awards, according to U.S. News state-by-state statistics.
Croatan High School was granted a silver award. Read Entire Story
Picky Home Buyer Pursues An Epic Hunt for 'the One'
'Tire Kickers' Drive Brokers Bonkers, but Lidia Pringle Is in a Class of Her Own
By JULIET CHUNG / Wall Street Journal
TIBURON, Calif. -- Bay Area real estate has always demanded patience on the part of buyers. Many spend months scouring listings in hopes of finding "the one."
Then there is Lidia Pringle. The 58-year-old former reporter for United Press International became something of a legend in local real-estate circles for conducting one of the longest and most tenacious house hunts that brokers here can recall.
"I've always given 110% to whatever it is I do," says Ms. Pringle. "If I'm looking for a dream house, of course I'm going to follow the same methodology."
The National Association of Realtors says the average buyer visits 10 to 12 homes before buying. Over two-and-a-half years, Ms. Pringle personally inspected 298 homes in Marin County.
Interest Rates To Climb To 8% in 2010?
Excerpted article By Oliver Biggadike and Daniel Kruger
Bloomberg.com
Dec. 28 (Bloomberg) -- If Morgan Stanley is right, the best sale of U.S. Treasuries for 2010 may be the short sale.
Yields on benchmark 10-year notes will climb about 40 percent to 5.5 percent, the biggest annual increase since 1999, according to David Greenlaw, chief fixed-income economist at Morgan Stanley in New York. The surge will push interest rates on 30-year fixed mortgages to 7.5 percent to 8 percent, almost the highest in a decade, Greenlaw said. Read More
Latest Home Price Data Is Good News for Buyers
By: Brett Arends
Wall Street Journal
Homes are now cheap.
No, not everywhere in the country (more about that later). And, even after the latest Case-Shiller data, it's anyone's guess when they might actually turn around and start rising steadily again. It could be years.
But if you've been thinking of buying a home to live in, the current meltdown is a big opportunity.
You might not know it from the coverage of the latest data. Too many, as usual, are focused on the trees instead of the forest. The 10 and 20-city composite indexes were unchanged between September and October. And the numbers were lower than a year ago, but the rate of decline seems to have slowed: Two facts that are both obvious and practically useless. Indeed the latest survey contains a whole truckload of information for all those who prefer data to knowledge.
But long-term fundamentals are more important than the short-term noise. And it's generally a mistake to pay too much attention to doomsayers or to overthink these things.
