Buyers

WASHINGTON - Requiring all gun buyers to pass a federal background check could be a key part of a White House plan to combat mass shootings, Vice President Joe Biden indicated as he prepared to present recommendations to the president on Tuesday. Speaking to reporters Thursday, Biden said he had found a "surprising recurrence of suggestions" for "universal background checks" in meetings with interest groups. Background checks are not required in private sales by unlicensed dealers, including transactions at gun shows.

WASHINGTON - They're back after barely a decade: escalation clauses in real estate contracts, "naked" contingency-free offers and low-ball-priced listings designed to pull in dozens of bidders and turn routine sales transactions into auctions. These are all techniques last seen with frequency during the frothiest months of the housing bubble in 2004-05, when prices were rising at double-digit rates, buyers thought they couldn't lose money in real estate and mortgage financing was available to anybody who could sign a loan application.

I'm responding to the Aug. 2 article by Ellen James Martin, "Keep Home Orderly but Still Have a Life." Give me a break! Buyers are not buying the lifestyle of the present owner of a home the buyers are seeking to buy. Buyers are not buying personal property of the owner of the home the buyer is seeking to buy. Is the picture clear, yet? I really feel strongly about the claptrap owners are fed by so-called expert real estate professionals who take over the life of owners when owners decide to sell their residential property.

You have long been able to get prequalified to buy a house. Now you can "pre-list" one for sale as well. That's the idea behind Buyer Buzz, a recently launched feature of ZipRealty.com that, in theory, lets would-be home sellers dip their toes into the marketplace without actually putting the old homestead up for sale. I say "in theory" because ZipRealty readily admits that the new feature on its site is a lead generator, which in sales parlance means the company hopes to land clients from it. "This is a way for us, honestly, to attract listings to the business," said Myron Lo, vice president of innovation at ZipRealty.

Forged $100 bank notes found many buyers among hard-currency-hungry people on Czechoslovakia's black market last year, the official Ceteka news agency said Friday.

Volkswagen United States said Tuesday that it will cover car payments and insurance for up to 12 months for new Volkswagen buyers laid off because of the recession. Consumers buying or leasing cars between Tuesday and March 31 qualify for the program, whether or not they finance the deal through VW Credit Inc. The company said it will pay up to $500 a month for car payments and insurance.

American art collectors defied a sinking U.S. economy Wednesday, making up 67% of buyers at a Sotheby's New York sale that saw records smashed for work by artists Edvard Munch and Fernand Leger. American buyers at the Sotheby's Impressionist and modern art auction were double the number of U.S. buyers who were successful at Christie's rival sale Tuesday. "It shows any attempt to draw a facile relationship between what's happening in the financial markets and what's happening in the art auction market is irrelevant," said Simon Shaw, head of Sotheby's Impressionist and modern art department.

While there are dozens of things that first-time buyers should do, there are also many that they shouldn't. "Don't go out and buy a car or some other big-ticket item because the more you owe, the less you can borrow," said Linda Orr, president of the Irvine-based brokerage Real Estate Marketeers. "Don't change jobs unless you'd get a decent-sized pay increase because you want to show the lender job stability." Also, don't get surprised by any long-forgotten blemishes on your credit record.

I was appalled to read "Buyer Turnoffs," (May 28) in which writer Ellen James Martin described a collection of pet birds as "odd or excessive accumulations" to be tossed out, and equating these intelligent creatures with "a huge collection of beer cans." Scientific studies have consistently shown that pet birds can be extremely intelligent--rivaling the IQs of chimps and dolphins--and that they are highly emotional and closely bonded with their human companions. They are not objects to be gotten rid of to make a buck.

It was with great interest that I read James Flanigan's column ("Information Age Gives Clout to TV Shopping," July 14) in which he states that "the competitive edge in this new horse race will be less a matter of fashion than information. The contest looks unequal today--crude costume jewelry sold on TV compared to splendors of the world sold in fashion malls." He goes on to state that people want to spend less time shopping in stores. I have done a lot of comparison shopping in my lifetime, particularly in jewelry stores and pawnshops.