In India, to build more suitable housing would add only 2-4% to construction costs.

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Government interventions to shore up the housing market add an extra element of unpredictability.

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The ongoing tightening of lending standards, although an appropriate market response, will reduce somewhat the effective demand for housing, and foreclosed properties will add to the inventories of unsold homes.

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For example, nothing would add more to solving the housing situation then adding educated immigrants to the slowing growth rate of our native population.

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Add to this the biggest monthly increase in housing starts in seven years (up 11.6% in May) and the picture that emerges is one of consumers on a buying spree.

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You add it all up, and I think the housing market's going to continue to struggle for the remainder of 2008 and probably well into 2009.

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Our own political problems and bloated pension systems, high unemployment, poor housing market and the hit to U.S. corporate earnings from overseas weakness all add up.

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To add insult to injury, property taxes continue to climb as assessments catch up with housing values.

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