Will the city slicker benefit from the temporary increase in conforming loan limits? As we heard, the conforming loan limit now referred to as the Jumbo Conforming Loan Limit will be 729,750 for single family houses and condominiums. Unfortunately, this will not include cooperative apartments. Manhattan Island has over 65% of their housing in cooperative form. The average home price is over 700,000. Therefore, this forgotten feature would have fit perfectly and helped the rich Manhattanites save some hard-earned bucks for Starbuck’s. Not so! Maybe Spitzer had a hand in that cooperative alienation from the program….if Governor Spitzer did not have his hand in something else at the time! Sorry, my wealthy clients in the Big Apple – I cannot save you from the high cost of living. Suck up and purchase some pots and pans, because you will be eating home this year. With the high cost of jumbo mortgage rates and the higher price of consumer goods, eventually we will all suffer together. – Dale Siegel