Photo: U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development

Faulty Appraisals Harming Housing and the Economy

Twenty-six percent of builders are seeing signed sales contracts fall through the cracks because appraisals on their homes are coming in below the contract sales price, according to a nationwide survey conducted by NAHB.

“Home builders are increasingly concerned that inappropriate appraisal practices are needlessly driving down home values. This, in turn, is slowing new home sales, causing more workers to lose their jobs and putting a drag on the economic recovery,” said NAHB Chairman Joe Robson. ...

AD&C Credit Crunch Imperils Housing-Led Economic Recovery

As the scarcity of credit for building new homes remains a major obstacle to the full-fledged housing recovery needed to lead the nation’s struggling economy to higher ground, participants at a June 25 NAHB audio seminar on the AD&C lending crisis reported that the association is making steady progress on this issue.

Case studies from builders and developers who have experienced financing difficulties have been a key component of NAHB’s efforts to alert policy makers to the problem. More than 125 examples of how the AD&C credit crunch has been harming businesses have been collected at www.nahb.org/adccasestudy, and panelists encouraged association members to continue to report on the financial constraints they have been encountering. ...

I-9 Audit Notices Issued at Record Pace

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on July 1 issued formal I-9 Notices of Inspection letters to 652 businesses nationwide — 149 more audit notices in a single day than were issued in all of 2008. Businesses both large and small were targeted, with 40% of those being notified that they would be audited having fewer than 20 employees.

As reported in the May 11 issue of Nation’s Building News, The Department of Homeland Security's new “Worksite Enforcement Strategy” is shifting the focus of immigration law enforcement from illegal workers to employers. ...