A report from the Connecticut Post. "Foreclosures are so prevalent in New England that one Massachusetts-based research firm is tracking them weekly as an integral part of the real estate market. The Warren Group announced Monday it is offering a new quick-search feature listing foreclosures by state and county for subscribers. The Warren Group said there were 3,789 filings in the first quarter of 2007 in Connecticut, compared to 5,855 in the first quarter of this year."

"'It's not good,' said veteran mortgage broker and Realtor Mark Ballaro, of Fairfield. 'I don't need The Warren Group to tell me that.'"

"Ballaro, who has been in the business for 23 years, said this market is reminiscent of the 1990s, when sales and prices crashed. 'Im showing the places,' Ballaro said. But he's not getting many offers and those he does get are often $100,000 less than the asking price."

"These days are a far cry from 2005 and 2006, when the 'asking price was the starting price,' he said, which meant a higher sales price. Buyers are thinking, 'Why should I buy now, when next year I could buy for less?' Ballaro said."

"Todd Martin, of Fairfield-based Todd P. Martin Economic Services, agreed the problem in Connecticut is similar to the 1990s in that there is too much supply."

"Martin said the real estate agents he talks to say there are people putting their homes on the market to see what kinds of bids are out there. They're not selling because they have to move, Martin said, they're seeing whether they can turn a profit."

"During the week of May 9 to May 16, there were 237 foreclosure filings in Connecticut courts, according to The Warren Group. New Haven County had the highest number of new filings that week, with 77. Hartford County had 65 and Fairfield County 46."

The New Haven Independent from Connecticut. "When they knocked on the door of L & S Mortgage, Delroy Reid and Debra Willoughby just wanted to buy a home. After getting lured into buying a broken-down house through an alleged mortgage fraud scam, they found themselves knee-deep in sewage - and debt. The unwitting first-time homebuyers have gone to court to try to recover."

"'We got suckered,' said Willoughby, a heavyset mother of nine struggling with cancer and unemployment. She was brought to the point of tears as she recounted how she and her partner, two low-income, unsophisticated first-time homebuyers, got swindled into buying a home they would never have wanted for a price they could never afford."

"Jan. 18, 2006, the couple signed a Purchase and Sale Agreement to buy the Hobart Street home for $395,000. 'We were really happy,' recalled Willoughby. 'I was like, oh my God, I really got a house!'"

"On April 17, 2006, just before the closing, L & S told Reid the home was not available, but he could have 192-194 Winthrop Ave. instead. In an admittedly unwise move, the couple agreed to close on the home the next morning - without ever taking a look inside or seeing an appraisal."

"As a result of the alleged false application, Reid got hooked onto a loan he would have no way of supporting...a subprime loan that stayed at $2,100 per month for the first two years, then ballooned - by over 50 percent - after the two-year mark."

"The biggest surprise of all came when the couple entered the house. 'As soon as you hit the kitchen, you had the biggest hole, and water leaking,' Willoughby recalled. There was trash all over the house."

"'I was pissed,' said Willoughby. 'Look at this shit.' The third-floor apartment had 25 violations disqualifying it from Section 8 funding."

"'It's just a raggedy-ass mess,' Willoughby said."

"But the battle has been a losing one. The couple, both of whom are now unemployed, have failed to make mortgage payments since December. 'The bank account went down, down, down, until there was nothing,' Willoughby recalled. 'We livin' up in this house with stress. Stress, stress, stress, stress, stress.'"

"'We would have been better sitting back in an apartment, not owning a home,' she said. 'They really took advantage of us, they really did.'"

The Boston Globe from Massachusetts. "MassHousing said yesterday it is teaming up with real estate agents on the weekend of May 30 to host home-buying fairs and open houses for properties listed at prices that qualify for MassHousing's loan program for moderate- and middle-income buyers."

"The agency makes loans for houses priced up to $428,000 in high-cost housing markets in Eastern Massachusetts, such as Somerville, Cambridge, Dover, and Nahant, and as high as $396,000 in communities such as Lawrence, Andover, and Boxford. In Western Massachusetts, the maximum price is $273,500."

"The median price for a single-family house declined 8.4 percent in April, to $315,000, according to the Massachusetts Association of Realtors."

"'We're going to have listing sheets right there for homes in the area that fall within the purchase price limits,' said Thomas Gleason, MassHousing's executive director."

"During the housing boom, many low- and moderate-income buyers flocked to subprime mortgages that were aggressively marketed by loan brokers. But many could not afford those high-rate loans, and a record number of Massachusetts homeowners are now facing foreclosure."

Gleason said that home buyer courses are filling up in the wake of the subprime mortgage crisis. 'People are saying we're going to do it right because we've seen what happens when we do it wrong,' he said."

"Sometime late next year, the first residents are expected to move into the brick town houses and contemporary Colonial homes built on what was once an airstrip for Navy A-4 Skyhawks flying training missions for the Vietnam War."

"These newcomers are supposed to be pioneers in one of the biggest residential developments in Massachusetts, the transformation of the 1,400-acre South Weymouth Naval Air Station into SouthField, a trendy 'urban village.'"

"But its long-awaited launch could hardly come at a worse time. As housing sales plummet across the country, no one knows whether this grand enterprise will turn into the next hot spot for young families or something closer to a desolate outpost in the woods."

"'You know the old saying, if you build it, they will come,' said Robert W. Terravecchia Jr., the president of Weymouth Bank who served for two years on a commission overseeing the project. 'Well, what if you build it and no one comes?'"

"In Concord, the developer of a luxury condominium complex completed last year auctioned off 25 of the 58 units after they failed to sell. In Braintree, the developer of another luxury condo complex completed last year auctioned off 10 units after just 12 of the first 24 sold, with the rest of the 304-unit complex still on the drawing board."

"An LNR marketing study identifies the development's biggest target audience as 'upwardly mobile young adults migrating out of Boston, as well as Gen-Xers from neighboring communities.' The study also features photos of a family picnicking and a gray-haired couple drinking coffee in a cafe."

"'We have our foot on the gas right now, and the feedback we're getting back from the market now is we should not let up,' said Kevin R. Chase, VP of LNR's Northeast region.

"Houses will be sold at prices that Chase said are equal to or less than current market rates; 10 percent will be offered at more affordable rates under state guidelines. They will include 3,000-square-foot 'golf homes' near the links that will retail for about $825,000, 2,500-square-foot 'garden courts' with yards that will sell for about $687,000, and 1,000-square-foot condos that will sell for about $275,000."

"'The biggest impediment to this thing actually doing well is the economy: Can this particular region on the South Shore absorb that many homes over the next 10, 20 years?' Terravecchia said. 'It's really not the best time in the world to be trying to sell brand-new construction.'"

The Boston Herald from Massachusetts. "In South Boston...a pair of high-powered local developers, after initially planning high-end condos, has shifted gears and will build 139 apartments on the former Cardinal Cushing High School site."

"The decision comes amid a tough sales market for new condos, one that has seen other for-sale projects near North Station and in the Charlestown Navy Yard go rental."

"The $61 million project takes shape not far from a pair of expensive condo high-rise projects. Slated to open in fall 2009, rents at the West Broadway apartment complex will range from $1,800 to $4,000 a month."

"'The city is really excited that there is new housing going up in this area,' said Jessica Shumaker, a spokeswoman for the Boston Redevelopment Authority. 'For many years nobody lived around the Broadway T station because it was primarily commercial.'"

The Long Island Business News from New York. "The number of personal bankruptcies on Long Island is way up in 2008, another sign that mounting mortgage defaults and the climbing prices of necessities like food and energy are taking a toll on locals."

"Thousands of Long Islanders whose home prices have declined are finding they have little or no equity left in their homes to draw on."

"'When the economy is in recession, or even in subpar growth, all the borrowings that people made in the good times come back to haunt them,' said Pearl Kamer, chief economist at the Long Island Association."

"Many homeowners have turned to bankruptcy as a way to stall foreclosure filings, which jumped 11 percent on Long Island in the first quarter compared to the prior-year period."

"'You can literally file a bankruptcy case five minutes before the auction is about to go off and stop a foreclosure proceeding,' said Pat Collins, chair of the bankruptcy law committee for the Nassau County Bar Association."

From Reuters on New York. "As foreclosed properties stack up in up-market areas of Long Island, New York, one company is capitalizing by taking potential buyers around the empty homes."

"'People have been evicted, it's a terrible thing,' David Farrell, director of tourism of the Long Island Foreclosure Tours told Reuters TV. 'But for the most part people have been out of their homes for six months, a year. The people who lost, lost a long time ago. Banks lost, homeowners lost. Now what we have are two people who can win.'"

"'This is devastating to see how these beautiful houses, and up and coming neighborhoods can be so dilapidated, so gutted,' said prospective buyer Cathy Germaine from Franklin Square, Long Island, who was on one of the tours."

"But she said she was 'sick and tired of renting' and was looking for a property to buy with her fiancee."

"Among houses on the tree-lined tour was a $372,500 four-bedroom property in New Hyde Park which the previous buyer paid $475,000 for a few years ago, according to Farrell. Another with three bedrooms in the same neighborhood which went for $550,000 in 2006 is now on the market for $324,900."

"Farrell said of the properties he was showing on Saturday the majority could be purchased for less than the cost to rent. 'To me, that's intrinsic value in real estate -- when you can live in a house and every month your bills are lower than they'd be as a rental. It's hard to lose if you're a long-term purchaser and it costs less every month to buy than to rent.'"

The Associated Press on New York. "In the past, people who sold their own homes could pocket the commission that otherwise goes to a broker. But in today's tough housing market, doing it yourself isn't so easy."

"'Two years ago, homes were selling overnight, and all you really needed was a yard sign,' said Steve Udelson, CEO of a resource site for buyers and sellers."

"In Brooklyn, Sheryl Miller put her two-family house up for sale last summer. After living there for 10 years and making significant upgrades, she thought her first offer of $700,000 was too low. The house appraised at $800,000; her asking price was $750,000."

"She decided to wait. 'If I could do it again, I'd price it below $750,000, but try to keep it above $700,000,' Miller said. 'I should've priced more aggressively. I lost out on that opportunity.'"

"After three months with no other offers, Miller took it off the market. The dream of her family living life at a slower pace in Maryland will have to wait."

The Press of Atlantic City from New Jersey. "The latest positive numbers for home sales and prices have divided real estate agents, ordinarily a group uniformly upbeat about the housing market."

"Some doubt the numbers, even though they're from their own association, and say it's making it tougher to get home sellers to reduce their prices to more realistic levels.

"Kevin Dawe, a real estate agent in Northfield, said last week's report that the median home price in the Atlantic City area rose 4.8 percent in the first quarter didn't match what he's been seeing."

"'As we talk to our sellers about the declining market we are actually facing and the fact that they have to be aggressive in pricing their homes if they expect to find a buyer, the statistics in your article are baffling and impact our credibility with customers,' Dawe said."

"To Eileen Raynes, an agent in Margate, the higher sales and price figures were a very welcome break from media coverage she described as 'standing on a corner screaming 'Get your dead fish.'"

"Bruce E. Breunig Jr., broker in Margate, admitted that 'we Realtors remain part of the problem. We blame the media for fueling the downturn and try to counterbalance it with our own positive spin.'"