Despite the weak housing market, not everyone is feeling the pain, including Donald Trump who recently made a killing selling a home in Palm Beach for a reported $100 million.

While Trump concedes that the housing market is still weak, he states that he thinks things are about to turn a corner. Trump said that what is most troublesome to him right now is that people are still pretty shy about investing in America, and is what he calls the "saddest part" of all concerning the current economic situation in the country.

Since the American economy is driven so much on oil, Trump admits that there are better investments that you can make by looking abroad.

A lot of Americans are watching their homes decline in value, and many families are finding themselves upside down on their mortgages -- owing more than the home is worth.

But don't worry: if you were wealthy enough to afford New York City's sky-high real estate in the first place, you're doing quite well. New York apartments hit record highs in the first quarter -- an average of between $1.63 million and $1.72 million, depending on which data source you believe. That's a year-over-year price increase of more than 19%.

Manhattan real estate rose 13% to between $855,000 and $945,276, depending on which source you believe. But some experts say that that number is inflated by a disproportionate number of high-end properties and that prices on lower-end units are flat to negative.

In a related story, Italian businessman Luigi Zunino is looking to sell a Park Avenue apartment he hasn't yet closed on for $100 million.

According to the Wall Street Journal (subscription required), the 1907 Plaza Hotel where the unit is located is also home to Bear Stearns Chairman James Cayne and developer Harry Macklowe -- both of whom are suffering (or rather their investors are suffering) in the wake of the falling housing market.

But as long as executives who destroy value still reap large paydays, high end real estate will probably continue to do fine.

Rarely does any new online toy launch with features that seem better from those that were advertised in the mockups. But somehow, this next-generation dynamic quotes and company research site launched today by our parent, AOL Money & Finance, still blows me away. I've watched demos and made notes on large-format printouts of how it could be; I've listened to calls in which developers enumerated its benefits. I'm still giddy like a kid Christmas afternoon trying out her new toys, such as:

• Interactive charting. Sure, that could mean anything, but this is truly great. Hover your mouse over the chart to see the high, low, open, close and volume from the day in question, or see where earnings and dividends were announced. Compare with a competitor at the click of a mouse; add in any symbol to compare quickly (I wanted to compare two of my portfolio holdings, Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) and Starbucks Corporation (NASDAQ: SBUX)). Clicking through to see seasonal performance shows trends (Apple often spikes at the end of November as investors anticipate holiday sales of gadgets and Macbooks and such).

I have reposted here my experience on Sept. 11, 2001, archived at http://911digitalarchive.org/parser.php?object_id=19929.

That morning my boyfriend, a NYPD officer, dropped me off at work at P.S.11 (on West 21st Street), where I was an assistant teacher at the time. Shortly after my students got to their classroom, while I left to retrieve something from another floor, another staff member told me a plane had crashed. On my way back to my classroom, someone said, "You need to turn on the T.V." I heard someone else say "The World Trade Center is gone." I went upstairs and shared the news with the other teachers in my room.

I left the room again to call my boyfriend since no one's cell phone was working. He was awaiting my call desperately, as he was being called in to duty. He told me we were in a state of emergency, and that I should try to make it to my mother's place in Spanish Harlem and not come home. He promised to call me. I told him I was to remain at school until all the parents came and that my kids were still unaware of the news. Parents began streaming in, tears falling from their eyes as they tightly hugged their small children and took them home. The children in my special education class sensed our anxiety and sadness and began to ply us with questions. What was happening? Why were the parents coming so early? Was it a half-day? I simply said the train was out of service, which was true, because I didn't want to frighten the kids.

MOST NOTEWORTHY: Countrywide Financial (CFC), Brandywine Realty Trust (BDN), Manhattan Associates (MANH), Spectrum Pharmaceuticals (SPPI) and Amazon.com (AMZN) were today's noteworthy upgrades:

• Keefe Bruyette upgraded shares of Countrywide Financial (NYSE: CFC) to Market Perform from Underperform on valuation.

• Brandywine Realty Trust (NYSE: BDN) was upgraded at Wachovia to Market Perform from Underperform based on pipeline progress and valuation.

• JP Morgan upgraded Manhattan Associates (NASDAQ: MANH) to Neutral from Underweight following better-than-expected Q2 results.

• Spectrum Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: SPPI) was upgraded to Hold from Sell at Brean Murry, expecting shares to remain stable into the spected Phase III initiation with Ozarelix coming in Q4.

• Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN) was upgraded by a host of companies following the strong quarter and margin growth, including JP Morgan, which upgraded shares to Neutral from Underperform. Bear Stearns upgraded shares to Peer Perform from Underperform, Lehman upgraded shares to Equal Weight from Underweight and Credit Suisse upgraded shares to Outperform from Neutral...

OTHER UPGRADES:

• Merrill upgraded United Parcel Service (NYSE: UPS) to Buy from Neutral.

• Goldman added AT&T (NYSE: T) to its Conviction Buy List.

• Raymond James raised Cheesecake Factory (NASDAQ: CAKE) to Strong Buy from Outperform.

• Kaufman upgraded Plantronics (NYSE: PLT) to Hold from Sell.

• Matrix USA upgraded Expedia (NASDAQ: EXPE) to Hold from Sell.

Analyst summaries provided by TheFlyOnTheWall.com (subscription required).

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced that the city's entire taxi fleet, all 13,000 cabs, will become hybrid by 2012.

Under Bloomberg's new plan, 1,000 NYC cabs will be hybrid by October 2008 and then 20% will make the switch each year until 2012.

The standard cab, the Ford Motor Co (NYSE: F) Crown Victoria, gets 14 mpg. The city's hybrid models have expanded to include three Toyota Motor (NYSE:TM) models: the Prius, the Highlander Hybrid and the Lexus RX 400h. NYC will also use the hybrid Ford Escape.

That news doesn't bode well for Ford.

In addition to the five-year hybrd rule, New York City will require all new taxi's to get a minimum 25mpg vehicle starting in October of 2008. By 2009, the minimum bumps up to 30 mpg and must be hybrid.

The new standards are expected to reduce carbon emissions by more than 200,000 tons each year after 2012.

I'm breathing a sigh of relief right now. For decades, if you tried to look at Manhattan from the suburbs all you'd ever see is a cloud of smog surrounding the island. Thanks to Mr. Bloomberg, our lungs will breathe a little easier on the streets of Manhattan starting in 2012.

Think before you answer.

What would a $200,000 salary get you in New York, and what in Cleveland? Well, let's strip it down:

• What would be your purchasing power after accounting for the cost of living? New York's cost of living, for example, is double the national average.
• What about effective tax rates? The tax rate in New York is 25.4% for the $200K salary vs. a tax rate of 20.4% in Cleveland for the $100K salary.
• Different inflation rates? May annual inflation rate in New York metropolitan area was 4.8%, in Cleveland, the rate was 3%.

All these should be considered before deciding. So, have you changed your answer?

Let's start by saying that if you have that choice (of making a six figure salary), then congratulations are in order. You are part of the 5% of Americans who do (according to 2004 census reports). But the real question is - where do you live?

CNNMoney.com used data from 6FigureJobs.com and TheLadders.com to figure out the equivalent of $100,000 after adjusting for the cost of living in the top cities that have the largest numbers of six figures jobs listings. In New York, a $100,000 equivalent salary would require a salary of over $205,000, in Boston more than $137,000, about $101,000 in Cleveland and less than $89,000 in Houston.

So while many six figure jobs are indeed offered in higher cost of living areas, there are still many cities such as Chicago, Atlanta, Seattle, Cleveland and Denver as well as a few others that also have relatively high numbers of six figures jobs to offer. And as if that isn't enough to convince you, sometimes, just to attract talent, companies in those "lesser" cities would offer the same high salaries as in, say, New York.