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Strategies & Market Trends : The Residential Real Estate Crash Index -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Smiling Bob who wrote (124386)	5/21/2008 11:14:00 AM
From: Jim McMannis	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 306849

Vacation Home Rentals Increasing in Popularity Amid Rising Hotel Prices biz.yahoo.com Vacation Rental Market Growing Despite Real Estate Downturn BOSTON, MA--(MARKET WIRE)--May 20, 2008 -- Despite the dark U.S. real estate market, individuals that own a second home and make it available as a vacation rental are seeing pure sunshine. In March, the Vacation Rental Management Association (VRMA) announced that the vacation rental industry saw a 17.4% revenue increase in 2007. The $80B domestic vacation rental market continues to benefit from rising hotel prices and second-home owners looking for additional sources of income. Vacationers are quickly discovering that renting a vacation home often provides a more spacious, personal and economic lodging experience when compared to hotels.

To: Smiling Bob who wrote (124386)	5/21/2008 11:48:50 AM
From: Jim McMannis	Respond to of 306849

Soaring Foreclosure Numbers Mean More Prey for Vulture Funds Banks Desperate to Unload Distressed Properties Turn to Private Equity Firms sdbj.com As more homes fall into foreclosure, banks are packaging pools of foreclosed homes and wholesaling them to private equity “vulture funds” for pennies on the dollar. While the phrase vulture fund conjures up cold-blooded opportunists, the funds are buying assets that banks are desperately trying to move off their books to free up capital. Basically, anyone in the market with $3 million to $100 million or more to buy a block of REO, or real estate owned, properties could be called a vulture fund. National investors such as The Blackstone Group and Lehman Bros. Inc. have reportedly purchased billions of dollars of foreclosed properties through private equity funds......................