WASHINGTON -- The housing rescue bill passed by the Senate Saturday hasn't been signed into law, but top Democrats already are putting pressure on regulators and bankers to make sure a major program to prevent foreclosures doesn't fall flat.

For struggling U.S. homeowners, the success or failure of the program -- which would let roughly 400,000 owners refinance into affordable, government-backed loans -- depends largely on bankers' willingness to take a partial loss on the loans and to reduce the amount of money borrowers owe.

Although a bill aimed at reviving home sales and curtailing foreclosures is about to become law, some of its provisions are proving a drag for the nation's large home builders.

Despite a rally Tuesday, the Dow Jones Wilshire U.S. Home Construction Index, which tracks the stocks of major builders, has fallen about 8.5% since President George W. Bush indicated last week that he wouldn't veto the bill that has been approved by Congress.

Home vegetable gardening is surging thanks to rising food prices and health scares with commercial supplies. But at the rarified end of this horticultural renaissance is a world of backyard produce that has more in common with designer boutiques than the local farm stand.

America's shopping venues are getting an international makeover as moderately priced apparel retailers from Europe, Asia and Canada increasingly set up shop in the U.S.

Reuters Beverly Center in Los Angeles added 12 foreign retailers in the last two years.

The housing legislation that is close to becoming law may help as many as 500,000 cash-strapped homeowners avoid foreclosure, by assisting them in refinancing into more-affordable government-backed mortgages.

COUNSELING RESOURCES FOR STRUGGLING HOMEOWNERS • Neighborhood Assistance Corp. of Americanaca.com 1-888-302-6222• ACORNacorn.org 1-866-672-2676• Homeownership Preservation Foundation995hope.org 1-888-995-4673• HomeFree-USAhomefreeusa.org 1-866-696-2329

Supermodel Gisele Bündchen and quarterback Tom Brady have both re-listed their former Manhattan pads. Ms. Bündchen is now asking $5.9 million for her West Village penthouse, a bit more than half of her original asking price last September. Her boyfriend, the New England Patriots quarterback, wants $18.29 million for his Time Warner Center condominium, roughly 10% more than he asked last year.

The medical examiner in Arizona's Maricopa County said Wednesday that Scott Coles, the late chief executive of real-estate lender Mortgages Ltd., died on June 2 as a result of suicide induced by alcohol, the painkiller oxycodone and zolpidem, a prescription medication used in sleeping pills.

The Wall Street Journal profiled Mr. Coles, who was 48 years old, and Mortgages Ltd. in a page-one article July 16. He had built the 45-year-old company, which was founded by his father, into one of Arizona's biggest private lenders to commercial real-estate developers, including those building some of Phoenix's highest-profile condominium and retail projects.

A cadre of state-court judges scrutinizing foreclosure actions in a string of recent rulings have discovered flaws in documents that borrowers may be able to use to keep their homes.

The judges, including a committee from the Kings County Supreme Court in Brooklyn, N.Y., are highlighting shortcuts taken by mortgage companies in court filings, which borrowers might be able to exploit when facing foreclosure.

WASHINGTON -- James B. Lockhart III has spent the past two years telling almost anyone who would listen that the obscure federal agency he heads needed more power to do its job -- regulating the two government-backed providers of funding for mortgages, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Now Congress, after years of deadlock, is finally about to grant more power to the minders of Fannie and Freddie. And Mr. Lockhart will have to figure out how best to use that power.

SHANGHAI -- Outside a little convenience store, Shen Zaijie tells a tale of woe. According to a raging local rumor, a section of Shanghai will soon become the site of Walt Disney Co.'s long-anticipated theme park in mainland China. Mr. Shen tells passersby that the park might force him out of a two-year lease he just signed to operate a printing business.

Nobody buys the line. "Liar!" interjects a man listening to the story, as others join in to denounce the claim. Shifting in his brown flip-flops, Mr. Shen admits he doesn't have any employees or printing orders to go with his business license.

WASHINGTON -- A sprawling bill that reaches deep into the U.S. housing industry is close to becoming law, in what will likely stand as the federal government's most expansive effort to stabilize the mortgage and financial markets.

The bill, which began seven months ago as a modest attempt to help struggling homeowners, will now likely touch a vast array of borrowers, lenders, and investors: from owners in Colorado facing foreclosure to community banks in California and investment banks on Wall Street.

The number of U.S. workers filing new claims for unemployment benefits soared last week, suggesting no stabilization is in sight for labor markets.

Initial claims for jobless benefits rose 34,000 to 406,000 after seasonal adjustments in the week ended July 19, the Labor Department said. It matched the level of late March, which was the highest since September 2005, after Hurricane Katrina.

WASHINGTON -- The chief of the mortgage industry's most powerful lobby group resigned Tuesday, just as the industry is defending itself from a hostile Congress and a punishing housing slump.

Jonathan Kempner, president and chief executive of the 2,400-member Mortgage Bankers Association, will step down when his contract ends Dec. 31, he said. He will be succeeded by former board Chairman John Courson, who coordinates the association's state-level lobbying. Mr. Courson immediately will take the post of the association's chief operating officer.

Home-mortgage rates are nearing their highest levels in a year, adding to pressures on the already weak housing market.

Rates on conforming 30-year fixed-rate mortgages rose by nearly 0.40 percentage point in the past week to an average of 6.71%, according to HSH Associates in Pompton Plains, N.J. Rates on jumbo loans, which are too big to be eligible for purchase by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, currently average 7.84%.

The higher rates are making it more difficult for borrowers to refinance and putting another crimp on weak home sales. "It's a tough market and rates going up isn't helping it," said Steve Walsh, a mortgage broker in Scottsdale, Ariz.

The first tenants won't move into Vista del Sol in Tempe, Ariz., until next month, but its nearly 2,000 beds have been preleased for months. Cancellations aren't a concern: There's a lengthy waiting list for tenants eager to live in a resort-like setting with pool, fitness center and theater.

The secret is location, location, location. Vista del Sol is a private development that will house college students on the campus of Arizona State University. Across the country, more colleges are starting to loosen their grip on campus housing and strike deals with specialized developers to help meet housing needs. Modern dorms built and managed by professional real-estate companies can help colleges recruit and retain students while freeing up funds needed to improve classrooms, upgrade facilities and provide financial assistance.

WASHINGTON -- House and Senate leaders have largely hammered out a compromise deal on a mammoth housing package that would permit the government to bolster Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in an emergency, overhaul supervision of the housing-finance giants and allow the government to insure up to $300 billion in refinanced mortgages.

The deal comes after tense negotiations and is likely to remain a source of contention when the House of Representatives votes Wednesday. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Tuesday that a temporary measure to prop up Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could cost the government as much as $25 billion. And despite repeated White House veto threats, lawmakers plan to include a $4 billion program that would allow local governments to buy and rehabilitate foreclosed properties.

Bank examiners from the Federal Reserve and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency are looking at the books of mortgage investors Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, a person familiar with the situation said.

The examiners are working with the two companies' main regulator, the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, or Ofheo, this person said. This joint effort to assess the financial condition of the two government-sponsored companies was first reported by the New York Times Web site late Monday.

WASHINGTON -- U.S. home prices fell 0.3% from April to May, the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight said Tuesday.

Additionally, the government agency, which overseas mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, said U.S. home prices fell 4.8% for the 12 months ending in May.

Ofheo's monthly index is based on the purchase prices of houses backing mortgages that have been purchased or guaranteed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Decades of white flight transformed America's cities. That era is drawing to a close.

In Washington, a historically black church is trying to attract white members to survive. Atlanta's next mayoral race is expected to feature the first competitive white candidate since the 1980s. San Francisco has lost so many African-Americans that Mayor Gavin Newsom created an "African-American Out-Migration Task Force and Advisory Committee" to help retain black residents.

Federal officials heap much of the blame for the subprime mortgage mess on lenders, claiming they recklessly made too many high-cost home loans to borrowers who couldn't afford them.

It turns out that the U.S. government itself was one of the lenders giving out high-interest, subprime mortgages, some of them predatory, according to government documents filed in federal court.

WASHINGTON -- House Democrats negotiating a rescue of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac said they wouldn't exempt the proposal from the annual debt limit, a move designed to quell lawmakers' concerns that the Treasury's financial aid could be unlimited.

Mortgage giant Freddie Mac -- emboldened by emergency regulatory actions that have triggered a two-day rebound in its battered stock -- is considering raising capital by selling as much as $10 billion in new shares to investors, according to people familiar with the matter.

The selling of new shares would have the potential to avoid a full-blown government rescue for Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, twin keystones of the U.S. housing market. The publicly traded, government-sponsored companies own or guarantee about $5.2 trillion of home mortgages, or nearly half the total outstanding, and are at the center of government efforts to prop up the sagging housing market.

Nicolas Cage could be leaving Las Vegas.

Marin County, Calif., estate Locksley Hall

The "National Treasure" star is asking $9.95 million for a 14,000-square-foot home there with garage parking for 16 cars, real-estate records and listing information show. The home has been on the market since late fall, but Mr. Cage's ownership wasn't disclosed.

The hottest trend this decade in shopping-center development has gone cold.

Known as lifestyle centers, the open-air shopping venues offer small parks, fountains and cafés amid name-brand retailers selling fashion apparel, housewares and other discretionary fare. Developers raced to add new ones as they became popular with shoppers, especially women between 20 and 50 years old, a coveted category. Meantime, construction of traditional enclosed malls all but stopped.

BEIJING -- Predictions that half-a-million overseas visitors would attend the Olympics accelerated a surge of hotel construction here. Now, with the Games less than a month away, all that building may have produced a glut of rooms in one of the world's prized hotel markets.

Las Vegas

Illustration by Sean McCabe; Photo by Robert Gallagher/Wonderful Machine for The Wall Street Journal Sam Nazarian

A black Maybach 57 rolls down the Strip ferrying another big dreamer. The luxury sedan passes the glittering gambling palaces and heads north to the Sahara Hotel & Casino, an aging, down-on-its-luck landmark that hardly seems fit for this well-heeled passenger. Except that he's the owner.

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration's hastily arranged strategy to stabilize Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac came under siege on Capitol Hill, as Republicans tried to slow it down and Democrats moved to marry it with a program the White House has threatened to veto.

In most markets, home buyers have the upper hand these days. That often means they have greater negotiating power when it comes to price or the ability to squeeze out extra perks from sellers.

But on occasion, they will ask a seller for even more, a request that will help get to know the home better. They will ask to sleep over.

As reality programs such as TLC's "Date My House" and HGTV's "Sleep On It" show buyers spending a considerable amount of time -- and sometimes an entire night -- in homes they are considering, some buyers in the real world are getting the chance to do the same.

NEW DELHI -- Amid the debris of a battered Indian real-estate sector, some analysts say investment bargains may be emerging. Their favorites: blue-chip property companies DLF and Unitech.

This has been a miserable year for Indian property stocks. Rising inflation and interest rates have delivered a double whammy: Capital is more expensive, and consumers are scaling back spending.

"The real-estate sector has been witnessing a cash crunch," says Shaleen Silori, a real-estate associate at ICICI Securities in Mumbai.

(See Corrections and Amplifications item below.)

Mortgage insurers have been dramatically tightening their standards throughout the U.S., further squeezing potential home buyers.

Stung by growing defaults, lenders are offering borrowers fewer ways to avoid purchasing private mortgage insurance. Mortgage insurance, required for buyers who are unable to make a full down payment or who have insufficient credit histories, reimburses lenders in the event of a borrower default. But over the past few months, mortgage insurers have been declaring more and more of the U.S. a "declining market," raising the requirements and making such insurance harder to obtain. The result: another hurdle for home buyers, and yet another wrenching change for the struggling housing market.

After months of struggling with a life-threatening glut of debt, shopping-center giant Centro Properties Group agreed to sell 29 U.S. properties for $714 million in a deal being closely scrutinized as a measure of how far commercial real-estate values have fallen.

WASHINGTON -- Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson took the lead in crafting a rescue plan for ailing mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, a move that appears to have staved off an imminent crisis but one that draws the federal government into an ever bigger role managing the American economy.

Mr. Paulson ordered his staffers to draw up contingency plans at the end of June, almost two weeks before such a move became public Sunday. He quickly persuaded the Federal Reserve to participate. As recently as a Friday breakfast between Mr. Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, such a move had been only briefly discussed.

WASHINGTON -- The U.S. Senate passed an extensive package of housing legislation Friday, reacting to the continuing erosion of home prices and growing foreclosures by taking their most aggressive step yet to address the housing crisis.

Despite the vote, which came after weeks of political wrangling, House and Senate lawmakers will still need to overcome a number of impediments before President George W. Bush can sign the bill into law.

The U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve, capping a weekend of high-stakes maneuvering, attempted to shore up confidence in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac by announcing a plan that placed the federal government firmly behind the battered mortgage giants.

In a statement timed to precede the opening of Asian markets Monday, as well as a closely watched auction of debt by Freddie, the Treasury said it plans to seek approval from Congress for a temporary increase in a longstanding Treasury line of credit for the two companies.

Grubb & Ellis Co., a struggling Chicago real-estate-services company, said its chief executive, Scott D. Peters, has resigned, about seven months after taking office.

Independent Director Gary H. Hunt will be interim CEO while the company searches for a permanent successor.

Mr. Peters' resignation follows that of Anthony Thompson, who resigned as chairman in February, and Robert Osbrink, who resigned in June as executive vice-president.

In the latest in a series of ultrahigh-end Palm Beach listings and sales, a Florida car dealer is asking $72.5 million for a house -- almost three times what he paid in 2003.

The recently renovated main house, built circa 1924 and designed by veteran Palm Beach architect Addison Mizner, has nine bedrooms, 15 bathrooms, a movie theater with a ticket window and concession stand, an exercise room, a wine cellar and a private generator: all told, about 30,500 square feet. A pool, large pool house and two three-car garages, each with a second-floor guest apartment, are also included.

The Russians are coming.

As many of America's wealthy are roiled by the credit crisis and general financial gloom, a growing number of rich Russians are house-shopping -- and buying -- in costly U.S. enclaves.

Fertilizer mogul Dmitry Rybolovlev is set to pay nearly $100 million to Donald Trump for an oceanfront mansion in Palm Beach, Fla., say people familiar with the deal reached in May. Last year, Oleg Baibakov, president of GSC City, a Moscow construction-management and consulting firm, bought a condo at Manhattan's Time Warner Center for $13.5 million, according to public records.

As the crisis worsens for mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is insisting that any potential government rescue plan not benefit the companies' shareholders, according to people familiar with the matter.

The two stockholder-owned, government-sponsored companies, whose operations are vital to the functioning of the U.S. housing market, faced a severe crisis of confidence after a week in which their stocks each lost nearly half their value. On Friday, Freddie Mac finished the day at $7.75 a share, and Fannie Mae at $10.25.

Even as federal officials sought to reassure investors about the financial health of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, pressure mounted on the giant mortgage companies to raise fresh capital to offset the tumbling values of home loans they hold.

The bottling company went bankrupt, leaving 35 real-estate investors in a bind. To come up with a solution, all 35 of them had to agree -- no dissenters. None of them could be in charge while they discussed what to do. And, for most of them, their life savings were at stake.

The 35 investors were part of a tenant-in-common real-estate venture, a structure in which multiple investors buy fractional ownership in a commercial property, in this case a Phoenix bottling plant. But the bottler -- the building's lone tenant -- was forced into bankruptcy in November 2006 amid allegations of accounting fraud. Then, the investors found themselves in largely uncharted waters.

Pasadena, Calif.

First, Countrywide Financial Corp. went down, as the nation's biggest mortgage lender was acquired in a rescue operation July 1 by Bank of America Corp. Now Countrywide's offspring, IndyMac Bancorp Inc., is on the ropes.

SINGAPORE -- The sharp inflation slowdown in Singapore's private residential market is the latest sign that times are getting tougher for local developers.

Prices increased 0.4% in the second quarter from the first, the smallest rise since mid-2004, according to recent government statistics. The figures were based on the first 10 weeks of the quarter, and some analysts said final numbers could show a decline in prices, which are likely to fall further in coming periods.

BEIJING -- The run-up to this summer's Olympics ignited an explosion of new commercial and residential space in the Beijing market over the past two years.

The Chinese capital has given itself an urban facelift that includes skyscrapers and sports stadiums, a new third terminal in Beijing's international airport, bigger park space and a more expansive subway system -- ingredients for a modern metropolis.

However, the construction boom has been accompanied by fears that once the games end on Aug. 24, Beijing could plunge into a property slump.

The British housing market has been spared the subprime debacle that has devastated its counterpart in the U.S. But there is something else in the United Kingdom that is causing a growing amount of pain as its housing market weakens: the build-to-let business.

Investors dumped shares and bonds of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, signaling a dramatic loss of confidence in two government-sponsored mortgage companies considered crucial to restoring the health of the housing market.

Shares of the two companies dropped Monday to their lowest levels in more than 14 years, and at one point, Freddie Mac had lost nearly 30% of its value.

• The News: Fannie and Freddie stocks plunged, closing at their lowest levels in more than 14 years.• The Backdrop: Investors are increasingly anxious about losses from mortgage defaults.• Why It Matters: Fannie and Freddie are the biggest providers of funding for U.S. home mortgages.

U.S. lawmakers are touting a home-buyer tax credit in a high-profile housing bill before Congress, but critics say it may do little to help consumers amid the mortgage crisis.

The tax credit would allow qualified home buyers to subtract the credit amount from their income taxes when they buy a home, but it requires them to pay it back over 15 years. It resembles an interest-free loan that must be repaid to the government.

The credit is part of the Housing and Economic Recovery Act, a huge package of legislation that includes a refinancing program aimed at rescuing hundreds of thousands of homeowners facing foreclosure. Housing advocates say it has a good chance of passing this summer because of increasing concerns about U.S. foreclosures.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Gasoline was less than $2 a gallon when Mike McKeever brought his gospel of bikes, light rail and tightly packed neighborhoods to this state synonymous with cars, freeways and suburban sprawl.

"The development industry was very concerned," says Mr. McKeever, head of Sacramento's regional planning agency. "The environmental community was openly negative," concerned that it was "just more talk, talk."

The faltering economy took a heavy toll on malls and shopping centers in the second quarter, but it didn't hurt the rental-apartment market as much as expected.

Vacancies at retail properties rose to multiyear highs in the second quarter as retailers closed stores and curtailed expansion plans. Meanwhile, apartment-complex vacancies remained unchanged and rents rose by a stronger-than-expected 1.1% in the quarter, according to real-estate research firm Reis Inc. in New York.

Real-estate shares registered bigger declines than the broader S&P 500 in the second quarter, weighed down by economic and credit concerns.

The Dow Jones Equity All REIT Total Return index, which tracks 118 equity real-estate investment trusts, declined 4.9% in the second quarter compared with a gain of 1.4% in the first quarter. REITs, which outperformed the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index in the first quarter, lagged behind in the second, with that broader index down 2.7% on a total-return basis. On the other hand, REITs outperformed the Dow Jones Industrial Average's total return, which was down 6.85% in the second quarter.

Worried that wily thieves could invade our home and steal items like the computer where this story got written and our aging Asimov's Science Fiction collection, we decided to get bids from residential home-security companies and learn how they'd protect our stuff -- and us.

We aren't alone in our worry about residential security: The security market is a $10 billion industry in the U.S., with a professionally installed and monitored security system in roughly 20% of homes, according to Bill Walker, senior vice president of research at First Research in Raleigh, N.C. Residential clients account for 40% of the industry, First Research reports.

Given what's happening with oil prices, anyone building a new home now would be crazy not to make it as energy efficient as possible.

But what's most energy efficient isn't always what's most cost efficient: The tough part is figuring out the point where the return of lower energy costs will offset the up-front expenditures on newer materials and techniques.

As we consider what kind of insulation to use in our home, we're struggling to figure this out.

The Florida attorney general on Monday filed a civil lawsuit against Countrywide Financial Corp. and its chief executive, Angelo Mozilo, alleging the company engaged in deceptive and unfair trade practices.

STOCKHOLM -- Sweden's government continued its privatization drive Thursday, selling Vasakronan to Swedish property company AP Fastigheter for 41.1 billion Swedish kronor ($6.88 billion).

The sale of the wholly owned property company knocks another company off the government's shortlist of assets it is looking to sell in a 200-billion-kronor privatization drive that started in 2006.

Still to be sold are stakes in telecommunications company TeliaSonera AB, bank Nordea AB and mortgage company SBAB. The government has sold stock-exchange operator OMX AB and spirits company Vin & Sprit AB, the maker of Absolut vodka.

Wall Street is bracing for regional and small banks to fess up to large losses from their mounting volume of soured construction loans made primarily to home builders.

According to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., $45.4 billion of the $631.8 billion in construction loans outstanding at the end of the first quarter were delinquent. When banks announce second-quarter results in coming weeks, they are expected to report sharp increases in loans that builders can't repay. Banks are also facing intensifying pressure from federal and state regulators to deal with the problem loans on their books.

Trevor Walczak is concerned about the environmental impact of natural-gas companies drilling on his land in eastern Pennsylvania, but $342,000 in this economy was too good to pass up.

Companies are taking less office space across the nation, driving down rents in most markets and causing pain for real-estate landlords. It is also making it easier for businesses to rent space.

Nationwide, rents on office properties -- including landlord concessions and discounts -- rose 0.7% in the second quarter to $25.16 a square foot, the slowest growth since the second quarter of 2005, when the office market was just emerging from a half-decade-long slump, according to Reis Inc., the New York real-estate research firm.

Home-mortgage lender IndyMac Bancorp Inc. said it is working with U.S. regulators on a plan to shore up the company's "safety and soundness."

In a securities filing late Monday, the Pasadena, Calif., lender and savings-bank operator promised more information "as that plan becomes more fully developed." Last week, IndyMac's chairman and chief executive, Michael Perry, said the company is trying to raise more capital.

IndyMac, hit hard by rising defaults and falling home prices, also said in its filing that its financial position "has deteriorated" since the first quarter. In May, IndyMac posted a $184.2 million loss for the first quarter.

While the most-visible worry over Bank of America Corp. involves its acquisition of home-mortgage lender Countrywide Financial Corp., the bank continues to struggle with another type of real-estate loan it inherited in another recent merger.

When Denise Lopez bought two new tables, a floor lamp and a chair recently, her intent was to finance it with her home-equity line of credit. But it wasn't long before she discovered that wasn't an option. Her line of credit had been frozen.

The gambling slowdown that began early this year is taking a serious toll on Las Vegas, with banks, investors and private-equity funds growing as tightfisted as the consumers who are gambling less in the slumping economy.

Once believed to be recession-proof, casinos are proving to be highly vulnerable to the economic downturn, which is striking the industry at a bad time. Las Vegas is entering its lethargic summer season, and a boom-time frenzy of grand expansion plans and private-equity buyouts has left casinos laden with debt.