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Many homeowners and real estate investors are asking if the housing market has hit its bottom yet. Will we ever see recovery? If so, when? Goldman Sachs Group released a statement in December 2011 proclaiming, "The home price bottom [is] in sight." If that is so, however, when will it start, exactly? National home price data seems to suggest that the worst is now behind us. Clear Capital, a real estate research firm in Truckee, California, explained that, "2011 saw a national decrease of 2.1% in home prices when compared with 2010." Yes, this is still a loss. However, a 2.1% decrease is rather paltry when compared to the double-digit drops we suffered in the preceding years. Dr. Alex Villacorta, the director of research and analytics at Clear Capital argues, "Overall, 2011 was a relatively quiet year for U.S. home prices compared to the last five years." He thinks that "the current balance the market has found will continue through 2012." 

If you are thinking of purchasing a home in the near future and you keep wondering if now is the right time for you to jump, remember that the comparatively "flat national average" is made up of metro markets that have been anything but "flat." Clear Capital advises, "Individual markets reacting to their local economic conditions continued to exhibit a wide range of performance levels in 2011, with only 12 of the top 50 metro markets returning year-over-year price movement that can be considered stable." What is meant by "stable price movement"? It means shifts and swings of less than 2.5%. Clear Capital believes that less than half of America's largest metro areas will reach stability in 2012, Denver among them.

Although this is good news for fellow Denverites, we still have to unload the troubling influx of distressed inventory still flooding the market.

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