Misha Weidman, Esq.

I know that sounds crazy, but having just studied absorption rates for San Francisco single family homes over the last two years and compared them to median prices, I don't see a correlation. ie. Even when there is a lot of supply (inventory) in relation to demand (sales), it doesn't appear that prices soften.

For a full discussion of why this might be the case, see my blog and website at www.pegasusventures.net

That's according to the widely quoted and respected Case-Shiller Index, quoting price drops year over year of 25% for July 2008 (the latest figures available for the index). But not so fast. As I explain here, the so-called "San Francisco Index" actually comprises a much much bigger area than the City by the Bay. How is San Francisco doing? Not so bad, relatively speaking. It's down around 11.3% for September 2008 from a year earlier. Here's how the Bay Area Counties stack up according to Dataquick -- my data for San Francisco shows a slightly smaller drop for September 2008).

I've finally moved my website over to a bloglike format and have blogged for the first time in a long time (many more to come, I hope). I've got some really good data on the individual MLS Districts witin San Francisco and how they've been performing over the last several years relative to each other. For those interested in cool data and graphs, please take a look and read my conclusions -- bottom line: some are obvious, be careful about others -- real estate is local, local, local.

Here's the graph (click on it to make it bigger)

And you can get the whole schmooze here: http://www.pegasusventures.net/wordpressblog/