For sale or rent by distressed owner: 248,000 homes. That’s how many residential properties the U.S. government now has in its possession, the result of record numbers of people defaulting on government-backed mortgages. Washington is sitting on nearly a third of the nation’s 800,000 repossessed houses, making the U.S. taxpayer the largest owner of foreclosed properties (via BusinessWeek.com): http://buswk.co/rgN9VX

A San Diego attorney was convicted Thursday of attempting to break into his client's foreclosed Newport Coast home (via latimesblogs.latimes.com): http://lat.ms/oxuhcY

Mortgage Suits May Seal Obama's Election Doom (via TheStreet.com): http://bit.ly/neGIYa

Two former California radio hosts of a money matters show and another man face charges of real estate fraud for allegedly scamming listeners into dubious deals after encouraging them to attend investment seminars (via BusinessWeek.com): http://buswk.co/riz0ky

Former Denver Broncos coach Josh McDaniels -- the guy who drafted Tim Tebow last year and later  got fired -- has taken ANOTHER major hit in Colorado ... losing $500k on a bad real estate deal (via TMZ.com): http://bit.ly/oCs29q