Phoenix pretty much made everyone's list of one of the most affected areas of the real estate crunch. That shouldn't come as a surprise, since we were also in the top few locales in the nation a couple of years ago with respect to increasing home values, speculation and house-flipping.

March showed signs of a continuing weak real estate market. Even though the number of home sales improved over the February numbers, sales were significantly below last year’s numbers. Actually, March 2008 had the lowest number of home sales since March 1996. Ouch! In Maricopa County, 39% of the resale homes sold for more than $300,000 in March 2007. It was 27% in March 2008. Homes selling for under $200,000 have increased from last year’s 16% to a current 40% of the local resale housing market.

Don't forget that home prices vary widely from place to place in Maricopa County. Some parts of town have experienced more price suppression than others. You can check on the median prices of both new and resale homes as recorded in the first quarter of 2008 here and compare those to what the prices were at the same time last year.