The Daily Camera reports from Colorado. "It's been a little more than two years since Michael Kirby and his wife put their 3,200-square-foot Longmont home on the market, which is listed at $474,000. And Kirby says he doesn't expect to sell it anytime soon. Although the house's fixtures are up to date, Kirby says the 33-year-old property can't compete with newer homes nearby that are similarly priced and come loaded with builder-offered incentives."

"'The people who are buying houses can't sell what they have,' Kirby says from his second home in Fiesta Key, Fla., citing recent rashes of foreclosures and widespread trouble with subprime lenders. 'We're running into that same situation here.'"

"'That's happening here, that's happening in Colorado, that's happening in California,' Kirby says. 'Things in Erie and Frederick are pretty serious.'"

"Jon and Barb Verson purchased their north Boulder home in September 2007, a decision spurred by the impending arrival of their now 3-month-old daughter. The couple refinanced their downtown condominium and bought a two-bedroom fixer-upper in the Sundance neighborhood."

"Staying in Boulder was important not only because of proximity to his work and open space, but also because of the property's value, Jon Verson says. 'It'll go flat, but it won't really go down,' Verson says of the appreciation."

"Taking into consideration the rates and the housing prices, people who are in a position to buy a home should not sit on the sidelines, says Janie Henry-Bolger, a Realtor in Longmont."

"The lower prices, Bolger says, should come back up soon. 'My job as a Realtor is to keep the public positive, and that's what I'm doing,' she says. 'I think we're all in the position of: 'If you don't own, buy. If you do own, re-fi.'"

The Longmont Times Call from Colorado. "It’s been done in California. It’s been done in Florida. And on Saturday, Longmont tried its version of the foreclosure bus tour." "Russ Scranton of ERA Tradewind Real Estate, which sponsored Saturday’s tour, said he remembered similar trips in the early ’80s. Back then, homes would even be auctioned off during the trip, he said."

"'When we saw the trend coming back again ... we got together and said, 'Let’s try it,' Scranton said."

"The city had 574 foreclosures recorded in 2007, according to the Boulder County Public Trustee’s office — more than half the foreclosures in Boulder County last year."

"About 20 people piled on the bus Saturday morning for a 31/2-hour tour that would visit 13 bank-owned homes all over Longmont. East side, west side — no area was immune. The houses ranged from a nearly new $239,900 property down to a $94,500 home in need of a fair amount of work."

"'It shows you different levels of income are having the same problem,' said Johnnie David of ERA Tradewind. 'It’s not just the ones that flip burgers.'"

The Rocky Mountain News from Colorado. "Home prices fell in the Denver area in January as the sale of distressed properties drove down prices and few McMansions sold. The median price of a single- family home fell about 8 percent, to $216,950 from $236,000."

"About 80 percent of the homes sold last month were priced at less than $300,000 as the record number of foreclosures drive down the average and median prices, said independent broker Gary Bauer."

"At the same time, sales are sluggish at the other end of the market. 'The McMansions, homes priced at $500,000 and above, are not moving right now,' Bauer said."

"New housing sales and starts in the Denver area fell by about a third in 2007 from 2006, according to a report. It's likely that 2007 was the worst year for home builders in the metro area since Denver's economy crashed in the late 1980s, said John Covert, who heads the Denver office for Metrostudy."

"'Basically, last year was the worst year in 20 years,' Covert said."

"When the local economy collapsed in the late 1980s following the bust in energy prices, the population of the Denver area was much lower. 'Our population is so much bigger and more diverse now, it shows how dramatically the builders have cut back,' Covert said."

The Arizona Daily Star. "The worst of the slowdown in Southern Arizona's new-home market is likely still ahead, analysts said an an annual industry forecast on Friday. At best, they said, the market will hit bottom this year."

"Local new-home market consultant John Strobeck of Bright Future Business Consultants said the number of new-home permits pulled in the Tucson area will fall to 4,000 this year from 5,098 last year. Meanwhile, the number of new homes sold will fall to about 3,500, a drop of 43 percent from 2007 and the lowest number since 1992, Strobeck said."

"To help spur on sales, he urged local builders to seek 'continued price reductions' and encouraged real estate agents to take fewer listings and list 'only sellers who are serious and have homes priced to sell.'"

"'Housing activity and prices are falling sharply,' said Marshall Vest, at the University of Arizona. 'Not just nationally, but locally, as well.'"

"Phoenix-area housing market consultant R.L. Brown said the economic downturn in 2007 has forced all analysts of the state's housing market to revise future projections downward. He added that builders and other home-building-related businesses have to be 'cognizant of the reality of the marketplace that we're operating in.'"

"'Many have sat on their hands, wishing that the market would be different, hoping it would be like 2005,' he said."

"'2008 is going to be remembered, I think, as the year we'll all want to forget,' Vest said

The Arizona Republic. "Home prices in several Valley cities are falling at rates not seen since 1990, wiping out equity and making it difficult for those trying to refinance."

"Throughout the Valley, prices on repeat home sales fell 4.6 percent overall from October 2006 through October 2007. That compares with an overall decline of 3.8 percent for September 2006 to September 2007."

"The decline is the biggest drop in housing prices over a 12-month period since the February 1989 to February 1990 period, when home prices dropped 5.01 percent, during the last real-estate recession."

"'It's not just a matter of too many houses on the market,' said Karl. L. Guntermann, real-estate professor at W. P. Carey School of Business. 'It gets into the sub-prime-mortgage problem, affordability, foreclosures, and that has a big impact on people's ability to refinance if their house prices go down 6 to 8 percent. They may not have any equity, and that may create cascading problems.'"

The Washington Post on Arizona. "'We're in so deep that it doesn't seem like anything will help,' said Rebekah Ao, a pregnant homemaker who lives in a new four-bedroom home in Avondale with her husband, Otto, a truck driver."

"The Aos, with $50,000 in income, owe a total of $607,000 on mortgages for two houses they bought since they moved to the Phoenix area about two years ago."

"In Maricopa County, which encompasses much of the Phoenix area, there are about 13,000 homes in foreclosure, which is more than a sixfold increase over two years ago."

"They bought their first home in 2005, for $269,000. They paid for it using an Option ARM, which allowed them to make a monthly payment of $850, which was less than what they paid for rent in Los Angeles. Only later did they realize that meant that their loan amount would grow over time, not shrink, as would their payments."

"'When we saw the payments were so low we decided to buy another house,' Rebekah Ao said. 'With the market going crazy, we figured we could sell the other house in a couple of years.'"

"They now owe $287,000 on the first one and $320,000 on the new home, which they are renting. Their credit card balances, which they once kept at zero, have ballooned to more than $14,000 as they struggle to make ends meet."

"'It hurts to know that you are on a road that leads to a dead end,' Rebekah Ao said. The Aos are weighing their limited options. Foreclosure? A sale that takes in less than they owe? 'But right now,' she said, 'we're just throwing our money away every month.'"

The Las Vegas Business Press from Nevada. "Amateur night is over and only the pros are going to survive in Las Vegas, real estate observer Richard Lee said last week at Preview Las Vegas 2008."

"The housing market is in the dumps, partly due to 'irrational exuberance,' in the words of former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, which led to an 'implosion' of the subprime mortgage market, Lee said."

"'The big question is where is the bottom? I don't know. I think we're close to the bottom for new homes. We still have a ways to go in resales,' he said."

In Business Las Vegas from Nevada. "Lee's reserved presentation may have been inspired by the speaker who preceded him, Jeremy Aguero, principal of Las Vegas-based Applied Analysis. He, too, had a presentation grounded in reality, acknowledging that economically, 2008 is going to be a tough year."

"Aguero warned that by the end of the year, there could be more jobs trimmed than created in Nevada. (A day later, it was reported job creation nationally entered negative territory for the first time in four years.)"

"Part of the reason for the potential downturn is a product of the state's success in diversifying its economy, Aguero said. 'It's a double-edge sword. Our economy is more diversified and more susceptible to the ups and downs of the things that are occurring nationally,' he said. 'It's harder for people to grow during a recessionary period.'"

"The construction industry, largely affected by Aguero's No. 1 trend to watch last year - the slumping housing market - was largely responsible for some of the downturn. Aguero said 11.9 percent of the workforce at the end of last year was in construction-related industries, two times the national average."

"But another factor was the employment buildup in boom periods such as 2005 and the spending that occurred in those good times."

"'A lot of the buildup that we have is a result of huge amounts of unsustainable levels of consumer spending,' Aguero said. 'So consumers also are also pulling back. Places like restaurants are overstaffed. It'll get back, but to imagine that 2005 was by any way sustainable is just unrealistic.'"

The New York Times on Nevada. "Home prices in the North Las Vegas neighborhood of Brenda Harris have fallen 20 percent to 30 percent. The builder who sold her a new three-bedroom home on Pink Flamingos Place for about $392,000 in 2006 is now listing similar properties for $314,000. A larger house a block down from Ms. Harris was recently listed online for $310,000."

"But Ms. Harris does not want to leave her home. She estimates that she has spent close to $40,000 on her property, about half for a down payment and much of the rest on a deck and landscaping."

"'I’m not behind in my payments, but I’m trying to prevent getting behind,' Ms. Harris said. 'I don’t want to ruin my credit.'"

"In addition to the declining value of her home, Ms. Harris will soon be hit with a sharply higher house payment. She has an option adjustable-rate mortgage. She is making the minimum monthly payments due on her loan, about $2,400."

"But she knows she will not be able to pay the $3,400 needed to cover her interest and principal, which she will be required to pay once her loan balance reaches 115 percent of her starting balance. And under the terms of her loan...she would have to pay a prepayment penalty of about $40,000 if she chose to refinance or sell her home before May 2009."

The Reno Gazette Journal from Nevada. "A flood of foreclosed homes presents prospective home buyers across Northern Nevada with new options the likes of which have never before existed."

"'It's absolutely unprecedented,' Cheryl Taylor of Ferrari-Lund Real Estate in Reno said of bank-owned dwellings for sale. 'I have quite a few in the Multiple Listing Service and almost as many waiting for the bank to get a price on.'"

"As of last week, there were 6,492 homes on the MMLS in the greater Reno-Sparks-Carson City-Fernley-Fallon region with an absorption rate of 18.3 months...more than three times longer than at the height of the housing market three years ago."

"With the number of mortgages in default adding homes to the total, real estate agents like Karen Greathouse of Dickson Realty, who specializes in foreclosures, are feeling the strain."

"'The system is overloaded,' she said. 'Three years ago, the business didn't exist in Northern Nevada. You'd get 30, maybe 40 listings a year. Now, the numbers are just staggering. We had a mob frenzy then, everyone was buying just to buy, thinking (the market) wouldn't do anything but go up. We all know that's not the case now.'"

"Greathouse said she has foreclosure listings in a wide range of neighborhoods, from Somersett in northwest Reno to Saddlehorn in the south suburban zone to golf course-bordering properties in Dayton."

"Broker Ken Wiseman said his listings range from $700,000 homes to $70,000 condos. 'It doesn't seem like anyone's immune, except maybe the ultra-rich,' he said."

"Residents who have gone through home foreclosures compare the experience to an earthquake, a flash flood or even a death in the family. 'It's a nightmare,' said Shannon Churchwell of Sparks, whose monthly payments on a condo soared from $772 to $1,700 last year as the result of an adjustable rate mortgage."

"'I have to take responsibility because I didn't read the fine print and didn't fully understand what I was getting into. But it was still a shock. It was a draining and frustrating process to renegotiate the loan, get it modified and get back to where we could afford to stay here,' she said."

"Churchwell bought just about two and a half years ago with no money down by using an interest-only loan for a first mortgage and taking out an amortized second mortgage. The loan rate was frozen for two years, but she thought it would be three years before the rate adjusted."

"'My first mistake was thinking it was three years, not two, and I also never thought the market was going to change so much,' she said."

"But in April 2007 her $772 monthly payment went up by $400 and she realized it was going to go up every six months until her interest rate reached 13 percent. She said she tried to refinance but couldn't get a deal that kept her payments low. She then put her condo on the market where it sat from May to September."

"'A lot of people looked, but I had no offers,' she said. 'I went back to the lender, but by then I was paying a mortgage that was close to the value of the condo. I was getting upside down on the loan.'"

"'The lender kept saying my paperwork was in progress,' she said. 'I found out that because I kept up the payments, even though it was a hardship, my paper was put at the bottom of the pile. People who were defaulting were the priority.'"

"'I was about ready to go into foreclosure,' she said. 'I was ready to walk away.'"

"She went to Reno Credit Builders, which was able to negotiate with her lender to get her loan modified. The new loan reverted to the original payment for three years. The adjustable rate still looms beyond that, she said."

"'It was worth it to buy time,' she said. 'I hope to sell or refinance within those three years.'"