The Times Herald Record reports from New York. "When it comes to housing, the hottest town in Orange County last year was 'none of the above.' The highest median price last year was boasted by Woodbury ($419,250), but that was down 4.5 percent from 2005, and the number of sales in Woodbury plunged more than 25 percent, according to the Greater Hudson Valley MLS. Around the county, results were similarly tepid."

"The number of homes sold fell last year in 30 of the 37 Orange County municipalities covered by the GHVMLS. The median sale price slipped in 15 of 37. Some of Orange's steepest price declines came in previously red-hot markets like the towns of Hamptonburgh and Goshen, two of the region's priciest locales in recent years. Each town's median price fell more than $40,000 last year, although it's hard to pinpoint why."

"Sunset Ridge debuted a couple of years ago with prices starting a hundred bucks shy of $700,000. When Roz Novick took over the project a year ago, one of the first things she did was drop the starting price to $579,000. She's sold three of the homes since."

"'It was just a matter of offering a wider variety of prices,' said Novick. 'The market is the market. If you're positioned right, you're going to sell.'"

The Press Herald from Maine. "Mainers are finding it harder to keep their homes, as many people become squeezed between loans they cannot repay and lenders who are offering fewer financing options."

"'You have loans happen that should not happen,' said Will Lund, who heads Maine's Office of Consumer Credit Regulation. 'There's no doubt that we will see an increase in foreclosures.'"

"Donna Gillette said she started looking for a house in early 2006 and quickly found one that she liked in Sanford. The price was $165,000. The loan officer said she could get an adjustable-rate mortgage, with no money down and a starting interest rate of 8 percent. A few days before the closing, though, the loan officer told her that the rate had to go up, to 10 percent."

"After a few years, Gillette learned, the interest would rise to between 11 and 16 percent. 'I was already emotionally tied to this house,' she said, and went along with what the loan officer told her."

"It turns out (that) included a note for $30,000, due in six months, unless she paid $900 twice a year to renew the note. Gillette said she had no idea why she needed the note and was further amazed when her loan officer said she could get some cash back at the closing."

"She later found out that the loan papers had listed her income as $60,000 a year, when it was half that, and that she was putting $21,000 down on the house, when she wasn't putting anything down. Gillette said she ended up with initial payments of $1,274 a month, which she could barely make, that would soon jump to $1,400 and then $1,500."

"Gillette eventually found help at Legal Services for the Elderly in Scarborough, where staff attorney Mary Kathryn Brennan said it was difficult for even a lawyer to sort out what Gillette had for a mortgage. 'It took me two weeks to figure out what had actually happened,' Brennan said. 'I was sitting here with these loan documents, thinking 'Where did this money come from? How did they come up with this figure?'"

"James Seely, CEO of RMS, said he subsequently fired the loan officer, has reworked another 10 mortgages that the officer wrote and is working to refinance two others because the terms were so poor."

"'The essence of the problem in our industry (is that) in good times, bad loans are made,' said Seely."

The Boston Globe from Massachusetts. "Tyrone Lobo quit his job last month as a deputy in the Barnstable Sheriff's Department so he could cash in his pension and use the roughly $30,000 to...prevent their four-bedroom Cape-style home in Falmouth from being auctioned off."

"Lobo and his fiancee had seen their monthly mortgage payment jump from just under $800 in 2002 to $2,700 last fall because of previous refinancing to stave off a previous foreclosure, they said."

"They said they were able to hold off the foreclosure by refinancing at 12.8 percent interest, double what they were charged before, but bumping their monthly mortgage to $2,700. They couldn't afford it."

"'It was the only deal on the table to save the house in that amount of time,' Lobo said. 'It's been a struggle every month.'"

The Times from New Jersey. "Two years ago, when the housing market was booming, William Soodul figured he would reduce his costs with a 'creative mortgage.' He took out a $226,500 adjustable-rate mortgage on his A-frame home in Allentown with a 1.8 percent interest rate and monthly payments that were not applied to either the principal or the interest."

"His plan was to refinance before his interest rate rose and higher payments kicked in. But Soodul got the surprise of his life when he tried to line up a conventional mortgage last month. Not only would his costs rise $7,000 a year if he kept the mortgage, he would have to pay a $10,000 prepayment penalty just to get out of the deal."

"In county offices throughout the state, foreclosure filings are rising sharply. 'We've seen a 30 percent increase in our foreclosures in the last five or six months,' said Mercer County Clerk Paula Solami-Covello. 'Some lending institutions made it easier for people to get mortgages, and maybe they don't make the salary to pay for them. People are getting into situations where they just can't pay.'"

"All towns in the county, even wealthier areas where homes carry price tags of $500,000, have seen increases in foreclosure filings, Solami-Covello said. In 1998 and 1999, there were about 1,000 new foreclosure filings in Mercer County for the entire year. This year, 421 were filed through the end of March."

"Statewide, the figures are even more dramatic. There was a 70 percent increase in new foreclosure filings statewide from the third quarter of 2005 to the third quarter of 2006, said Jeff Posner, owner of a Web site that tracks the filings. In January, the state filings more than doubled over the same month last year; in March, filings were up 22 percent."

"Experts believe boom-time credit practices are accelerating the pace this time around. 'A lot of cheap money out there was fueling the real estate market,' said Timothy Duggan, who chairs the bankruptcy and creditor's rights group for (a) law firm. 'Wages haven't kept up with the increase in the housing costs. People, over time, have taken on too much debt,' he added."

"There was 'an easing of underwriting standards, where we provided loans for people with poor credit, who maybe in the past wouldn't have gotten loans, people who wouldn't have been able to purchase homes in the past,' said E. Robert Levy of the Mortgage Bankers Association. 'There's no question credit will tighten now,' Levy said."

"Frank Mancino, of Gateway Funding in Hamilton, said mortgage companies are already tightening their lending practices. While it was possible two months ago to get a mortgage without proof of income or a good credit score, that is no longer viable, Mancino said."

"'The money was flowing very freely and everybody wanted to get in on that lending,' Mancino said."

"Posner blamed lenders for the foreclosure surge. 'It's the loose lending,' Posner said. 'Not just subprime loans, there are also a lot of prime loans in foreclosure.'"

"People have been offered 100 percent financing, he added. 'Three or four years ago, you could never get a loan like that,' Posner said. 'Even people with good credit want to put down less money if they can get away with it.'"

"From 2000 to 2005 housing prices in New Jersey rose 85 percent, said Pat O'Keefe, the CEO of the New Jersey Homebuilder's Association. But beginning in 2006, the 'housing market stalled,' he said. 'Particularly in the resale sector. It ground to a halt.'"

"Sales are down 20 percent since 2005, he said. This spring, prospective sellers are becoming more realistic and lowering their prices, he said. But sales are still 'very sluggish.'"

The Record from New Jersey. "When Iraj and Michele Hastings began searching for a house in North Jersey recently, they were happy to find a lot of choices in their price range of around $500,000."

"'We saw at least 25 houses,' said Iraj Hastings, who works in New York. 'We thought it best to take our time.'"

"'We had a remarkable six or seven years. We might be going into a more typical time,' said Harry Collis of Collis Realty in Bogota. 'We're in a state of transition. Two springs ago, that was hysteria. Multiple bidding, that's a thing of the past.'"

"'I'm not optimistic about the spring home buying season,' said economist Celia Chen. 'Affordability still remains an issue for many people, particularly in markets that previously were hot, which would include the New York City metropolitan area. On top of that is concern about what's going on in the subprime lending market...there are definite risks that conditions will get much worse.'"

"Many sellers are getting used to the idea of lower prices. Jay Noriega and Tara Voss Noriega first tried to sell their Rochelle Park Cape Cod by themselves, asking $415,000. They got a couple of low offers, including one for $330,000,- and then listed the property for $404,000."

"'I'm asking a little bit less than what the peak price was, and I feel we can get it,' said Voss Noriega."

"Not all sellers have gotten the message about lower prices, according to many real estate agents. 'Sellers still believe that the old prices are the right prices, and buyers obviously don't,' said Robin Malley in River Vale."

"'The sellers who think they can get what they got two years ago for houses, their houses are not selling,' said Joe Boreale in Wayne."