A report from the Arizona Republic. "Mainstream home builders are under growing pressure to go green...which could be risky at a time when revenue is down and sales are stalled. 'These guys are fighting for their lives at the moment,' said RL Brown, a Valley housing analyst. 'They're trying to figure out how to make a sale, how to carry the burden of the inventory, how to get rid of the excess land, how to get the cancellations to go away. They're into serious, hard marketing challenges right now. They're not into that (green) kind of thing.'"

"Right now, they're struggling to get their finances in shape as they try to clear an excess of inventory. At least 20,000 unsold new homes in the Valley wait for buyers, according to various analysts."

"Doug Fulton of Tempe-based Fulton Homes said his company has started to sell houses below cost in some fringe markets, and he believes other builders are, too. 'If it sold homes and made sense, I'd do it,' Fulton said. 'We're just trying to keep our heads above water. It's a little brutal out there.'"

The Explorer News from Arizona. "About a year ago Ricardo Small received a fax asking him to appraise a house in Marana, a daily event in the life of a real estate appraiser. When the appraisal was complete, Small sent it to the mortgage broker who had requested his service."

"Small said the broker launched a campaign of furious phone calls demanding that the house be appraised for a greater value. 'There’s an unacceptable level of dishonesty among appraisers,' Small said."

"After his conflicts with the mortgage broker, Small said the broker acquired the services of a second appraiser whose estimate actually exceeded the broker’s desired price."

The Arizona Daily Star. "The cost of building and improving homes and businesses in Sahuarita is about to go up. The housing slowdown has reduced the town's revenue collected from a construction sales tax, Town Manager Jim Stahle said last month."

"Rents are rising modestly for large apartment buildings in Tucson and the occupancy rate is slipping down, according to a rental market research firm."

"The dip could be related to the slowdown in the real estate market, and the abundance of unsold single-family homes, which are now being marketed to renters, said Terry Feinberg, president of the Arizona Multihousing Association. The same phenomenon is occurring on an even larger scale in Phoenix, he said."

"But Tucson has an added twist in its market helping to prop up both rents and occupancy levels, no new supply of apartment buildings, Feinberg said. Rents have not been high enough to justify the cost of constructing new apartment buildings in Tucson over the past several years, he said."

"'Now since the real estate market has shut down a little bit, they're not buying homes,' said George Amos III, CEO of Tucson Realty & Trust Co. 'They're going back into apartments again.'"

In Business Las Vegas from Nevada. "Las Vegas homeowners are showing signs they are willing to cut their prices to make a sale. The median price of new homes listed on the MLS in June was $329,825. That's the lowest median listing price since it was $324,900 in December 2004."

"Las Vegas Realtor Steve Cross said he's been surprised at what he's seen recently on the MLS. It appears the number of daily price revisions on listings is increasing, Cross said."

"Between July 1 and July 15, there have been more than 4,200 revisions of prices, and Cross said it's unlikely many would be increasing. As recently as July 13, there were more than 700 revision a day, which he said is well above normal. Some of the revisions have ranged from $1,000 to $50,000, he said."

"'I think many people are realizing they have to be realistic on their prices,' Cross said. 'Some have doubled their money in the last five years and if they knock a few thousand off their price so it sells, is no great shakes.'"

"Others who bought late into the market are going to have to turn to short sales and sell the home for less than what they owe the bank, he said."

"In June, Nevada had one foreclosure filing for every 175 households to lead the nation for the sixth-consecutive month, according to RealtyTrac. That's a 280 percent increase over June 2006 and well ahead of second-place California, which had one filing for every 315 households."

"Michael Krein, president of Nevada Real Estate Services, said he's carrying 700 properties that have been foreclosed and expects that number to increase because many loans won't have their payments adjusted until later this year or early 2008."

"Homeowners who bought their homes with an adjustable rate mortgage have seen their payments increase 50 percent in some cases and others have seen their payments more than double, Krein said."

"Foreclosures are occurring in every price range but the majority of the houses and condominiums fall between $350,000 and $600,000, Krein said."

"About 75 percent of the homes Krein has dealt with were purchased by speculators who misjudged the market. 'When you have cab drivers talking about real estate, it's time to leave the market,' Krein said."

The Review Journal from Nevada. "The summer months are always slow for home sales in Las Vegas. When it's 110 degrees outside, nobody likes to go house hunting. There were 1,872 new home sales in June, bringing the total to 10,395 for the first half of the year, a 45 percent decrease from a year ago, Home Builders Research reported."

"Home prices have fallen, but not nearly as much as pundits predicted. California real estate consultant John Burns said housing Las Vegas prices must drop 30 percent to return to a normal market."

"'Is it realistic for houses to back off by 30 percent?' asked Larry Murphy of SalesTraq. 'Why are we even talking about it? Come on. I think prices still have a ways to come down in Vegas, but not 30 percent. Eight to 10 percent, maybe.'"

"'My interpretation of Vegas is not that it will have to plunge 33 percent, but rather that Vegas is being promoted into the small elite group of cities that have enough external factors that make people want to own property there that the prices simply are high relative to income,' said Alex Edelstein, developer of the mid-rise Manhattan condos and Manhattan West in Las Vegas."

"Peter Kaiser was hoping to find a home at a reasonable price. 'What I have found is a market full of homes still hoping to extract the prices seen in late 2005. Simple three-bedroom, two-bath homes that are still $100,000 more than they're worth are languishing on the market for well over a year,' Kaiser said."

"He said he's seen at least a 10 percent slide in prices for homes in Henderson and Green Valley for the past six months and they're still not moving at the reduced price."

"'Bottom line from my point of view is that the current price levels have been set by investors, not people who plan on actually living in any of these homes,' Kaiser said."

"'I cannot and will not jeopardize my family's financial well-being by jumping into a market that has such a high chance of going further south. We are currently renting a nice little home and doing what very few in our society are able to do any more -- save money,' he added."

"He has a novel idea about what to do with all the vacant homes in the valley. An estimated 40 percent to 50 percent of the 23,000 homes on the MLS are sitting empty. According to the Las Vegas Outreach Center, there are 10,000 homeless people in the valley. 'I think I just solved our homeless issue,' Kaiser said."

The Deseret News from Utah. "Housing prices continued to rise in Utah during the second quarter of 2007, but the number of homes sold dropped along the Wasatch Front. Most notable were Salt Lake and Utah counties, each of which saw a 19 percent decrease in the number of units sold in the second quarter compared to the same three-month period of 2006, according to the Salt Lake Board of Realtors."

"Jillinda Bowers, the Salt Lake board's president-elect, attributed the decreased sales to fewer investors participating in the market. 'We don't have the influx of investors that we had in the past. We're not seeing that as strong in our area,' she said."

"Debra Sjoblom, former president of the Salt Lake board, chalks the declining sales up to the typical summer slowdown. 'Who the heck knows (why)? Is it the heat? Is it summer vacation? Is it just a combination?' said Sjoblom, anecdotally noting that while the market remained robust through May, it has 'slowed tremendously' in the past 45 days."

"Several individual ZIP codes posted a decrease in median home values. The 84103 ZIP code, which includes the Avenues in downtown Salt Lake City, saw an 11.9 percent decrease in median price over this time last year. Three Weber County cities, Eden, Huntsville and Marriott/Slaterville, also experienced varying levels of price drops, as did Alpine, American Fork and the 84604-area of Provo in Utah County."

The Salt Lake Tribune from Utah. "Higher mortgage rates. Reduced affordability. A nagging fear prices are bound to nose-dive. Home buyers along the Wasatch Front pulled back this spring for a number of reasons, leading to falling sales of existing homes as reported Friday by the Salt Lake Board of Realtors."

"Some buyers have been priced out of the market as a result of the double-whammy of rising home values and rising mortgage rates, both of which push monthly mortgage payments ever higher. Home values in a number of areas have grown by 50 percent to 100 percent over the past five years."

"Add higher payments to tighter lending guidelines, and 'there are more buyers who simply cannot qualify [for a home loan] right now,' said economist Jeff Thredgold."

"But Thredgold said an even greater factor driving down sales of existing homes is all the talk about the bursting of the nation's housing 'bubble,' where selling prices are flat or falling in cities such as Phoenix and Las Vegas. 'Buyers are concerned,' he said."

"In many areas, for-sale signs are piling up and take longer than they have in past years to come down. One concerned Utah home buyer is Jeff Rouse, who has recently moved to Salt Lake City from the San Francisco area. Rouse said he initially was going to buy right away. But as he began to drive around the Salt Lake Valley, he said he noticed quite a lot of for-sale signs. Some of the homes he looked at a few weeks ago now have lower asking prices."

"'I'm thinking of renting for a while and just seeing what happens,' he said."