We are still unwinding the top of the market and people are looking for the bottom! Your best indicator is realty offices, when they have all closed in your area but one, and you walk by and there is one pathetic realtor in there looking bored, with the lights turned off to conserve energy costs and interest rates have not started downward for the purpose of ending the recession [hint: we aren't even in the recession yet] , it's still not the bottom. It will take as long for people's thinking to overcome the negativity at the bottom as it has for them to overcome the positive outlook at the top........ and the builders are the dumbest money in town, they will be the very last to catch on that the top is over with... we are already seeing projects catch fire in Southern California so some of them have figured it out...
If you see a house you would like to own and occupy, you might rent it with an option to buy, no locked in prices at this point, just an option to buy at the market price later on, years later on, and a portion of all your rent applied to the down payment.. that option will make $ all the way down to the bottom... sellers have to be a little desperate at this point...