The Federal Reserve Bank of New York offers an interesting way to see non-prime mortage statistical information at the state, county, and zip code level. Values are shown using a "relative strength" comparison using color.

There are 12 different statistical displays for both sub-prime and alt-A mortgages. These range from the number of loans per 1000 homes, to the number which have had a late payment in the past 12 months.

This should give the visitor a way to visualize how potential mortgage difficulties could affect future home values. 

 http://www.newyorkfed.org/mortgagemaps/

There is no “knocking” residential real estate investing. After years of relegation to a speculative investment, residential real estate is taking its rightful place as an investment with real returns, not just price appreciation. It’s the equivalent of a corporate stock becoming a US Treasury bond.

The March MxEq newsletter contained the following sidebar:

 Editorial: Politically Corrected - We were contacted by a nice woman who read the February MAX EQUITY Newsletter. She gently complained that she had been offended by the term “tar baby”, which was used (in an article about real estate opportunities) to describe bank-owned income properties. She was offended because of the “pejorative connotation” toward people of the black race.