Town and Country carefully chooses its professionals. Judi Desiderio’s expertise and Quartery East End Market Insight reports are sought after sources of information. And information is what clients and customers alike need more than anything else for the most important business decisions people make: Real Estate decisions. Buy or sell? Hold on and rent/lease? How do I price my property if I decide to sell? How long are properties on the market? Are we past the bottom of the Market? No other reports more closely follow the specific East End, South Fork and North Fork, Real Estate Markets than Judi Desiderio’s reports – more than just statistics, because they include Judi’s daily experience as well.

But our experience also shows in the press quotes of our associates: Cathleen Doldon was interviewed by Long Island Business News , I was quoted in the Suffolk Times last week on local RE conditions. Many of our listings were featured in articles in Newsday and other newspapers and magazines.

Local papers have covered lots of events our brokers participate in or orgainzed, such as Newsday’s article on the Art Openings for Hamptons Artists in the Southold Office of Town and Country!

So don’t just take it from us how good our associates are: Take it from the press!

The National Association of Realtors stated that its seasonally adjusted index of sales agreements for sales of previously owned homes fell from 110.9 to 77.6 April to May respectively, which was also 15.9% lower than the same month the year prior. This national statistic clearly shows the power of the government incentives which expired. What baffles me though, is why the government set up housing to take such a blow…

You don’t need to be a genius to know that in a fragile economy such as this incentives are like bandaids, and if you rip them off too soon you bleed! Sometimes the injury is even worse due to this action… From day 1 I questioned why they didn’t ‘phase out’ all incentive programs.

BIG MISTAKE!  I wonder what the next move is?

Fortunately, our little microsm of a market here in the East End is somewhat insulated and is not experiencing what other markets are but the over all buyer confidence in the old American Dream of ‘Home Ownership” is taking quite a beating here.

Will someone up there on that hill use their head please.. don’t rip off bandaids in this environment,, rather,, change the dressings wisely until we are out of the woods and the wound is healed.

Russell McCall is a great North Forker. Russ is an entrepreneuer at heart – started Atlanta Foods in 1967, but always remained a loyal North Forker: his Great Grandfather Russell Walker already maintained a fishing cabin at the South End of Downs Creek in Mattituck.

McCall, member of the President’s Council of  the Peconic Land Trust was instrumental in establishing the gift  to the Town of Southold of Fort Corchaug Preserve  , helping preserve one most precious ecologies in the Eastern US around Downs Creek in Mattituck. Anyone who has ever witnessed the Autumn and Spring Bird Migration along Downs Creek will agree. In 1999 McCall further helped the conservation of  the North Fork farming tradition by planting 20 acres of Pinot Noir and Merlot, starting McCall Vineyards.

McCall recently opened his winery – in a beautifully restored barn  "with woodworking skills as if the barn was a piece of furniture" in presence of a North Fork who’se who of friends and acquaintances who had been a part of Russ McCall’s entrepreneurial activities on the North Fork.

 Towering above the vineyard is another example of McCall’s forward thinking mindset-  a windmill, churning and producing green electricity for his farm – a project he started with Green Logic and LIPA. And along the way helping the Town of Southold set standards for windmills on the North Fork.

The "North Fork Sound Stage" where Russ and his son John did a jam session and thanked the crowd before digging into a Gaucho Style "Parrila" style barbeque – sorry if the image seems blurry – after a few glasses of Russ’s delicious Pinot Noir Rose.

McCall’s wines can be savoured at Adam Lovett and Tom Chaudel’s  "A MANO RESTAURANT"  one of my favourite spots in Mattituck to taste local wines and eat local foods and hang out or get to know some local North Forkers or visting Manhattanites alike – a really great crowd.. Don’t forget to try the individual pizza’s, Truffles and Mushrooms is my favorite.

Some vineyards and farms are still for sale on the North Fork – with current interest rates at historical lows an interesting investment opportunity. Call Town and Country Real Estate to discuss the possibilities of investing in the North Fork and learn about the sale of development rights to help make a farm purchase feasible for buyers and save farmland for the North Fork in perpetuity.

 The next “market trend” is well under way.

It may seem so confusing with home sale reports coming at you from all different sources with all different results.

So what is a seller and buyer to do?? As a Real Estate Broker who has been publishing Market Reports for many years,, the answer to that is.. #1- know your source #2- get specific! Your source should be someone working in the field for a minimum of 10-20 years with great success AND the reports you review should be specific to your area of interest. In our Town & Country Home Sales Reports for the Hamptons and the North Fork, in addition to consolidating the numbers, I break each report down to inspect different markets with in each market then monitor the number of home sales, the median home sale price, total sales volume AND the number of home sales within 6 different price catagories. Visit www.1TownandCountry.com/Reports to view Quarterly and Year End Reports.

While nationally, reports have indicated home sales were down, the National Association of Realtors just published a report indicating MLS statistics show Long Island realized a 13.4% jump in home sales in February 2010 compared with the same period one year earlier.

In fact all of Long Island was up 13% year over year.

Such information is crutial for both buyers & sellers when entering negotiations. Buyers reading national home sale reports may believe they are the ONLY buyer and lose the house due to inappropriate information…

I always reccomend buyers and sellers do their home work and confer with experienced knowlegable professionals… after all it is one of your greatest purchases in life.

Some 1.5 hours outside of New York City, some 20 minutes from most of the Hamptons,  by car, by Hampton Jitney or by Long Island Railroad, you will find the North Fork…. a tiny peninsula accross the Peconic Bay from its famous South Fork, the Hamptons. (click for a Map of the North Fork) 

Many New Yorkers call the North Fork their best kept secret: a place to live while working in the City, or a place for a second home and enjoy the good things of life. The North Fork is surrounded by water, the Long Island Sound on the North, with spectacular homes overlooking the dunes and high bluffs towards Connecticut. To the South the North Fork encounters the Peconic Bay The Bay’s topography is characterized by many creeks and inlets allowing for many waterfront homes with their own (deep water) docks, with access to what many consider the world’s nicest fishing grounds for Sea Bass, Fluke and Bluefish; clams and lobsters are plentiful and the burgeoning oyster industry is famous on menues at the best restaurants not just locally, or in the City, but recently even worldwide. And through Shennecock you can reach the Atlantic’s best fishing grounds (The Canyon)  for sportsfishing and some of the most delicous Tuna – in itself a reason to come visit the North Fork if you like eating fish. To the South, the Bay between the Hamptons and the North Fork is called Peconic Bay, home to many charming and old whaling ports (Orient, Greenport)  with its charming whaling villages (Orient and Greenport), and the Tip of the North Fork point into the Atlantic Ocean. 

The Long Island Wine Council can provide you with information on all vineyards: lots off family fun atMartha Clara Vineyards, but certainly do not leave the Island without tasting some of the local Champagnes. 

I will be atSparkling Point this New Year’s eve… a great new vineyard at Hortons Lane and the North Road in Southold, and great members of the Community.And for a serious Beautiful local Merlot: try the Macari Bergen Road Merlot…

The North Fork has succeeded in maintaining its rural, agricultural character, with a life style many modern cisitzens of the World aspire to: eat and drink local foods and wine, and be connected to the soil! We have come far from the days of endless potato farms – the potatoes left are now the finest only! But Satur Farms and Sang Lee Farms show how specialty farming can succeed: they now are purveyors of the finest and most delicious and healthy produce served in top restaurants.

There’s lots to do on the North Fork. Check this blog out for current affairs and stuff to do in this great place:

For New Years Eve: The restaurants are providing a great wealth of quality places to be romantic or to see and be seen. The crew of "The Romantics" (Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, Murphy Brown’s Candice Bergen and Elijah Wood were seen hanging out in Greenport at FOB and the Frisky Oyster – for the celebrity watchers among you). And some local gossip: Dennis Mc Dermott sold his famous and successful restaurant and one of my favorite places to hang out: the Frisky Oyster in Greenport. New Year’s will be his last night, and we wish his chef success after taking over. And the FOB is sold to Noah, the chef of the Seafood Barge.  Change is good!

So come be a part of the North Fork and check things out. Stay a while, and let me and Nicholas at Town and Country help you find a place to stay more permanently if you like! We look forward to meeting you and introducing you to our local friends.

Today’s WSJ reports trader & investment bankers are spending on luxury items on the QT.

The focus was on the parallels between big bonuses and big spending. WSJ used the example of spending from $15,000-a-week-caribbean vacations to $200,000 platinum watches… and of course hi end real estate in NYC and the revered home in the Hamptons.

In the Hamptons the number of home sales in the 3rd Quarter of this year dramatically increased over the 2nd Quarter 2009 as well as increased from the same period (3rd Q 2008).

Bonuses are considerably lower than 2007 figures.

With all the bad PR these bonuses are getting, it seems the receipients are being told to be discrete in their spending.

The good news for the overall economy is they ARE spending it! Undeniably, this fuels the US economy and trickels down to everyone from the home seller to the shop keeper to the tax collector…