While Gov. Jim Gibbons was hosting a summit in Las Vegas yesterday to discuss Nevada's number one position on foreclosures, local real estate representatives sought to portray a still positive image of the business.

But Pahrump has been affected by the high rate of foreclosures and a slowdown in the real estate industry affecting the rest of the country, statistics show. Some of the figures weren't as alarming in Nye County, however.

RealtyTrac, based in Irvine, Calif., listed 55 properties in Nye County in pre-foreclosure status during August, another high number of 55 pre-foreclosures in May and 59 in April. Only the 75 listed in April 2005 is a higher number -- most months the company listed 20 to 30 properties in pre-foreclosure, meaning properties in various stages of the process that begins with the notice of default. A check with the most recent listings showed 81 Nye County properties, all in Pahrump.

RealtyTrac counted 6,197 pre-foreclosures statewide and 243,947 nationwide, both record highs for a three-year period of published figures.

In an alarming statistic, the Pahrump Valley Times published notices of trustee sales for nine properties in August and September 2006. For the same two months of 2007 that number soared to 4.

The Nye County Recorder's Office reported there were 35 trustee deeds recorded upon foreclosure for August and September of 2007, up from 23 for the same two months in 2006.

The county recorder's office also had lower numbers of total deeds registered. With 372 registered this past September 2007, the recorder's office recorded 487 deeds in August and more than 400 deeds every month for at least the past year.

"That shows there's a slump in the housing market. Houses are not moving," said Nye County Recorder Byron Foster.

A few area builders contacted by the Pahrump Valley Times, like Classic Homes, William Lyon Homes and Concordia Homes of Southern Nevada, didn't respond for a comment by press time. But the real estate slowdown would appear to be reflected in the fact only 24 building permits were issued for single-family residences by the Pahrump Building and Safety Department in September. That's the lowest number since August 2002.

Thomas Mayes, a building inspector for Charles Abbott and Associates, said building activity is down but inspectors are still doing six to eight inspections per day on new construction, as opposed to 14 to 16 inspections before. Mayes said he just finished inspections for six model homes Celebrate Homes is building at Mountain Falls.

"There's steady growth instead of unmanageable," Mayes said. "We have it to a level where people can stop and take a look at things."

Building inspectors, however, are busy after a brisk spring, as building permits were issued for 119 single-family residences in April and 61 in May, before dropping steadily to 51 in June, 41 in July and 39 in August.

William Yacobozzi, broker and owner of Great Basin Mortgage Company in Pahrump, said some people who took out mortgages with only 1 percent interest rates on a $200,000 home may have seen their $600 to $700 monthly mortgages rise to $1,300 after rates went up recently. He said there's still money out there to borrow, though lenders are tightening up their practices with the foreclosures.

"Number one, there's not as many buyers as there were six months ago. Number two, many of the lenders have stopped making loans as they reassess their portfolios, meaning they have some losses," Yacobozzi said. "Number three, lenders are tightening up their lending practices."

"People with good credit with down payments can still get mortgage money very easily. There is still a lot of money out there, it's just the standards are changing as they study it," Yacobozzi said.

"I don't think it's as bad as people think it is," he added. "Actually, our mortgage business has been about the same, even with the problems going on. We're just working harder to find places to put these loans."

Andrew "Andy" Alberti Jr., a local real estate broker helping people avoid foreclosure, said people have to remember to set aside money for the mortgage in their regular budget every month, but it's become harder as other costs rise as well, like gas and food.

"I really think there are people out there who don't know how to rescue their homes and they can," Alberti said.

Alberti said almost all of the property owners he's working with defaulted on loans taken out from 2003 to 2006. They got a good initial interest rate after signing the loan for a couple years before the adjustable interest rate began to rise. But he said in one case an individual bought vacant land in January and defaulted by March.

Norma Jean Opatik a realty agent with One Stop Realty who represents the Greater Las Vegas Association of Realtors in Pahrump, said the market is definitely slower, but that's after the breakneck pace of the past few years.

Opatik said some real estate agents who formerly made five or six sales per month, even 10 sales per month, may be down to only one sale per month. She said that can be tough in an expensive business to operate, with membership dues in real estate associations, Multiple Listing Service software and advertising.

"If your income dropped by 60 percent, how long would you be able to stay in the line of business you were in?" Opatik asked. "The media drove this market to make it boom the way it did. Now I think it's the media once again doing it. If we could get those prognosticators to stop this doomsday thing the market would rebound much quicker than it's doing."

The sales pitch: Property owners who could have bought an acre of land in Pahrump for $12,000 only five years ago have seen their land appreciate to $50,000 now, Opatik said. Meanwhile, she said real estate prices are still a bargain in Pahrump -- 30 percent lower than Las Vegas.

"The lenders have put a bit of a stranglehold on us but there are still programs out there," Opatik said. "People who are credit-worthy who have job experience, they can still buy a home at a good rate and now is the time to buy because the market is down from 2004 to 2005."

Lenders are now questioning appraisers of property, Opatik said.

"Our appraisers know our market. Even the appraisers who come out from Las Vegas, they know our market, and yet they're questioned all the time, and that's totally beyond the scope of what a lender should be doing," she said.

Interest rates were adjusted upward big time, Opatik said.

"Now people can no longer afford the home because of the adjustment their loan took. Now again, that's the mortgage industry. When this boom happened they would lend to many people that probably shouldn't have been lent to. They call it creative financing," she said.

However, Opatik thinks investors will step in to scoop up the bargains. A home that may have been on the market for $300,000 to $350,000 might be selling for $250,000 to $280,000 now, she said.

Figures of 139 single-family home sales in Pahrump compiled by Las Vegas-based Equity Title of Nevada, however, showed the average price rose slightly to $286,175 in the first half of 2007, up from $276,999 in the first half of 2006 based on the average sale price of 190 homes. Average mobile home sale prices rose slightly from $162,811 based on 187 sales in the first half of 2006 to $166,103 in the first half of 2007.

Opatik also has high hopes business will pick up when Home Depot is under construction, recalling the boost in the real estate market when the Wal-Mart project began in 2003.

"I think we're doing 50 to 60 percent of what we did before. We're able to handle it. But it hurts. It hurst everybody," Opatik said.