Binyamin Appelbaum

Binyamin Appelbaum, a reporter for The New York Times, grew up in Newton, Massachusetts, and attended the University of Pennsylvania, where he was executive editor of the Daily Pennsylvanian. Appelbaum previously worked for the Florida Times Union, the Charlotte Observer, the Boston Globe, and The Washington Post.

At the Charlotte Observer, Appelbaum led a team of reporters that helped shed light on the area's high rate of housing foreclosures and questionable sales practices by Beazer Homes USA, one of the United States' largest homebuilders. The Observer's reporting led to FBI, IRS, SEC, and HUD investigations of Beazer Homes, which has since stopped making mortgage loans nationwide and stopped building homes in Charlotte, North Carolina.[1][2][3]

The series won a Gerald Loeb Award, a George Polk Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in public service.

A profile of his reporting on the subprime mortgage crisis described how, well before the nation knew about the coming crisis in mortgage lending, Appelbaum "noticed a strange pattern while compiling a list of foreclosed homes in North Carolina’s Mecklenburg County—clusters were concentrated in new developments. Appelbaum wondered if faulty loans were behind the trend".[4]

References

  1. ↑ Rick Thames, "Observer series named Pulitzer finalist; 'Sold a Nightmare' couldn't have been done without readers", Charlotte Observer, April 8, 2008.
  2. ↑ Don Aucoin, "Globe writer wins Pulitzer Prize for criticism", Boston Globe, April 7, 2008.
  3. ↑ "Globe arts writer Feeney wins Pulitzer", The Boston Globe, April 8, 2008
  4. ↑ Kelly Carr, "The Charlotte Observer’s 'Sold a Nightmare'", Business Journalism, January 2008.