Ohio home sales up

Ohio home sales up

COLUMBUS

Ohio home sales rose 14.7 percent in 2013, and the average sales price increased at a rate of 5.2 percent over 2012 levels, according to the Ohio Association of Realtors.

In the best fourth quarter since 2006, sales rose 6.7 percent to 29,989. That marks the 10th-consecutive year of year-over-year gain, according to OAR.

In all, 132,566 homes were sold at an average price of $142,004 last year.

New rules urged

WASHINGTON

Warning that a “major loss of life” could result from an accident involving the increasing use of trains to transport large amounts of crude oil, U.S. and Canadian accident investigators urged their governments Thursday to impose new safety rules.

The unusual joint recommendations by the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board and the Transportation Safety Board of Canada include better route planning for trains carrying hazardous materials to avoid populated and other sensitive areas.

They also recommended stronger efforts to ensure hazardous cargo is properly classified before shipment, and greater government oversight to ensure rail carriers that transport oil are capable of responding to “worst-case discharges of the entire quantity of product carried on a train.”

Wire reports