The Indystar reports from Indiana. "A downward trend in Indianapolis' home-building market is fueling scores of job cuts and discounts that, in some cases, risk devaluing entire neighborhoods. The half-dozen or more national tract builders in the market, plus local players, are trying to hang on by cutting overhead and turning to price-cutting and promotions to lure the smaller pool of increasingly picky buyers."

"Some builders have even cut their prices below what comparable homes in the same subdivision sold for in the past year. Patty Torr, a VP for F.C. Tucker Realtors, said one builder this spring knocked $100,000 off the price of a Northside home it couldn't peddle."

"'That's just crazy,' she said. 'That devalues the whole neighborhood.'"

"'Anybody looking to sell land, it's virtually impossible,' said Corby Thompson, president of Thompson Land Co. in Fishers. 'We're going through a cleansing,' he said. 'I think it was overdue. Land prices were getting frothy. It was just unstable.'"

The Star Press from Indiana. "Two years ago, Laurel Meadows was in the Parade of Homes, the showcase for the newest and nicest local houses. This summer, the housing development south of Yorktown is on the foreclosure auction block."

"The subdivision's developer says the bottom fell out of the local housing market, leaving him owing more than $500,000 to a Michigan bank. Terry Moore's company, M&M Construction, was the developer of Laurel Meadows, a 52-lot subdivision."

"'It's a struggle right now to survive,' Moore said. 'The housing market has disappeared.'"

"Moore, who said he has built and sold as many as 100 houses locally at a rate of eight to 10 each year, said Laurel Meadows floundered because of the downturn in the sale of new homes. 'I could never dream that the economy would turn off that quick,' Moore said. 'We went from selling 10 houses a year to selling nothing.'"

"The house on Kepner Drive was home to Charles Minton, his wife and four kids, until a series of events caused him to fall behind on payments, prompting Huntington National Bank to foreclose on the house."

"Minton said he made some bad decisions, including not having private mortgage insurance. 'I didn't have the greatest credit in the world, and I bought out of my means, when all is said and done,' he said."

"Home foreclosures in Delaware County increased an average of 20 percent a year between 2000 and 2006, and this year's numbers are likely to equal or top those for last year."

"Local real estate agent Cindy Welch agreed that there's no immediate change to the foreclosure problem on the horizon. 'I think the market is going to be like this for a couple more years.'"

The Journal Sentinel from Wisconsin. "The latest statistics indicate that foreclosure filings in Wisconsin have risen 21% so far this year over last year, to 7,697."

"Homeowners are trapped not just by life's reversals, but by increases in adjustable-rate mortgages, more restrictive refinancing standards and a housing market too soft to allow a quick house sale, theorized Robert A. Jansen, president of the Milwaukee-based property listing service."

"'In addition, the slowdown in (price) appreciation has taken away many homeowners' safety nets,' Jansen said."

"The hardest-hit areas: Milwaukee County, with 1,932 foreclosure filings this year as of May 31; Waukesha County, 326 cases; Dane County, 322; Brown County, 328 cases; Racine County, 294 cases; and Kenosha County, 305."

The Star Tribune from Minnesota. "Jack Capman needed cash to pay some bills and to repair his house in Anoka County last year, so he refinanced his fixed-rate mortgage into an adjustable loan that dropped his $1,500 payment to $600."

"Three months ago, he got a letter informing him that his payment was going to increase. That's when he and his wife started thinking about selling the house, which was appraised at $271,000 last May and has a $223,000 mortgage."

"But their real estate agent said that they'd be lucky to get $204,900. And the difference between the home's value and what Capman owes could get worse every month because Capman got his big break on the monthly payment by taking a negative-amortizing mortgage."

"'This is not a position to be in at age 72,' he said, contemplating the possibility that he could lose the house he's owned for nearly 20 years. 'And I shouldn't have been here, and that's why this hurts so much.'"

"'The subprime bust was the tip of the iceberg for the foreclosure problems. You also have a group of people that were refinancing every two years to pay off credit card debt, and with housing prices declining, they cannot refinance,' said Steve Sherwood, owner of RMG in Minnetonka."

The Pioneer Press from Minnesota. "Forget what you've heard about the condo glut. It's a great time to buy, if you're shopping for foreclosures."

"A newly formed group called the Condominium Opportunities Partners in Eden Prairie said it couldn't resist the opportunities it sees flashing in all those empty new condos dotting the Twin Cities landscape."

"'We came to recognize that developers were working very very hard to hide the state of trouble of their projects,' said Ted Glasrud, a former commercial real estate lender heading the group. 'We really believe that things are far worse than they seem on the surface.'"

"Foreclosures are rising fast, and developers are competing with a record number of homes for sale in the Twin Cities market. In the first four months of this year alone, 3,605 homes in the seven-county metro area have been sold in foreclosure auctions, according to Pioneer Press records. That puts the area on track to top last year's record 7,076 foreclosure sales."

"Altogether, there are a record 34,000-plus houses, condos and town homes on the market across the metro area. That doesn't include all of the estimated 9,000 single-family homes either currently under construction or finished and sitting vacant."

"Glasrud said he's been studying the area's overbuilding and has seen many poorly designed projects. He estimated that about six 'good-sized multi-project developers' in the area are struggling financially, and said he knows of a few condo projects that have gone into foreclosure."

"Some troubled projects were built with one cookie-cutter floor plan for all the units in the building, he said, and others added too much expensive parking or thousands of square feet of unnecessary amenities."

"Others were just built in the wrong place, Glasrud said, recalling condos carrying price tags of $300,000 and $400,000 sitting in neighborhood where the homes are valued at about $225,000."

"'There are a number of projects that were just bad projects from the get-go,' Glasrud said."