House chair: 'Deep-six' real estate rule - 2004-01-12
Rep. Don Manzullo, chairman of the House Small Business Committee, gave the Bush administration some typically blunt advice on what it should do with a regulation designed to simplify real estate closings: "Deep-six this thing," Manzullo declared at a Jan. 6 hearing on the regulation.

Two mortgage brokers, a community banker, a Realtor and the president of a title agency traveled to Washington, D.C., to testify at the hearing, which Manzullo called even though Congress is not yet in session.
Read the full story at bizjournals.com

Mortgage borrowing surged 23pc - 2004-01-12
Mortgage borrowing surged by over 23 percent, according to a report by financial analysts released Monday. The total borrowed by Spaniards by November last year is at EUR456 billion - EUR86 billion more than by the same month in 2002.

The represented a year-on-year rise in the amount of credit which Spaniards took on to pay for mortgages of 23.4 percent.
Read the full story at Expatica Spain