The Daily Press reports from Colorado. "It is true. Foreclosures have increased in Montrose County. The total number of sales in the area are down. Home values have also decreased and there is a larger buyers market than ever before. Montrose native Dave Weber bought his house about three years ago. He knew the house needed repairs, but he never figured that additional construction projects, plus some unexpected medical emergencies would put him in the position he is in now — foreclosure."

"About a year after he bought the home, he refinanced. Now he spends hours a day on the phone with the company trying to save his home, each time he is told something different."

"'When the market was really hot, almost anyone could get a loan,' said Marjorie Phelps, broker and current president of the Montrose Association of Realtors."

"Subprime loans were created to 'make ownership more available to more Americans,' said Merle Allen, director of counseling for the Grand Valley Housing Initiatives. It was economy driven."

"'It was a good idea gone bad,' he said. 'The American Dream was to own a home, but it wasn’t available to the working class American. The idea was never being that someone would look at that and take advantage ... it spiraled out of control.'"

"From 2002 to 2005, Montrose County saw a large steady increase in sales, according to analysis by Lynn Vogel of Comparable Sales Research. The total dollar sales also increased significantly during that time."

"Between 2003 and 2004, the total dollar sales growth rate in the city of Montrose was at 58.83 percent. That growth rate was high again between 2004 and 2005 at 29.99 percent. However, data shows Montrose, city and county, started to fall after 2005."

"'Our adjustment started in 2005,' said Vogel."

"Where the area is seeing the largest inventory, according to Phelps, is in the $240,000 to $325,000 range. However, Montrose has a larger-than-normal inventory in all areas. Phelps said she heard there is a five to 10 year build-out in the county."

"'A lot of people move here and want to buy a home, but it’s hurting because they can’t sell their home in California, the Front Range,' Phelps said."

USA Today on Colorado. "Foreclosures are ripping through the rows of new homes in the flatlands where Denver turns to prairie. The foreclosure epidemic has swept so quickly through this part of Denver that in less than two years, lenders took action on 919 of the roughly 8,000 properties here, according to city records."

"'The people ultimately getting hurt here are the homeowners, often lower-income people that probably should never have been approved for a mortgage in the first place,' says Sindee Wagner, a deputy in the city's Public Trustee office."

"Dave and Suzie Evans' was a tidy, two-story house on Orleans Street,. Dave Evans admits the $182,000 mortgage they took out was more than the couple could afford, even with both working."

"'My parents taught me not to spend more than a third of your paycheck on a house, but that went out the window,' he says. They wanted to buy and fell in love with the house. For a time, it worked."

"Then Evans lost his job. The couple fell six months behind on their mortgage. Their credit cards slipped, too. And their car payment. At first, creditors called at all hours. Then even the bank stopped calling."

"'Eventually we sat down and said that's it,' Suzie Evans says. 'It was almost a relief when we got to the day when we walked out of that house, when it was over.'"

The Greeley Tribune from Colorado. "Shelley Costigan's dream seemed so real it felt tangible. The project was a way for Greeley Realtor to create business. She had done similar things on a smaller scale before. She would work with a builder to build a spec home or two, and the homes always sold."

"That was during Greeley's roaring housing market. Times, of course, have changed. With the downturn in the real estate market, building has slowed, lots planned for development sit vacant and growth rates are stagnant."

"She sold two homes right away. 'Then the market just started changing,"' she said. 'It pretty much just slowed down, totally.'"

"Greeley has about 4,000 vacant units that could be developed. 'If you look at it as a peak year, you would say we've only got about two years of capacity,' said Greg Flebbe, the senior planner with the city of Greeley. 'If you look at it as what we're expecting for this year, you've got about 20 years of capacity.'"

"During the boom years, said developer Jeff Demaske, Greeley made a good market because the prices for homes were good."

"As the housing bubble grew, however, everyone wanted a piece. The city raised its fees, farmers started charging more for land. As builders passed these costs onto the price of a new home, much of the demand dried up. It no longer made sense to commute to Loveland, when a house there cost virtually the same as one in Greeley."

"'It's our own fault to a certain extent,' Demaske said. 'There were just too many lots on the market.'"

"'I don't think it will ever get back to the growth it was,' said Costigan. 'I think part of that was because as a market, Greeley was very low in the pricing of their homes, so there was a big adjustment there.'"

"Costigan said the reasons for the slowdown are varied and complex, but she points to the housing boom itself as a contributing factor. Greeley simply over built. 'We were building quickly,' she said. 'Because for a while we had a definite need for new construction, and we just kept going and going and going.'"

"In retrospect, the housing collapse shouldn't have caught anyone by surprise. 'We should have known,' she said. 'It always goes in cycles.'"

The Arizona Daily Star. "There apparently is no shortage of deal seekers in the Green Valley real estate market. Dozens of them turned out for Saturday's auction of nine new homes in Las Campanas Village."

"The bidding came hesitantly and in increments of only $1,000 or so. Several of the winning bids landed around $140,000 plus a 10 percent auction premium. That's about $100,000 below the list prices for the two-bedroom homes, which ranged from about 1,680 to 1,760 square feet."

"The developer, Mark Hughes, called it 'a bad night in Las Vegas.'"

"Only three of the houses, those that were "absolute" with no cancellation rights, were sold after the auction. Hughes made counteroffers for the other six. Hughes said he probably will reduce the prices of his remaining houses based on the auction results."

"The winning bids 'were lower than I expected,' he said."

"A drop in prices is not welcome news for some retirees who bought at the peak. Winter resident Joe Morrow, who attended Saturday's auction, said his Green Valley house is probably worth about $150,000, compared with about $200,000 two years ago. Judging from the prices at the auction, he thought he might revise that estimate to the $120,000s or $130,000s."

"Gary Beatty, an unsuccessful bidder on two properties, said he felt sorry for other buyers in the Las Campanas neighborhood who paid in the $230,000s or more. He bid about $137,000 on both tries on behalf of a brother. The winning bids were not much higher."

"'This market is terrible right now,' he said."

From KTAR.com in Arizona. "Some homeowners facing foreclosure are finding a way to take advantage of the slumping housing market."

"As mortgages structured during the housing boom leave them with negative equity, they are purposely allowing those homes to go into foreclosure while buying another home at today's depressed prices."

"Jill Hoogendyk with Home Point Mortgage in Phoenix said it's a growing trend."

"'Many times, homeowners are upside down on their property. They can't sell the property, so they walk away,' she said, adding, 'Before they let that happen, they go and buy another property because their credit's still intact and their income justifies the other property. Then they move into that property and walk away from the property that they're unable to sell.'"

"Hoogendyk added, 'People can't afford the home they're in, so they're actually moving down to a more affordale home for them.'"

In Business Las Vegas from Nevada. "Sales during the fourth quarter for all three categories were bleak, with the 8,668 recorded representing a 50 percent drop from the fourth quarter of 2006."

"One of the hardest hit areas for single-family housing was 89146. Its prices fell 28 percent to $211,075. Another hard-hit area was east of the Strip in 89169, which has many condo conversions. Its median price fell 52 percent to $204,500."

"With about 40 percent of the existing home sales in some phase of foreclosure, Dennis Smith, president of Home Builders Research, says he expects the median price to remain at or below the current level."

"'It appears many foreclosures are now being sold by banks at roughly 35 percent to 50 percent below peak prices of 2004,' Smith says."

"Operators of the Trump International are hoping the resort will be greeted as a breath of fresh air in the Las Vegas market when the property opens its doors March 31."

"It should. The luxurious 645-foot, 64-story, $500 million hotel and tower will be smoke-free and has no casino."

"'It will be a place of refuge for our residents and guests,' said Steve Shalit, managing director. 'No clang, clang, clang sounds from slot machines anywhere in the building. And, it has a lot of Donald Trump in it.'"

"Trump International is classified as a condominium-hotel property with about 95 percent of the rooms privately owned. Studio apartments start at $700,000 and the one-bedroom units at $1.8 million. Shalit said because the tower hasn't opened yet and it's difficult to gauge how often residents will occupy their units, it's hard to tell how many rooms will be available for rent on any given day."

"Trump International is next door to the site of the proposed Plaza hotel project where the New Frontier once stood and adjacent to the construction site of Boyd Gaming's Echelon. Another new neighbor on the horizon is the Fontainebleau, across Las Vegas Boulevard."

"'Besides, we're right across the street from a spectacular shopping mall in the Fashion Show, and I'm sure many of our guests will take advantage of having those high-end stores nearby,' Shalit said."

"Shalit also said, like Mark Twain, reports of the demise of the second Trump tower in Las Vegas have been greatly exaggerated."

"'The second tower is designed and will take reservations when the market is right for it,' Shalit said."

The Record Courier from Nevada. "Local subcontractors are among the victims of the current mortgage crisis, some of them filing liens against property owned by local developer Syncon Homes."

"Dana Linehan of Tri Valley Plumbing said Syncon owes them money. Tri Valley is now being sued by one of their suppliers, but can't make those payments until they're paid by Syncon."

"'They paid us in a timely manner from 2003-05, but we started having problems in 2006-07 and now, they haven't cut us a check for four or five months,' Linehan said. 'I've been calling them, but they aren't returning my calls.'"

"Mike Hansen, division manager of Gale Building Products in Reno, said his company has written off hundreds of thousands of dollars from some Reno developers, but Syncon has done well with respect to payments."

"'Other builders are in much worse shape,' he said. 'Builders have to understand their finances better. For awhile, they were selling homes as quickly as they built them and at that point, they didn't have to understand finances.'"