Bloomberg reports on Florida. "Scott and Kerry Bingham put down a deposit three weeks ago on a new $321,000 house at Heritage Bay, a development set on a golf course about seven miles from the ocean in Naples, Florida. Two days later, they abandoned the deal. Like other prospective new-home purchasers, they were nervous about falling home prices across the country and the prospect their new property could tumble in value."

"We don't want to buy if prices are going down,' said Scott Bingham. 'At this point, we're in a holding mode. If we wait, we might be able to get closer to the ocean and get a better deal.'"

"For some, such as Toll Brothers, the lackluster spring market is a surprise. CEO Robert Toll told investors three months ago the market may be poised to rebound. It didn't happen."

"'We're all a little more disappointed than we were two weeks ago,' Toll said Feb. 22 on a conference call, responding to questions about February sales. 'We didn't have anywhere near the bump up that we usually see.'"

"When the Binghams started their search a year ago in Sarasota, Florida, they were disappointed. That market was full of overpriced houses, said Scott Bingham. They moved their search to Naples, two hours south, and found things weren't much better."

"'I'd say about 70 percent of the homes aren't priced competitively to sell at this time,' Bingham said. 'I don't want to be the guy who pays too much and then watches the value of my real estate fall through the floor.'"

"As 2007 began, the housing rebound proved elusive. U.S. new- home sales fell in January by the most in 13 years, the Commerce Department said last week. The annualized rate dropped to 937,000, lower than any economist had forecast in a Bloomberg survey and down from the 1.12 million pace in December."

"The time a completed home stood empty before being sold reached a record 4.8 months, the highest in almost seven years."

"'Some people are waiting on the sidelines trying to time the market and buy at the absolute bottom, just like the people who tried to time the top perfectly,' said Tom Doyle, a real estate agent in Naples."

"Homebuyers seeking clues about the pace of the recovery should look to buyers like the Binghams. They say they're in no hurry to sign a contract to buy a home. 'Prices are going to drop, but it could be nine months before they drop to a level that makes us comfortable about buying,' said Scott Bingham."

The Bradenton Herald. "A Cape Coral homebuilder is planning to step in and complete some of the hundreds of homes that were left unfinished in the wake of the Construction Compliance Inc. and Coast Bank loan debacle."

"In all, 482 borrowers of Bradenton-based Coast Bank were left in limbo after CCI's announcement. The bank determined about half of those homes amounted to empty lots at the time CCI ran into trouble."

"'I talked to Coast and Coast wants to help them (investors) out any way they can,' said Tom Gillespie, owner of Enchanted Homes. 'I think they're taking the steps to do whatever they can do to help these investors finish their projects.'"

"Zanuel Johnson, an account executive at a Tampa mortgage company, said he closed in June on a home in Cape Coral being built by Enchanted Homes. The deal was brokered through Tampa-based American Mortgage Link, a broker involved in many of the CCI home loans."

"Johnson claims he was promised a 10 percent return on the sale of the home without having to take ownership. Instead, Johnson maintains, he now is obligated through a Coast Bank loan to pay $430,000 for the home, a price he says was inflated by those involved in the investment scheme."

"'They told me it was an investment program for people with good credit and assets,' Johnson said. 'They would use my credit to build a home and I would get a 10 percent return, because I would never take possession or move into the home.'"

"Johnson said the home is mostly finished but he doubts he'll be able to sell it and accuses Enchanted Homes and American Mortgage Link of inflating the price. 'There's no way they could sell that house for $430,000. They have one listed for $349,900, two houses down from me,' Johnson said."

"Gillespie blamed investors for not being more shrewd and failing to consider future risk. 'If they felt there was crookery or trickery or problems, none of them would have done it,' Gillespie said. 'Let's face it, if the market had stayed strong, we wouldn't even be talking today.'"

"'It wasn't a guarantee. It was an investment. Now that the market hasn't gone the way everybody thought it was, now they want to come say someone's done something crooked,' he said."

The Herald Tribune. "A subsidiary of Orion Bank has bought a 289-acre tract near Lakewood Ranch that formerly belonged to Michael Tringali for $14.3 million, the exact amount Tringali owed the bank."

"But the Dog Kennel Road property, which the bank was foreclosing on, is worth far less than what Orion's Fruitville Acquisition LLC said it paid, and the Naples-based bank will soon have to take a multimillion-dollar hit to its earnings."

"The reason the property became so overvalued can be traced back to a November 2005 appraisal done by Julian Stokes. Stokes, who has completed at least three faulty appraisals involving properties bought by Tringali, omitted the fact that Tringali's former partner, Neil Mohamad Husani, bought the land for $8.93 million on Dec. 30, 2004. Husani then sold it to Tringali the next day in a cashless transaction for $18.2 million."

"'The appraiser is key to these transactions,' said Jack McCabe, a real estate industry analyst based in Deerfield Beach. 'Nothing can happen unless an appraiser comes up with an overinflated price.'"

"'The reason banks ask appraisers for a three-year sales record is to verify whether rapid transfers have occurred at rapidly escalating prices,' said Dennis Black, (a) Port Charlotte appraisal instructor. 'Those standards date back to the end of the savings & loan crisis of the 1980s, and are meant to stem the kind of daisy-chain real estate deals that occurred in the years preceding the crisis.'"

The Tampa Tribune. "Hundreds of Tampa employees of beleaguered subprime lender Fremont Investment & Loan are on paid leave and waiting on a telephone call today to find out whether they still have a job."

"The company is expected to announce whether it will sell or liquidate the division today, spokesman Dan Hilley said. 'Employees were told to go home on paid leave indefinitely,' Hilley said. Among the Tampa employees are loan originators, appraisers and review appraisers."

"Monday's staff announcement came after a cease-and-desist order issued last week from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. telling Fremont not to write any more subprime loans, according to Hilley and a statement released from Fremont."

"'The FDIC obviously went in and found a lot of things they didn't like,' said Chris Wolfe, an analyst with Fitch Ratings."

"Fremont isn't the only subprime lender in trouble now, and Wolfe said others likely will follow Fremont's lead. During the recent boom years of the housing market, the list of the nation's subprime lenders grew, and now that the market is slowing, there is too much competition, Wolfe said."

"'It's like musical chairs,' he said. 'Somebody's got to go.'"

"Too many subprime lenders were lax on lending requirements and too many buyers jumped into unsuitable loans, Wolfe said. 'The quality of loans deteriorated rapidly in 2006.'"

"Employees of the company's residential division could find out today they still have job but now work for a new employer, Hilley said. That may be unlikely because numerous other subprime lenders also are looking for buyers."

"'I think it's going to be difficult to find a buyer for a reasonable price,' Wolfe said. 'It's basically a distressed sale at this point. Nobody's going to give them what it's probably worth.'"