Real Estate

NEW YORK (AP) - Regulators shut down San Joaquin Bank in California on Friday, marking the 99th failure this year of a federally insured bank.   Full Story

WASHINGTON -- Aspiring homebuyers rushed to take advantage of a tax credit for first-time owners that expires in November, driving up the number of signed sales contracts for the seventh straight month in August.   Full Story

NEW YORK (AP) - Regulators shut down two banking units of Irwin Financial Corp. Friday, marking the 93rd and 94th failures this year of federally insured banks.   Full Story

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Federal Reserve for the first time would police banks' pay policies to make sure they don't encourage excessive risk taking under a plan the Fed is drafting.   Full Story

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) - Federal regulators on Friday said they seized Corus Bancshares Inc., a major Chicago-based lender to condominium, office and hotel projects, adding it to the long list of banks that have succumbed this year to the recession and waves of loan defaults.   Full Story

WASHINGTON (AP) - Regulators on Friday shut down Guaranty Bank, a big Texas-based lender felled by losses on loans to homebuilders and borrowers, in the second-largest U.S. bank failure this year.   Full Story

WASHINGTON (AP) - Regulators on Friday shut down Colonial BancGroup Inc., a lender in real estate development, in the biggest U.S. bank failure this year, and also closed four banks in Arizona, Nevada and Pennsylvania.   Full Story

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) - Community bank failures are accelerating and some experts believe as many as 100 may go under this year, the most in 16 years. Many of the banks were caught up in lending money to developers to build neighborhood strip malls and other commercial or industrial buildings that in this recession have attracted too few tenants or sit empty.   Full Story

You're paying your bills, but your landlord isn't. And you're the one holding the eviction notice.   Full Story