The Home Front

(above) Chicago Police Commissioner Larry Snelling By Don DeBat With the dawn of 2026, many Chicago apartment renters, home buyers and bungalow owners probably are wondering how they survived the crazy roller-coaster- ride of 2025. Read these 2025 stories recently reported by The Home Front column: • With property tax bills soaring by an average of 16.7%, there are threats of double-digit apartment rent increases on the horizon for spring of 2026. • Resale home prices in Linc

Victorian home in Old Town (above) By Don DeBat The 2025 holidays may be only weeks away, but dark clouds still hang over Chicago’s North Side resale-home market, leaving gold-seeking prospective buyers wondering if they will find a lump of coal in their Christmas stockings. Through the third quarter the North Side residential market continued to struggle with the same year-long hangover headaches—limited listing inventory and strong buyer demand, which keeps pushing home pri

Economists predict that a recent quarter-point interest rate reduction by the Federal Reserve could lead to mortgage rates as low as 5.75...

Homeowners in Chicago and Cook County are left in limbo as the county struggles to finalize the 2024 property tax bills. Initially due on...

Apartment hunters in downtown Chicago may encounter sharply higher rents next spring due to a significant drop in new rental unit...

(Above) 2017 photo of a flooded Chicago Riverwalk. As recent monsoon-like rains inundate neighborhoods, Chicago homeowners are grappling...