According to this Biz Journal article, finding qualified renters is getting harder to do.

Gonna have to let my significant other know about this.

For once a positive story about consultants.

"The Mortgage Bankers Association is revising downward its 2009 forecast for U.S. loan originations.

The industry group now expects nationwide mortgage originations this year of $2.03 trillion, down more than $700 billion from what it was forecasting in March.

The association says fewer home purchases account for $84 billion of the drop. The rest is due to fewer refinancings.

The MBA now expects 4.8 million existing-home sales in 2009, a 1.2 percent decline from 2008. The association forecasts new-home sales will drop 27 percent to 352,000 units."

From the article: "Former N.C. State Auditor Les Merritt has teamed with Frank Perry, a veteran FBI agent who worked for both the N.C. Ethics Commission and the N.C. State Auditor’s office, to launch the Foundation for Ethics in Public Service.

The nonprofit will facilitate the investigation and reporting of public corruption by receiving tips about alleged acts of corruption, ascertaining their credibility and passing the information along to investigative reporters or enforcement agencies."

Links to audio and PDF files from Paul Krugman's Robbins Memorial Lectures at the London School of Economics

Welcome to North Carolina and here's what you need to know.

Why the argument that a public health insurance option would destroy competition is misleading; basically any real competition in health insurance disappeared a while ago.