Analysis: "Home Prices Seem Far From Bottom"

LINKAGE: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/16/business/economy/16housing.html?ref=todayspaper

The article is from The New York Times, written by Vikas Bajaj is about home prices being "far from hitting bottom" and explains who will be hit hardest by this blow, where it's affecting the country, and offers a slew of statistics on mortgage prices and other stuff of which I don't have the proper knowledge to even begin to write about.

So. It begins with a hard-news style lede: simple, yet hardhitting. "The American housing market, where the global economic crisis began, is far from hitting bottom" it reads. Basically, it only answers 2 W's, but the two W's in particular are very effective, seeing as it's a much talked about story in the media anyways. The second graf is technically a second lede; it is elaborating on the first sentence and answers the rest of the W's. The third paragraph/nut graf tells the readers why they should care by identifying the hard-hit areas (Arizona, California, and Florida) and adds a bit more useless elaboration on the lede, stating, once again, that home prices are on the decline and fewer people are willing to buy them...yeah, so we've read twice already.

The first quote of the article comes in here. It is a quote from a primary source, a real estate guy, and definitely is the voice of authenticity in the article.

The rest of the article expands on previously stated themes to the story. For example, it elaborates on the states that are suffering the most from the drop in housing prices and what life has been like in these areas. Also in the remaining paragraphs, it cites many sources and gives many statistics on exact prices and dates. It attributes a number of reasons for the decline in prices as well, in a strictly unbias way.

The article ends with a quote, and a pretty bad one. Actually, the article ends with "he said." So, thumbs down for that.