Robert Shiller, laying it down, telling you how it's gonna be.

A "historic housing bust" the likes of which haven't been seen since the Great Depression.

Any questions?

What happens when all the buyers go away, everyone wants to sell, and your town's REIC economy is fake? Well, just go to Vegas to find out

It is fascinating to watch the end of a Ponzi Scheme. Sad, but fascinating.

Hint to anyone trying to sell a home in Vegas - rollback prices. It's no longer 2007. Or 2006. Or 2005. Or 2004. Turn on the way-back machine, and do what you need to do to get out now.

Because it's just gonna get worse.

Oh, one more note. It's nice to see the national media doing the job that the local media is supposed to do but won't, as they're supported by REIC ad dollars, corrupted and dying.

Lady luck turns on Las Vegas' once-hot home market

LAS VEGAS (Reuters) - People trying to sell their homes in Las Vegas -- one of America's hottest job and property markets over the past decade -- have seen their luck turn dramatically worse this year.

Away from the flashing lights of the famed Strip, thousands of signs in front of single- and two-story homes illustrate a glut of available properties, many of which are now vacant. Along one stretch of six homes on Edgeworth Place in south Las Vegas, four show "for sale" signs.

After more than half a year on the market, one house is in the process of being sold after the owner dropped the price from $324,000 to $250,000, broker Doug Helen said: "They literally wanted to get rid of it."

Another owner on the street moved back to his native Singapore because he thought his children could get a better education there, his broker, Betty Chan, said.

The situation has also been tough on builders, who continue to expand into the desert around Las Vegas. Robert Toll, chairman of Toll Brothers, recently told analysts the new home market in Las Vegas rated an "F minus minus."

"What are we doing about it? We are out there with the rest of the builders in Vegas praying. There's not much you can do," he said in August. "You can't advertise your way out of that situation. You just have to wait for the market to come back."

FLASH: Novastar blows up - the latest subprime casualty. So when does Countrywide pre-announce it's disaster?

The race to jail between insider sellers Bob Toll and Angelo Mozilo seemed to be neck and neck, but I'd bet more on Mozilo today, as not a word yet from Countrywide about their impending disaster and write-down. I guess they're still adding up the carnage.

The loans ain't gettin' paid back folks. Massive mortgage fraud, flaky flippers and plummeting prices have destroyed anyone playing in the subprime pool.

Fannie and Freddie know it too. And we're talking TRILLIONS when it comes to those impending disasters.

Here's the latest dot-subprime to predictably blow up. Now there's blood in the streets, and we're just starting...

(disclosure - I'm gleefully short CFC and LEND at time of writing, and sure wish I was short 'em all)

NovaStar Flames Out

Shares of NovaStar Financial plummeted 26% after the real estate investment trust became the latest casualty of rising problems in the subprime mortgage market.

The Kansas City, Mo., mortgage lender reported a loss of $14.4 million, or 39 cents a share, compared with a profit of $26.4 million, or 84 cents a share, a year earlier.

"The credit performance of our portfolio, and specifically our 2006 originators, deteriorated during the fourth quarter, resulting in impairments on mortgage securities and additional loss provisions for loans held-in-portfolio in the REIT," says Scott Hartman, NovaStar's CEO. "Also, our gains upon securitization were reduced during the quarter because of lower whole loan prices. Furthermore, during the fourth quarter, we experienced a greater level of loan repurchase requests due to early payment defaults than we have historically."

The news comes just two weeks after shares in NovaStar rival New Century blew up after the company warned it was experiencing similar problems.