Fort Myers: 'Perfect Storm' for Foreclosures

President Barack Obama takes his pitch on the road today to Fort Myers, Fla., an area hit hard by unemployment and rising foreclosures. My younger brother Les lived in Fort Myers many years ago, and I thought it was such...

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February 10, 2009 | Permalink | User Comments (26)

A little Christmas present from Odell Barnes

Bad news out today about the housing market: sales of single-family homes down 8 percent in November from the previous month, and the median price of a home down 13 percent from the same time last year. Not a pretty...

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December 23, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (3)

On Fifth Avenue with Tim Gunn

I know this is the Realty Check blog, but stay with me here. Bad subprime mortgages led to financial market meltdown which led to fashion retrenchment (no pun intended), and that leads to my shoot with Project Runway guru Tim...

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November 25, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (3)

The Hidden Costs of Homeownership

In our Odell Barnes piece Tuesday night on Nightline, we showed pictures of a variety of houses. Tiny neat bungalows... a lovely brick cottage... a moderate-sized brick tudor... and a beautiful salmon-colored brick colonial, measuring 5,000 square feet, that is...

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November 21, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (5)

Response from Odell Barnes

Apologies... We posted Odell's response on Thursday, but in a hard-to-find spot on our site... Here it is today, hopefully where you would expect to find it... VM I appreciate all of the messages you have posted to the story...

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November 21, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (49)

Odell Barnes to Respond Tomorrow

We at ABC News and "Nightline" are both heartened and saddened by the number of responses we've received to the story we aired last night on real estate investor Odell Barnes. Heartened because we love hearing from you and knowing...

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November 19, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (131)

Secondhand Timeshares

Lo those many months ago I wrote about my Aunt Liz's rude awakening when she tried to sell her timeshare -- the one she and her late husband purchased four years ago for more than $50,000... which we've discovered is...

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November 14, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (21)

Realty Check: Are Timeshares Risky?

Tonight on 'Nightline' Vicki Mabrey will revisit the topic of timeshares and the many problems that can come with them. Tonight's report emerged after Vicki decided to blog about the topic a few months ago. On June 12th, she blogged...

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November 14, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (9)

Who's to Blame for the Mortgage Meltdown?

Vicki Mabrey Reports: A lot of ABC viewers have written in expressing anger at Melanie Bruce, a homeowner in Phoenix that we profiled on the Friday, October 17th edition of "Nightline." Melanie graciously opened her home and her life to...

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October 20, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (10)

Kwame Kilpatrick Doesn't Live Here Anymore

Vicki Mabrey reports: Kwame Kilpatrick, Detroit’s embattled mayor, has finally left the building. The Manoogian Mansion, to be exact. That's the name of the 4,000-square-foot Italian- and Spanish-influenced residence where Detroit's mayors live. The mansion, built in 1928 for $300,000,...

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September 22, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (11)