Reminder: Half the nation's housing is still losing value

The Housing Wire reports:

According to a post on the Federal Reserve Bank of New York blog — Liberty Street Economics — roughly half of the nation's properties are still declining in value.

As the bloggers mention, "The blood flow of a housing market is the transaction volume of its housing stock." So a close look at transaction flow provides a good pulse check. The Fed notes that turnover volumes are still below that of 2000 to 2002 levels, before the housing bubble started growing — sadly the most recent example of a healthy housing market.

The low turnover does not bode well for short-term stability. It gets even darker when looking at distressed sales.

Yet, Barack Obama says things are getting better.