The Sun Sentinel reports from Florida. "Alice Gordon was getting ready to put her villa up for sale in Palm Isles, but she's decided to wait. She wants to move into independent living, but Alice is putting her move on hold because of the flat real estate market. How long was she told it would take to sell her place? 'Forever,' she said, laughing."

"Alice's scenario is played out across the swath of retirement communities, especially in western Delray Beach, where people bought condos decades ago. Now many of them are trapped, unable to move because they can't sell unless they significantly drop their price."

"'The real estate market is making it extremely difficult for residents who want to go into assisted living or go up to be by their children,' said Bob Schulbaum, longtime president of the Alliance of Delray Residential Associations. 'They're tapping their savings to bring in aides.'"

"Luckily, that's not the case with Alice, whose villa is paid off, so she can afford to wait."

"Bob sees other problems. Condos sit empty after a relative dies when the heirs can't sell it. The lack of turnover is being felt. 'The older communities, especially, need new blood,' he said. 'Where are the worker bees going to come from?'"

"Barbara Katz, president of the coalition west of Boynton Beach said she agrees with Bob about the real estate market. 'More people are feeling the crunch,' she said."

"People are late paying their maintenance fees. Homeowners who have to sell are forced to reduce their prices, and she's seeing a few foreclosures. 'You very rarely saw that,' she said."

The Herald Tribune from Florida. "The same group of colorful Californians who bought 15 units at the Bermuda on Osprey condo complex in Sarasota at inflated prices attempted at least three similar deals in Lakewood Ranch."

"Two of the sellers, who approached the Herald-Tribune with their stories, said the deals smelled fishy from the start. But the real estate agents and the lawyers they called for advice said it would be OK to proceed as long as all details of the transactions were spelled out to the banks providing the financing."

"To some critics, the fact that real estate agents, appraisers, mortgage brokers, title agents and lawyers all sign off on the legitimacy of such transactions goes to the heart of the problems facing the U.S. real estate and mortgage industries."

"'Realtors and mortgage brokers were thinking about commissions. Appraisers, title agents and lawyers were thinking about fees,' said Erroll Phillips, a Manatee County Realtor and real estate instructor. 'The victim is not just the banks. It is all of us.'"

The Miami Herald from Florida. "Miami's former building boom, has become Miami's building bargain, one city commissioner says. And Commissioner Marc Sarnoff says the best thing for government to do is just what any savvy shopper would: buy, buy, buy."

"The commissioner says if prices dip as low as $175 per square foot, government should purchase condo units and partially subsidize them for teachers, police officers and the like."

"Community activist Max Rameau worries that Sarnoff's proposal could become a taxpayer bailout for condo developers who overestimated demand and are now having trouble selling their units. Sarnoff says government wouldn't be bailing out developers, just taking advantage of a good deal. But if the idea helped stabilize the shaky real estate market a bit, Sarnoff said, that's not a bad thing."

"'This is a real-estate driven economy,' he said. Allow a collapse to happen and 'people won't be making a living. There are title companies. There are real estate agents.'"

"A government-assisted buyer program could fill up struggling condo buildings, Miami state Rep. Carlos Lopez-Cantera said, though he added there is a risk that buyers who paid full price will resist the new, subsidized, arrivals."

"Sarnoff says mixing people of different incomes is a laudable goal, something Miami should do more of. 'Instead of warehousing the working-class poor, let's put them amongst the middle class,' Sarnoff said. 'Not overload the building, but five or 10 here and there.'"

From My Fox Atlanta in Georgia. "For the past 13 years, Michelle and Raymond Beardon have enjoyed living in their Loganville home, but when they got back from vacation this past July, they were in for a big surprise."

"'Actually have mail, tons of mail and we open up the first piece of mail and it was actually a foreclosure notice out of the newspaper,' said homeowner Michelle Bearden."

"The Beardens had decided to refinance their home in 1999. They blame their lender for their current trouble, claiming their monthly mortgage payments were incorrectly credited to their account. They're now suing the mortgage company."

"'It's devastating to find out that way you are being foreclosed on,' said Beardon."

"There have been over 53,000 foreclosures in metro Atlanta in 2007, some 6,800 properties were foreclosed on in October 2007 alone."

The Atlanta Journal Constitution from Georgia. "The white paint has barely dried on the cathedral ceilings. And some of the stacked-stone chimneys have yet to crackle with that first fire. Here, in a half-built neighborhood near Grayson, everything is freshly minted, down to the suburban dreams."

"Yet earlier this month, outside the Gwinnett County courthouse, nearly half the subdivision was auctioned off — the latest casualty of a foreclosure crisis that has pounded model-home sales offices around metro Atlanta."

"'Going once, going twice, sold to Legacy State Bank,' attorney Samuel L. Chesnutt shouted to a crowd of investors showing little interest."

"A few were unsold homes. Most were vacant lots. All went to a buyer with no home-owning dreams. 'We expect to see a lot more of that, to be honest,' said Domonic Purviance, a senior consultant with Metrostudy."

"The building gloom is a stunning reversal for one of this decade's hottest Zip codes for new-home construction in metro Atlanta. Even now, by all outward appearances, this corner of Gwinnett is still bursting at the seams. Road crews are widening traffic-clogged Ga. 20. Another middle school is under construction. Subdivisions are sprouting up around every corner. But peek into many of those new houses, and there's something missing: people."

"Metro Atlanta has 140,000 vacant lots, Purviance said. That's a nearly four-year supply, or double what's normal for the region. And nobody is in a hurry to build on top of them. The supply of unoccupied new homes has soared and is now twice the usual three-month inventory."

"'People paid premium prices for land,' Purviance said. 'But the prices were a little inflated. The developers are stuck now.'"

"So are homeowners like Mark Braswell, who moved into Chandler Woods Estates last July. From his cul-de-sac lot, he expected to see property values rise with each new home. But sales slowed. And construction nearly ground to a halt."

"Last month, 'Reduced' stickers joined the 'For Sale' signs that lined Cattail Ives Road. Then, on a record-setting Tuesday for foreclosures in Georgia, the signs disappeared altogether. The properties went to the bank that issued the construction loans in the first place."

"Braswell fears the lots will end up in the hands of a builder who brings a cheaper product to the neighborhood, where homes currently are priced from the high $200,000s to the mid $300,000s."

"'It leaves us very vulnerable to whatever comes in,' he said."

The Birmingham News from Alabama. "Record low unemployment rates and economic development coups have done little to curtail bankruptcy filings across Alabama. Instead, a rush of foreclosures and surging debt consumer loads have pushed Alabama's personal bankruptcy rate to third in the nation."

"Last week, attorney Ted Stuckenschneider got a visit he says has become all too typical in recent months. A single mother, stuck with an adjustable-rate mortgage she no longer could afford, came in for help."

"'She makes $1,400 a month and her mortgage has doubled from $550 to $1,100 over the last five years,' Stuckenschneider said. 'There is no way she can afford that. She's three months behind and they are going to foreclose on her home.'"

"Once Stuckenschneider told her even bankruptcy could not save her home, the woman, who also faced a monthly car note that pushed her debt payments beyond her ability to pay, left his office in tears."

"'This is a woman who never should have been given a mortgage loan in the first place,' Stuckenschneider said. 'She lived with her mother and would have been better off staying there. But she wanted to realize the American dream of having a home.'"

"'It is ridiculous for people to be able to get a home loan with 50 percent debt ratio,' he said. 'The government had good intentions for people to be able to become home owners, but the criteria allowed more people to buy who shouldn't be. It should be harder to qualify.'"

The Charlotte Observer from North Carolina. "Charlotte's teachers, police officers and firefighters can now buy foreclosed houses at a discount under a federal program intended to improve neighborhoods hit by vacancies and flagging property values. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development is posting pictures on its Web site of houses it will sell for half the listed price."

"Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools teachers received an e-mail advertising eight houses listed between $33,000 and $187,000 that they could buy for $16,500 to $93,500. The effort, already in place in cities such as Denver, Chicago and Houston, is a response to Mecklenburg County's growing foreclose rate, the highest in the state."

"Federal officials contacted Charlotte leaders in May about joining the Good Neighbor Next Door program after the number of foreclosures in the county jumped to 7,162 last year from 4,414 in 2002, a 62 percent increase."

"The program comes with rules: Buyers must live in the houses for at least three years. Some of the houses also will cost thousands of dollars to repair. One house recently listed for $120,000 needed a new gas furnace, an air-conditioning unit, a sink and light fixtures. That would cost at least another $10,000, city officials said."

"Also, discounts are common on foreclosures. Such properties often sell for 60 percent of their listed price, said Mike Jaffa, president of Graham Investment, which lends money to developers."

"Additionally, Jaffa said, the homes frequently are in crime-ridden neighborhoods."

"Charlotte officials blame the trend on high numbers of risky subprime loans to homebuyers with spotty credit, on predatory lending and on liberalized finance laws."