Daily Market Update: Billionaires who got rich from real estate

Mortgage rates fall this week....The billionaires who got rich from real estate...Want your neighbor to have the X Factor?

Mortgage rates fall this week
The latest data on mortgage rates from Zillow shows a 6% drop in the last week on 30-year fixed rate loans to an average of 3.7%. The drop was due to the suggestion by the Fed chair Janet Yellen that interest rates are unlikely to rise in June.

However, Erin Lantz from Zillow wrote the real estate listing portal expects rates to be stable this week unless jobs data on Friday is stronger than expected which may spur talk of an early move by the Fed. Read the full story.

The billionaires who got rich from real estate
Forbes has published its latest list of billionaires and as usual there are many real estate moguls among them. Topping the real estate wealth list is Hong Kong’s Lee Shaw Kee who is worth a cool $24.8 billion.

Next on is Germany’s Michael Otto and family who own many properties in the U.S., Canada and Germany and are worth $18.1 billion. Thomas and Raymond Kwok are in third with a $15.9 billion fortune; their business was inherited from their father. Donald Bren’s Irvine Properties, which owns residential, retail and leisure properties in Southern California, is in fourth place with $15.2 billion.

Dallas-based Andrew Beal is the only other American in the top 10 with $11.7 billion.

Want your neighbor to have the X Factor?
An apartment in New York comes with a famous neighbor, but only if you’re quick. At four-bedroom home at 1055 Park Ave. is in the same building as music mogul Simon Cowell and Lauren Silverman’s current home.

The X Factor supremo won’t be there long though; the NY Daily News reported that the couple and their baby are waiting for construction to complete on their new home on E. 78th Street but for now, if you have a spare $11 million, you could be one step closer to that music career you always dreamed about.