WFAA reports from Texas. "On the southwest edge of Cedar Hill, the development's custom homes on oversized lots make a clear statement of prosperity. But unexplained house fires, foreclosure postings and empty houses send another message: This is a beautiful place teetering on the edge of decline, an apparent victim of lax lending practices and subprime loans."

"The three story brick-and-stone house at 419 Golden Pond caught fire on December 3. Cedar Hill Fire Marshal Randall Jordan said it was intentionally set. Now the charred ribs of what used to be a peaked roof stick into the sky. It was the most expensive house on the block, listed on tax rolls at $640,000."

"On Mallard Point, about a mile away, a bare foundation is what’s left of another home that burned. It was still under construction. 'We’re very worried,' Elaine Thieroff said of her neighborhood. 'We invested in our dream house out here and it’s such a beautiful area that we don’t want our property values to go down.'"

"But that’s what’s happening. The house across the street from the Thieroff’s blackened neighbor is vacant. It is listed on tax rolls at $580,000. But this house has been foreclosed upon by a subprime lender. It’s now on the market for $150,000 less than the tax valuation."

"Off the crest of the ridge, about a mile-and-a-half away, is a street called High Valley. Of nineteen houses, four are foreclosures. Half appear to be empty."

"In all, 26 properties in Lake Ridge were posted for foreclosure in March. Steven Nichols has seen all of this before in his 20 years as a real estate appraiser, but he had not seen so much in one place."

"'This is phenomenal,' he said while driving around the property. 'About every other house appears to be vacant.'"

"Most alarming to Nichols are a number of houses under construction in Lake Ridge which appear to have been abandoned by builders. 'You’re in a neighborhood of decline,' Nichols said. 'It’s not a very optimistic outlook for a neighborhood when you see several homes like this dead in the water.'"

The Dallas News. "Dallas-Fort Worth's apartment leasing continued to lag in the early months of 2007. Only 480 net leases were recorded in the area during the first quarter, a fraction of the more than 5,600 units leased in the same quarter of 2006."

"With home sales slowing, analyst Greg Willett said, the weak apartment demand must be due in part to economic conditions."

"With the slowdown in leasing, apartment construction far outpaces demand. Builders completed more than 1,300 units in the first quarter. About 10,600 units remained under construction at the end of March."

"About 6,300 apartment were taken out of the market during the year ending in March due to demolition or conversion into condominiums."

The American Statesman. "The subprime mortgage shakeout is being felt in Austin, as builders cut new home starts by nearly 28 percent in the first quarter compared with a year ago, according to a report from Residential Strategies Inc."

"As lenders tighten credit requirements, some buyers will not be able to get mortgages, said Mark Sprague, head of Residential Strategies' Austin office."

"'The large-production builders are battling inventory issues elsewhere in the country, and are thus conservative right now,' Sprague said. 'Moreover, with the rules being changed today regarding mortgage qualifications, builders are being careful until they can determine the extent of the fallout.'"

"Builders started work on only 3,327 houses, down from 4,613 a year ago, which was a record. On an annual basis, they started 15,468 homes in the 12 months that ended in March, down 4.3 percent from the year-earlier period."

The Caller Times. "For many it was the answer to achieving the American dream. A mortgage loan, even at high interest because of a low credit score, equaled owning a home. The so-called subprime loan - a no-money-down, adjustable-rate mortgage, was the only alternative for many in Corpus Christi and nationwide."

"Those adjustable rates adjusted upward, faster than a significant percentage of borrowers could afford. Steven Perez, a mortgage banking lender for Wachovia in Corpus Christi, said the situation in the subprime market has caught the attention of the nation because changes started happening, literally, overnight."

"About three weeks ago, lenders started losing faith in subprime loans and started to regulate themselves be-fore the government could step in."

"'Most of these loans came with no money down and adjustable interest rates that helped these people get the house of their dreams,' Perez said. 'The bad side is that due to their credit history, they didn't have the discipline to keep up with their payments. And then came the foreclosures.'"

"'The truth is some of us had been waiting for this to happen because once these loan payments jumped and the people with bad credit histories couldn't make the payment, we knew the foreclosures would eventually happen,' Perez said, 'but never at this magnitude.'"

"Molly Trice, associate district manager for GMAC Mortgage in Corpus Christi, attributes the subprime loan problems to lenient guidelines for borrowers."

"'A lot of people maybe had bad credit and didn't have the money for a down payment on a home and were tired of paying rent,' Trice said. 'These loans allowed for them to qualify.'"

"'The lenders have started to place tougher restrictions on themselves, but I think Congress will eventually step in,' Trice said."

"Trice and Perez predict that this may hurt Corpus Christi's healthy housing market. Top officials with the Corpus Christi Association of Realtors said they did not want to comment on the issue."