Candy Evans

Finally, a homeowners association foreclosure story with a happy outcome.

HousingWatch told you about Captain Michael Clauer and his family of Frisco, Tex., a community about 20 miles north of Dallas, who lost their home to foreclosure for failure to pay $977.55 in HOA dues. Well, on Monday, the Clauers settled with the Heritage Lakes Home Owner's Association, whose management company, Select Management, foreclosed on their home and sold it to a bidder for $3,500.

The good news: The Clauers get back title to their home. Other details of the settlement, however, are not available as the court has imposed a gag order on the case. Also, ABC's Nightline is in Dallas shooting a segment on the Clauer's ordeal that is scheduled to run Friday. The Clauer's attorney, Barbara Hale, was not permitting interviews for her client during the settlement process.

Horseshoe Bay, a vacation playland about 50 miles west of Austin on gleaming Lake Lyndon B. Johnson, has yachts, three championship golf courses, the biggest private plane FBO in the state, and the Hill Country of Texas as the backdrop. No wonder it is often referred to as the Pebble Beach of Texas. This is also where Texas Gov. Rick Perry has come under fire for a real estate deal that some say smacks of political favors and cronyism.

Some of the richest Texans vacation at Horseshoe Bay in mega-million-dollar homes: West Texas ranchers, oilmen, Roger Staubach, Jim Lovell, even the late Red Adair. Horseshoe Bay, once a goat ranch, is so attractive to Lone Star wealth that it is one of the reasons why Ilano County has been crowned as one of the top five places in the U.S. by Forbes magazine where, based on IRS data, the rich are moving.

Perry, a Republican, faces Democratic challenger Bill White of Houston (who Perry is grilling for not releasing tax returns) after defeating Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison in the Republican primary. But a recent story in The Dallas Morning News diagrams just how Perry may have had a little help from his friends, pocketing more than $500,000 from a Horseshoe Bay real estate deal.

According to an independent appraisal by the News, Perry's land appraisals were also a bit fuzzy. Critics charge that as governor of Texas, Perry should not use the influence of the governor's office to pad his pockets.

Did he? Or did he make a really great real estate deal, buying and selling at the perfect time?

When you live in New York City, you can barely find a place to park an auto much less a place to house one. All it takes, of course, is a wad of money. Better hurry: $5.95 million is the asking price for the last available unit at the Sky Garage.

The lavish, 19-story building at 200 Eleventh Avenue is nicknamed Sky Garage for the auto elevator that allows residents to drive in, hop the lift and park their cars on their own floors, right next to their town home -- the units are two stories each. If you don't have a car, you can use the garage space as storage or a studio.

"The building really draws A-list celebrities," says agent Torsten Krines of Sotheby's International Realty, who's client recently bought a $6.5 million unit as an investment property and has it available for lease for $22,000. "They can drive right in without being seen by the public."

The story of Army Capt. Michael Clauer's family, whose Frisco, Texas home was sold out from under them after his wife failed to pay -- or sporadically paid -- their homeowners association dues, has opened the floodgates to reports about how brutal HOAs are becoming. The reports are especially troubling during a recession, when so many homeowners are having trouble paying their bills.

In 30 states, HOAs have the power to foreclose on homeowners who do not pay up, which has made them even more vilified than the IRS!

And now some are resorting to cutting off utilities: A Georgia woman has been living without water for more than a year now, all because she failed to pay her HOA dues.

Texas real estate couple Nicky and Eleanor Mowery Sheets were living on the tip top of the real estate world. But their next accomplishment may be staying out of federal prison.

For 12 years, Eleanor was Coldwell Banker's top-selling Texas Realtor, and she seemed to have every ingredient necessary to become a local Dallas real estate star. Her entry into the business was an inspirational "dumped divorcee rags- to-riches" tale, and Eleanor was a formidable saleswoman from her very first closing.

But once she met and married Nicky Sheets, son of a wealthy Odessa, Texas, eye surgeon and ostrich rancher, the two teamed up as business partners and took over the town. They produced more than 100 million in annual sales. In November 2007, she ranked 17th in the nation with real estate sales of $171 million. From 1997 to 2003, Nicky and Eleanor cleared more than $9 million in commissions during the best real estate market that Texas has ever seen. It seemed there was nothing they could not accomplish, together.

Now the fate of both licensed real estate agents -- their Texas licenses are still active and current --- rests in the hands of two Texas judges.

Could the Gulf oil spill put a damper on homebuilder stocks? We simply don't know yet. That's basically what an analyst's report out of Citigroup says about the effect of BP's Deepwater Horizon oil spill on publicly traded builders, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Those builders could potentially see shares decline if the spill taints the beachfront communities where they build. And of all the U.S. public homebuilders, which might carry the most spill exposure? The report claims it's Meritage Homes, Inc.

The report also is an interesting look at yet another way that the largest oil spill in the history of our nation has rippled out to areas of the economy besides tourism, real estate, oil production and the fishing industry.

The man who made billions betting against the subprime mortgage market seems to have a more positive view of our real estate market these days. John Paulson told a captive audience at the London School of Economics that now is the best time ever to buy a house in the United States.

He's bullish on real estate and gold, and thinks inflation is lurking around the corner. Taking California as an indicator, the hedge fund guru says sunny California has recently been a leading indicator for a positive turn in the housing market.

"And it turned positive seven months ago," Paulson told the group. "I think we're about to turn a corner."

Once upon a time, parents and grandparents just packed up the car and took the kids to Disney World. But soon, they'll be able to live there and take their grandkids to Disney World 24/7 without waiting in line.

The Orlando, Fla., folks who create our fantasy entertainment environments are now creating living environments for baby boomers.

Rich boomers, that is.

Walt Disney World is back in the real estate business, this time with a series of high end, luxury homes in a gated community priced from $1.5 million to --- gulp -- $8 million.

We told you about U.S. Army National Guard Capt. Michael Clauer and his wife, May, who lost their Frisco, Texas home because they fell behind on home association dues. Now the HOA is getting blowback.

In Texas, if you fail to pay your home association dues, an HOA has the legal power to foreclose on your home -- even if you own it free and clear. May Clauer says that she got into a funk over her husband's deployment and failed to pay bills. She let the mail pile up, even the certified letters. May and her parents owned the $300,000 Frisco home free and clear -- May's parents apparently helped her buy the place, which is about 20 miles north of Dallas.

But the Clauers lost their home by failing to pay $977.55 in homeowners association dues.

As if the nation's real estate market did not already have enough problems -- declining sales, credit crunch and the home appraisal nightmare -- now squatters are moving into vacant and foreclosed homes and staking ownership claims.

A Seattle woman who plopped herself into a vacant $3.3 million suburban Seattle mansion with her two kids -- claiming she was squatting in empty foreclosed mansions as a means of "sticking it" to the banks -- now tells the judge she "meant no harm."

Jill Lane, an attractive blonde and co-owner of an online debt recovery business that also claims to help make mortgages vanish, says she made a mistake and is seeking legal counsel.

Shadow inventory is real estate to sell that we don't yet know about. It's made up of homes that soon will be on the market, but not for the usual reasons.

It includes homes that are usually several months in arrears on their mortgage and about to hit the foreclosure circuit; homes that are 90-plus days delinquent and currently languishing in foreclosure; or bank-owned (REOs) that have not yet been put on the market. But come on the market they will, one way or the other, and at greatly discounted prices – distressed or short sales.

These houses will keep our values flat as long as they exist. How?

Take Neiman Marcus: Let's say you put a discount designer-fashion outlet smack next to Neiman's couture -- if everyone can buy Ralph Lauren and Escada at half-price, they sure won't pay full price at Neiman's.

Neither will homebuyers.

After months of negotiations, one of the most elegant hotel complexes in North Texas finally has been foreclosed upon by a lender for an estimated $122 million.

The Four Seasons at Las Colinas in Irving, Texas, home of golf's Byron Nelson Championship, and an anchor for nearby home developments, now stands as one of the biggest foreclosures to hit Dallas real estate in the last eight years Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo even lives nearby. And even though it will not halt the daily operation of the hotel --- most hotels are run by companies contracted to manage the place regardless of who owns the dirt -- it could have a chilling effect on hotel operations, according to experts.

"It won't affect club membership," said an executive from another luxury Dallas hotel, "but if I were a bride choosing a place to have a wedding in six to 12 months, I might wonder if the doors would still be open."

Then, too, the Four Seasons sits on 400 acres surrounded by housing developments. Could this huge foreclosure bring down home values?

Real estate professionals are demanding redress from BP to cover loss of rental income and, some say, declines in property values brought on by the Gulf oil spill. And some residents are getting it.

Real estate experts claim the oil spill has created a 30 percent value decline to Gulf Coast real estate properties -- in an area that was already hurting but was starting to see a glimmer of hope from the housing recession.

CNN reported that at least 446 claims for loss of rental income have been filed in Florida, and $75,727 has been paid out to more property owners for real estate loss values. (Warning: those BP payments might be considered taxable income.)

But now some owners of beach properties wonder if their values will ever recover. HousingWatch talked to a few Gulf residents and real estate professionals who have been afffected: