1968 - Architecture, Real Estate

Architecture, Real Estate

The Kerner Report issued February 29 notes that some 400,000 housing units have been destroyed in the name of urban renewal but only about 10,000 new units have been built to replace them. The resulting shortages have helped fuel rage in black communities.

The Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. (Freddie Mac) chartered by Congress to supplement the Federal National Mortgage Association established in 1938 gives savings-and-loan associations access to secondary mortgage funds. Both entities will become stockholder-owned but government-supervised corporations, exempt from state and local taxes, and able to borrow money cheaply and offer what amount to government-subsidized loans to qualified home buyers; would-be borrowers who cannot meet Federal Housing Administration (FHA) standards will find any number of companies willing to offer "sub-prime" loans at higher rates of interest.

Construction begins in Boston's Copley Square of a 60-story John Hancock building that will dwarf the Prudential Tower of 1964. Designed by Henry Cobb of I. M. Pei & Partners, the Hancock Building will run into problems of falling glass panels and will not open until 1974.

Tokyo's 46-year-old Imperial Hotel comes down to make way for a new, 20-story hotel of the same name that will incorporate some of the public rooms designed by the late Frank Lloyd Wright.

The La Quinta Inns hotel chain has its beginnings in a San Antonio, Texas, hotel opened in April by Waco-born developer Samuel H. Barshop to provide basic accommodations for visitors to the city's HemisFair located next door; it has no restaurant, disco lounge, or large meeting hall, and room rates average only $13 per night. La Quinta will grow to own, operate, or franchise more than 590 hotels in 39 states.