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- 1. Cyan Magenta YellowBlack Sunday, September 6, 2009$1.50 WWW.greenwichtime.com SERVING THE COMMUNITY SINCE 1877 By Lisa Chamoff Staff Writer A couple of years ago, Jose Cortes and his, wife Maria Ayala, started to consider moving from their Scarsdale, N.Y., home, where they had lived since the mid-1990s. Their two children were away at school, and the couple was looking to es- cape New York state’s high taxes. But discouraged by es- calatingprices,Cortesand Ayala’s search ended be- foreitevenreallybegan. Now, with the real estate market leveling off, the couple recently started a house hunt in Green- wich, where many of their friends live. Sales of homes be- tween $1.5 million and $2 million, where Cortes and Ayala’s price range falls, were down nearly 60 percent in the first seven months of 2009, and they have decided now is a good time to buy. “Back then, every- thing was so expensive that it didn’t make sense for us to move,” Cortes said. “Right now, Prudential Connecticut Realty agent Julianne Ward answers questions about a house on Nimitz Place for client Jose Cortes, who, along with his wife, is looking at homes to buy in Greenwich. Helen Neafsey/Staff photographer STAFF GRAPHIC Stanwich Road Bible Street Cat Rock Road Clover Place Fairway Lane Rustic View Road Valley Road Cognewaugh Road Sheephill Road River Road Summit Ridge Road Palmer Hill Road North Ridge Road7 MONTGOMERY LANE Central Greenwich $1.79 million 3,000 square feet 41 HILLCREST PARK ROAD Old Greenwich $1.7 million 3,152 square feet 4 NIMITZ PLACE Havemeyer Park, Old Greenwich $1.77 million 3,400 square feet House shopping in Greenwich Jose Cortes and his wife are looking to buy a home in Greenwich. On a recent rainy day, Cortes, sans his wife, and Prudential Connecticut Realty agent Julianne Ward scouted a few homes around town to see if any fit the bill. Here’s a look at the house stops on their hunt: Advice..............................................PULSE Area News..............................................A3 BUSINESS...................................... C1-6 CLASSIFIED.................................D1-10 Comics.............................................PULSE Crossword........................................PULSE Lottery....................................................B5 Editorial Page.......................................A10 Movie Listings..................................PULSE Nation & World......................................A12 Obituaries...............................................A8 SPORTS.........................................B1-8 Television.........................................PULSE Weather..................................................B8 Copyright 2009, Southern Connecticut NEWSPAPERS INC. VOL. LXXII NO. 264, 5 SECTIONS partly cloudy HIGH 74 LOW 58 Index Weather In the market: An insider’s look at a Greenwich home search The series TODAY: Buyer SEPT. 13: Agent SEPT. 20: Seller On the hunt Real estate is a numbers-heavy game. The market is up or down this percentage, the average home price is that amount, one house has this number of bedrooms, another has this many square feet. But at its core, real estate is about people, what they need, what they want and how they live. So Greenwich Time looked beyond the data to find out how local lives are being affected by the real estate market. We checked with people in the three major areas of the market — buyers, agents and sellers. Each group has different perspectives and unique goals. But they all have at least one thing in common. They’re... part 1 of a three-part series buyers sellersagents Town paid for Himes’ forum By Neil Vigdor Staff Writer Greenwich, Norwalk and Bridge- port employed the equivalent of a small militia — police officers on horses, a blue wall of bouncers check- ing names at the door and detectives embedded among demonstrators — to keep the peace this past week dur- ing a trio of highly volatile health care forums convened by U.S. Rep. Jim Himes, D-4. Now the bills for that blanket of protection for the freshman congress- man, who was roundly booed and heckled at times for his support of a government-run medical insurance program, are starting to arrive at the door of taxpayers. Although the town hall meetings were organized by Himes’ office, the municipalities themselves will be re- sponsible for shouldering the costs of staging the events, from police over- time to the salaries of building custodi- ans who worked at each venue. “I think democracy is not free in multiple dimensions,” Himes said. “In- dividual congressional offices don’t have the budgets to (reimburse for) that. It’s just a practical impossibility.” A promise to always remember By Frank Juliano STAFF WRITER Eight years after the terrorist at- tacks, the area’s 9/11 memorials are a source of comfort for residents, a place to reflect and pray, and tangible evi- dence of the promise not to forget those who died that day. “I see people who work at the court- house sitting there, eating their lunch,’’ Joseph Della Monica Jr. said of Mil- ford’s black granite memorial. “The se- niors who live across the street have told me that they appreciate having it there, and the mayor now includes it in his City Hall tour. It gives the kids a perspective on history.’’ The twisted, charred hunk of metal that came from the World Trade Center in New York City always elicits a reac- tion from people seeing the memorial Municipal governments shoulder the cost of health care meetings See TOWN on A6 See ON on A6 9/11 memorials are touchstone of hope for victims’ families See 9/11 MEMORIALS on A6