The Palm Beach Post reports from Florida. "Complaints are nothing new to Ceebraid-Signal, the developer affiliated with Bocar. In addition to Bocar, home buyers have been frustrated by delays at another Boca Raton condo conversion, Eden."

"Now it seems the wait might soon be over for some Eden buyers. Was it worth the wait? Buyers soon will find out. One thing they're certain not to like is the view facing west. That's where they'll see the skeletal frame of the Eden's second, unfinished tower."

"Construction did start up a few weeks ago on the incomplete tower. But now progress looks slow. On many days, it appears that, once again, nothing is happening."

The St Petersburg Times. "In the glossy marketing brochures for St. Joe Co.'s resort communities, the residents are wealthy and well-insulated from downturns in the real estate cycle. But in the real world, many owners in the developer's second-home sanctuaries along Florida's Panhandle are showing signs of strain."

"Today, nearly 600 home sites, condos and newly constructed homes in St. Joe's resort communities are up for resale. New sales by the developer, meanwhile, have slowed to a trickle or stopped entirely. Along Walton County's Highway 30-A in WaterColor, about one-third of the community, more than 300 condos, single-family homes and vacant lots, are on the market."

"Rather than add to the glut of properties on the market, St. Joe has quietly throttled back on new releases. Peter S. Rummell, St. Joe's CEO, said just as the company profited from the real estate run-up of the past five years, now it must cope with the flip side of the cycle."

"'We are in a position where there was too much of a good thing,' he said. 'Now to some degree we've got to wait. And to some degree we've got to help the market correct itself.'"

"Michele Bertoldi thought he'd won the lottery when he and two partners picked up a lot at St. Joe's RiverCamps on Crooked Creek in Bay County about 18 months ago. They paid $600,000 for the nearly 1-acre home site, then promptly put it on the market for $750,000. But Bertoldi's lot is just one of more than 70 sites for resale, more than 40 percent of the total."

"Across a 1,500-acre flatland of spindly pine trees and palmettos, there are fewer than a half-dozen homes in early stages of construction. More noticeable are the St. Joe-approved, tastefully discreet 'for sale' signs that dot the landscape like crosses in a graveyard."

"'This (downturn) is not a matter of diminished demand,' Rummell said. 'This is a matter of oversupply and overpriced (product).'"

"Monte Williams, a custom home builder from Pensacola, can't afford to wait. His home has been on the market for nine months. Williams has cut the asking price once, by $400,000, to about $1.4-million. One offer fell through after the prospective buyer balked at how much it would cost to insure it. Two others were nixed by nervous spouses. Now the house is slated to be the first one in WaterColor to be auctioned."

"'The folks at WaterColor won't like it, but there's not much they can do about it,' Williams said of the upscale image-keepers at St. Joe. 'If we auction the house off at a decent number, there will be plenty more auctions at WaterColor.'"

"Some 40 miles east of Panama City at St. Joe's WindMark Beach, director of sales Ray Markwell was waiting for a resurgence of interest. When WindMark's first 15 lots were released in 2002, he was overwhelmed with 60 reservations. 'I was raising prices as fast as I could,' he said. 'But those people were just flipping sand and the real end-users left.'"

"Today, just 10 homes have been built on 106 lots in WindMark's first phase; half of them are for resale. More than 40 percent of the remaining lots are also back on the market."