The Sun Sentinel reports from Florida. "Is this market, defined by a glut of for-sale signs in front yards and a leveling of record prices, reminiscent of the recessionary periods of the 1970s and '80s, the pre-housing boom years of the late 1990s, or..none of the above?"

"'We have never had a market..where the investor and speculative buying played such a role in generating the big numbers,' said Lewis Goodkin, a Miami-based real estate analyst."

"Wayne Archer, director of the center for real estate studies at the University of Florida, said the overbuilt condominium market in South Florida reminds him of the 1970s. 'You get the sense that people have forgotten all the lessons that they learned,' Archer said."

"Looking to capitalize on the huge price appreciations, many people put their homes on the market. This year, the listing of homes for sale have doubled in Palm Beach County and tripled in Broward. But as values soared, so did property taxes, and people soon found that they couldn't afford to move within South Florida."

"Some homeowners are selling and leaving for Georgia, North Carolina and Tennessee, saying those states have a lower cost of living and a better quality of life. Michael Skiera, a native South Floridian, built a five-bedroom house on five acres near Boynton Beach for $300,000 in 2001. Two weeks ago, he listed it for $3.5 million because he and his family are moving to northwest Georgia."

"'The numbers are just staggering,' Skiera said of the recent run-up in prices. 'This has become the new California.'"

"Deerfield Beach analyst Jack McCabe expects the South Florida market to get worse before it gets better. The downturn, he says, reminds him of the 1980s. 'People just quit buying,' McCabe said. 'Prices went down by 30 percent and stayed flat for years. The ones holding the bag lost a lot of money.'"

The Naples News. "As prices skyrocketed out of reach, many families reached for what seemed like a good option at the time: creative and exotic mortgages. Some are now paying the price and many are finding they cannot afford it."

"The interest-only payment on the Valarie and Michael Thomasellis’ loan is now up to about $2,000 a month, almost 40 percent of their combined take-home income. 'I didn’t understand the difference between the payment going up and the interest rate going up. That threw me and I don’t think it was explained to me properly,' Valarie Thomaselli said."

"Mortgage brokers insist all the specifics of each type of loan is spelled out in the paperwork borrowers must sign. 'When they close the loan they specifically sign disclosures explaining the terms of the loan and the worst-case scenario,' said Patrice Yamato, president of the Florida Association of Mortgage Brokers."

"Chuck Kansy, who has been in the mortgage business since 1983, disagreed with Yamato’s assessment. 'A lot of people who took the option ARMs now come to me looking for refinancing advice, and when I explain to them what their loan terms are they look at me like I am from Mars,' Kansy said. 'They have no idea what I am talking about.'"

"The areas that have the most to fear are the areas with a high percentage of option ARMs. According to a recent study, 26 percent of all mortgages in Naples were option ARMs."

"Numbers from Fitch Ratings show that up to 80 percent of all option ARM borrowers make only the minimum payment each month. Meanwhile, the interest rates adjust each month, and after the initial fixed-rate period of the loan, the loans reset at much higher levels."

"When that happens, Kansy said, the borrower has the option to either refinance into a fixed-rate loan or sell the property to pay off the loan. 'The problem is lenders are paid to build in pre-payment penalties into the loans,' he said. 'The greater the pre-payment penalty - one, three or five years - the higher their commission.'"

"The notice of foreclosure is a telling figure, say industry observers. The number of homes entering the foreclosure process is on the rise, especially in the more middle-class Lee and Charlotte counties, said Keith Sipnick, a Realtor who also invests in pre-foreclosure properties."

"Since the beginning of the year he has been sending roughly 200 letters, about 20 percent more than last year, to property owners facing foreclosure, about 80 percent of them in Lee and Charlotte. Most involve investors who bought multiple properties intending to flip them and then got caught in the slowing market, Sipnick said. A vacant condominium on Citrus Drive (is) one of the several foreclosed properties he has for sale."

"'I think it is inevitable that we see foreclosures,' said (realtor) Greg Gorman. 'With interest rates rising and as we stay in a soft market, it is just inevitable.'"