“There’s as much risk in doing nothing as in doing something.”
— Trammell Crow, real estate mogul

Cycles are an inseparable part of the landscape of markets. Fortunes are often made in the valleys. I was thinking of this after I read several obituaries of Trammel Crow, who died this month. He was a guy who saw many booms and busts over his 94-year life.

Trammell Crow was a big-time developer and died a rich man. The Wall Street Journal once described him as “America’s biggest landlord.” His firm, Trammell Crow Co., estimates it built some 500 million square feet of real estate space. But it was a long road to get there from humble beginnings. His life is one of those great American…

After falling 35% in 2008, US stocks are now trading at only 10.6 times forecast earnings, well below the historical average. But are they good value yet? Martin Hutchinson says it will depend on the sector and country. He picks the biggest bull and bear markets for 2009.

Last week’s government aid package for homeowners appears to be working. Mortgage rates have fallen sharply, sending applications soaring. Andrew Snyder says this could be the start of a recovery in the real estate market, which would help stabilize the wider economy. This creates a great chance for profits with discounted blue chips like General Electric (NYSE:GE) and Altria (NSYE:MO).

Sometimes the worst markets hide the best profit opportunities. And you don’t get much worse than the housing market at the moment. Jonas Elmerraji says prefab manufactured housing is making a big comeback in devastated real estate industry. He says investors can play this emerging trend with small cap firms like Skyline Corp (NYSE:SKY) and Champion Enterprises (NYSE:CHB).

With the election now over, focus will turn back to what ails the economy. And front and center will be the continuing housing crisis. Foreclosure rates keep going up and the $700 billion bailout has yet to spur lending.

If you think subprime was bad, wait until “prime” hits. The whole mortgage market mess is going to get much, much worse, according to a report in The New York Times.

The paper reports today that although the first wave of subprime mortgage defaults is peaking, a second and far more damaging wave of defaults in building – this time in the alt-A and prime mortgage brackets.

Alt-A mortgages in arrears quadrupled to 12 percent in April from a year earlier. And delinquencies among prime loans, which account for most of the $12 trillion market, doubled to 2.7 percent over the same period.