Bloomberg - "Schwab May Pay Half-a-Quarter Profit on Fund Losses" (6-10-08)

"Charles Schwab Corp., the largest U.S. online brokerage, may pay the equivalent of half a quarter's profit, or about $260 million, to win public-relations points by settling investors' claims over losses in a bond fund with subprime holdings. The San Francisco-based company is accused in eight proposed class-action suits of misleading investors by describing its YieldPlus mutual fund in prospectuses as only 'marginally' riskier than cash. From last July 1 through April 30, investors lost about $1.3 billion, said Boston-based Financial Research Corp., which tracks investment flows for 35,000 funds."

Realty Times - "Interest Rate Update" (6-10-08)

"Inflationary fears have rates on the rise. Wall Street is keeping a close eye on any hint of rising prices and that’s going to translate into higher rates. If you like today’s rates you might think about locking in."

Realty Times - "Home Equity Stakes Stumped" (6-10-08)

"The equity stake in Americans' most important asset has dropped to its lowest level since the end of the second World War. Home owners' home equity slipped to 46.2 percent in the first quarter this year, the fifth consecutive quarter the rate was below the 50 percent market, according to the Federal Reserve's first quarter Flow of Funds report."

Realty Times - "Realty Viewpoint: Good News Cautiously Follows Rocky Week" (6-10-08)

"Rocked by four dollar per gallon gas, rising unemployment to 5.5 percent and a steep stock market decline, the nation is ready for some good news, and it just might come from the housing sector. The National Association of Realtors April Pending Home Sales Index stopped its nearly three-month slide, and rose 6.3 percent to a reading of 88.2. That's still well off the 101.5 reading in April 2006, but significantly better than the March 2008 index of 83."

Orange County Register - "Rents seen falling 3.1% at big O.C. complexes" (6-10-08)

"Preliminary numbers for this April and May show average rents in the second quarter at $1,657. Although that was up 1.5% from the second quarter of 2007, rents were down sequentially for the last two quarters. The second quarter dropped 0.7% from first quarter and the first quarter was off 0.8% from the fourth quarter of last year."

Orange County Register - "O.C. mortgage delinquency rate climbs faster than state, nation" (6-10-08)

"the bad news: O.C.’s delinquency rate increased more dramatically quarter-to-quarter, rising 32 percent, vs. California’s rate rising 25 percent and the nation’s rising just 8 percent. It seems delinquencies are leveling off across the country, while still climbing in the Golden State."

Orange County Register - "O.C. to cut property taxes for 116,000" (6-10-08)

"The Orange County Assessor’s Office has announced that about 100,000 houses and condos and about 16,000 timeshares will see their property taxes go down next year because of declining home values. But the majority of the 570,000 homeowners in Orange County won’t get a tax break next year, even though home values have fallen on average 20 percent in the past 12 months."