Seeking Alpha - "Housing Is Tumbling Even Faster Than Reported" (5-22-07)

"Real Estate Consultant John Burns has looked at the housing data and reached a rather interesting conclusion: 'The housing market has softened much more than is being reported.' Given all the negative news coverage, that's almost hard to believe. But John does a good job dissecting the data, and he is now concerned that both the publicly disseminated New and Existing Home Sales information is misleading. Even worse, he fears, is that policy makers are relying on this bad data to conclude that the housing market correction has not been too severe."

Yahoo - "Robert Shiller: Mr. Worst-case scenario" (5-22-07)

"Robert Shiller is worried about your home's value, and that's not good. A finance and economics professor at Yale, Shiller proved he could see a crash coming with his book "Irrational Exuberance," which forecast the end of the 1990s stock bubble and hit bookstores in March 2000 - almost to the day the Nasdaq started to collapse. Today, Shiller believes homes are roughly as overvalued as stocks were then and, once again, he's worth listening to."

Bloomberg - "Fremont Sells Commercial Lending Unit, Replaces CEO" (5-22-07)

"Fremont General Corp., whose loans to risky borrowers helped trigger the subprime mortgage crisis, agreed to sell its commercial real-estate unit for $1.9 billion and replaced its top three executives. IStar Financial Inc. will buy the commercial lending business, which has about 166 employees, said Daniel Hilley, a spokesman for Santa Monica, California-based Fremont. Shares of the company surged as much as 46 percent, and subprime lenders including NovaStar Financial Inc. also gained."

Yahoo - "Stocks Can't Fall? Check Out REITs' Retreat" (5-22-07)

"Back in early February, the real estate investment trust sector was the cat's meow -- it could do no wrong. Despite my pooh-poohing the sector's seemingly ridiculous popularity (and valuations) on Street Insight and even in a Barron's editorial, the group marched ever higher. Premiums to net asset value were at all-time record highs, dividend yields were at all-time lows (seemingly disconnected from the level of interest rates), multiples to funds from operations hit historically high levels -- and the entire sector was seen as takeover fodder."

Dr. Housing Bubble - "Housing Corruption and Greed: The Broken Windows Theory and Fundamental Attribution Error." (5-22-07)

"Have you ever wondered why many mortgage brokers and real estate agents try to hard sell you on a property or a unique mortgage? Those with dogmatic views usually try to convince themselves as much as they try to convince other people; they have a vested interest in believing that nothing negative can ever happen to real estate. And with this, you create a business culture where anything goes and financial prudence is thrown out the window. And speaking of windows, this brings us to the Broken Window Theory and how it applies to the current housing market."

The News-Press - "Bad loans saddle area banks" (5-22-07)

"Area banks are racking up millions of dollars in bad debt, thanks to the softening real estate market in Southwest Florida. Five Southwest Florida banks had a combined $57.5 million in outstanding construction and land loans that weren't being paid, according to records from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. for the first quarter of 2007."

Seeking Alpha - "San Bernardino County Not Recession-Proof: Wishful Thinking Won't Work" (5-22-07)

"I read an article Thursday in which the manager of Tarbell Realtors in Upland, CA was quoted as saying "At this point, at least, San Bernardino County housing is recession-proof." - Bill Velto. This is so wrong, it flies in the face of ALL the housing data. Resale prices have been going down in the County and in Upland for over a year, double digit in some areas. Oversupply conditions exist in most markets with some having over a 3-year supply."