I'm not sure how the fact that you don't see For Sale signs in North Berkeley translates to "the crisis hasn't hit the East Bay yet". I suspect that Berkeley, like most of San Francisco, will continue to be prime real estate no matter what the market does. - Bill Jennings

Bill: People have said the same thing about NYC but word on the street says it's taking longer and longer to sell. - Dan Kaplan

For Sale signs are a poor way to gauge the market. Taking down the For Sale sign is a sales trick that is becoming more and more popular with real estate agents. Watching MLS listings would be a better approach. The house I just bought had no sign in front of it until I'd already signed the contract, at which point the realtor installed a sign so he could attach the "SOLD!" label to it. - Kenneth LeFebvre

Interesting point about the For Sale signs. Does that mean the signs don't help sell the property? - Dave Winer

Dan: I should have said "prime real estate, relatively speaking". North Berkeley will continue to be more desirable than, say, Richmond. - Bill Jennings

I suspect many folks don't drive around neighborhoods looking for properties to buy. Certainly not here in the lowcountry of South Carolina, where there are still a lot of condominiums sold to retirees from the northern states. More and more real estate business is conducted, at least in the initial searching stages, online. - Ian May

We had 2 foreclosures on my short street here in North Phoenix. One no longer has a for sale sign outside. For a while there were 5 houses for sale - I think we're down to 2 now. From this tiny sample it feels at least like things might be getting a bit better. I still wish I hadn't bought in September. Even though we paid around $115k less than the original asking price we probably owe more than $50k or $60k more than the house would sell for right now. But then 20/20 yabbity yabbity... - Tad, Anti-Immanentizer

The current wave if forclosures is being caused primarily by the reset of two year subprime mortgage notes and defaults on 100% financing loans that were more common in lower-cost, newly developed areas. Coastal regions and more established areas won't see the foreclosure blight until 2009-2011 when the loans popular in those areas start to go bad (such as alt-a loans and loans with negative amortization which are popular unthise regions ) there are some great graphs of the Arm reset time table that show how this phenomenon will play out. I've been covering this mess for a year and a half at my blog http://blownmortgage.com - Morgan

I think the length a sign is standing has a negative effect. We were watching the market in our area for a couple years, before we bought this house. Very often, we noticed signs coming down for weeks at a time for houses that were still actively listed on realtors' websites and on MLS. It seems to me, the primary purpose for the signs, these days, is to advertise the Agent, not the property itself. - Kenneth LeFebvre

I think we're still early in this process--the first foreclosures started in Rust Belt states, then the hot markets like Nevada, Florida, Ariz--and it's rippling across the country I'm in San JOse and watched values go down 5% to 15% roughly but certain neighborhoods s are holding up better. Berkeley could be one of those too; foreclosures there get acquired quickly. Overall, it's usually a 7 year cycle, so if you figure we're less than 2 years into it, it's going to be awhile before real estate recovers. - mark ivey

For a different perspective, I'm in Michigan, which has been in a single-state recession for several years now. My sub of about 200 homes has at least 15 foreclosures when I last checked about three months ago. We also have several empty houses from corporate relocations where the companies have the houses for sale and they aren't selling. Homes in my neighborhood have dropped by about 30 percent so far, and they're not even selling at that price. Pretty depressing. - Tonja Deegan

I was in Houston in 1984 when the bottom fell out of the energy market and housing.Prices collapsed and you virtually couldn't sell a house (my employer, BusinessWeek, bought me out of my house so I could relocate). Ten years later Houston was strongly recovering, and now 24 years later it's booming. These are long cycles.It does offer an opportunity for people to get into real estate who couldn't before--but not much solace if you're watching your home value go down however. - mark ivey

Pennsylvania's governor launched two programs last year, REAL and HERO, to help prevent foreclosures in the state. It seems to be helping. I read that we started out high on the foreclosure list but are now toward the bottom (not sure if that is true). The real estate market here in the suburbs of Philadelphia is slow but healthy. Houses sell in my town, no foreclosures that I know of, one or two 'short sales' that I've heard of in neighboring towns with lower income levels. Taxes kill some owners here - Christine Cavalier

I live in Dallas and the wife and I are looking to buy a house. We have run into a few things. First, the foreclosures are mostly in the new areas of the DFW area. The more established areas hardly have any, but the faster growing cities like Frisco and McKinney have a tone. The second thing is new construction homes are not appraising for the selling price. So you can not get a loan for the house. - Caleb Easterwood

I just returned from the Wallowa lake region of Northeast Oregon. The small town of Enterprise had more houses for sale in its small grid than any place I have seen in years. - Alex Williams

Caleb, we've seen the same thing. (I'm in Dallas, too) The cities/neighborhoods that exploded over the last few years are really bad. The older neighborhoods have some for sale signs, but not many foreclosure signs. - Ha3rvey

I'm in the middle of my own house sale. as far as my neighborhood i believe century 21 has about 147 houses listed for sale in my city. tons of for sale sales in my area. i think of about 6 houses on my block 4 are for sale. some have been sitting there quite a while 6+ months. Mine luckily is almost sold. - Jay Martinez