Upcoming Business Stories in The Bee/Work&Money Friday

Here's what's being considered for Friday's edition of The Modesto Bee from the business staff and business wires:

FOR PAGE A-1:

SILVERLINING – W/ART -- There’s a silver lining to the current housing crisis: Plummeting property prices are providing purchasing opportunities for non-profit groups that help low-income and disabled people find homes. Houses and apartment complexes are cheaper to buy, and so are construction materials. Building contractors are eager to offer competitive bids, and landlords are more willing to rent to those with special needs, according several Modesto housing-related charities. SBRANTI

FOR FRI W&M SECTION: (REAL ESTATE)

CENTERPACKAGE: QUILT – W/ART -- R. Lily Stem Quilts is closing because of retirement, and judging by a 20-deep line outside, plenty of people will miss it. While the quilting crowd said many of the same fabrics are available online, they’ll miss the community, classes and friendliness at R. Lily. VAN DER MEER

ALSO:

NEWHOMES – W/FILE ART, CHART, LOGO -- New home construction has plummeted dramatically the last two years throughout the Northern San Joaquin Valley. Single family home starts plunged 73 percent in Stanislaus County, 80 percent in Merced County and 64 percent in San Joaquin County. About 14,000 homes were built in 2005 in the region, but only about 4,000 were constructed in 2007. SBRANTI

COUNTRYWIDE – W/ART -- Florida’s attorney general is investigating Countrywide Financial Corp., a beleaguered California-based mortgage lender, for possible unfair and deceptive business practices related to its home loans. The subpoena, dated Jan. 17, directs Countrywide to provide documents and other information describing procedures used to determine whether borrowers qualify for subprime loans, those for people with shaky credit. WIRES

WINEOUTLOOK – W/FILE ART, CHART OR BREAKOUT -- The state’s wine industry is looking pretty good, thanks to the end of the grape glut and an easing of cheap imports. That’s the message from a Sacramento symposium this week. Speakers also said consumers are moving toward wines over $10, though Two Buck Chuck and his siblings still have a role. HOLLAND

HARNEY – W/LOGO – NATIONAL REAL ESTATE COLUMNIST(OPTIONAL)

PAGE D-3:

BIZBUZZ – W/LOGO, CARTOON -- COLUMN

NETOUTAGES -- India’s lucrative outsourcing industry struggled Thursday to overcome Internet slowdowns and outages after cuts in two undersea cables sliced the country’s bandwidth in half. The disruption — which has hit a swath of users from Egypt to Bangladesh — began to affect much of the Middle East on Wednesday, when outages caused a slowdown in traffic on Dubai’s stock exchange. Such large-scale disruptions are rare but not unknown. WIRES

PAGE D-4:

SOLD IN YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD