The Herald Tribune reports on Floridas bursting housing bubble. "Is the real estate market really 'normal,' as a Realtor was quoted as saying in the newspaper the other day? A look at the sales and listings statistics leads me to believe that a market that was unusually tight a year ago is now unusually loose. There are a high number of houses for sale and so few buyers that there's a 20-month supply on hand in Sarasota."

"Economist John Tuccillo says a balanced market has a six-month supply. The situation is similar in Manatee County. In January 2005, 776 houses were listed and 223 sold (28.74 percent). In January 2006, 2,627 houses were listed and 166 sold (6.32 percent)."

"'That's a 15.8-month supply,' said realtor Ruth Lawler, who has sold Manatee County real estate for decades. 'What we are seeing on a daily basis is more and more supply. Normal is what you are used to,' she said, adding, 'I've never seen the market change so rapidly in such a short period of time.'"

"This is what we call a buyer's market, kids. You older homeowners know this already, because you remember the real estate recession of the early 1990s, or previous versions. 'We used to pray a house would sell in six months,' Lawler recalled. Now, at the current rate of sales, it would take almost two years to clear the boards, if no other listings came on the market in the meantime."

"'We are having price reductions every single day, and we're talking tremendous amounts, as many price reductions as we have homes on the market,' said Lawler. 'It's got to affect the price.'"

"But, you say, the headline in the paper said, 'Prices up.' Just because the median sales price goes up, that doesn't mean home values are appreciating across the board. It just means that the houses that actually sold were more expensive than the houses that sold last year at this time. The number is skewed by expensive new homes that are selling."

"But that will change, said (realtor) Steve DuToit, when sellers realize they have to cut prices if they want to sell houses. 'Because we have more than double the normal inventory that we've had over the past years (and) sales are less than half what they normally are, it has the market very out of balance,' said DuToit."

"'Sellers are "the last to know what is going on,' said DuToit. 'The numbers are clear: It has become a buyer's market.'"

"But Tuccillo, a Sarasotan who is former chief economist of the National Association of Realtors, says the housing market remains on strong footing. 'There's no way you can't interpret this as a slowing down of the market,' he said. 'But no market goes to pot unless the underlying economy goes to pot, and that's not happening here. We're going through a cycle. This is a marginal change downward and the market will stabilize.'"

And from the Daily News. "In January the number of homes sold by Realtors in the Fort Walton Beach-Crestview-Destin area dropped by 32 percent from January 2005. The median sales price of those houses was $225,500, down from $226,500 in 2005. The number of condo sales in January was down 43 percent from 2005. Median condo prices sank to $200,000 from $465,000 in 2005."

"'I think we’re on a plateau,' said realtor Claudette Heinrich, who has sold properties in the area since 1970. 'You’ve got fewer buyers and you’ve got more houses. It’s sticker shock for a lot of people.'"

"'We’ve just done a 360 and we’re in a buyer’s market,' said (realtor) Debbie Gericke. Dave Dorman, knows that better than most. He and his wife have had their five-bedroom house up for sale since September 2005. 'It’s frustrating because we put the house up for sale and purchased a house in Chicago,' Dorman said. 'We have two mortgages we’re paying right now.'"

"He’s come down in price, to $798,000, but refuses to go too low. 'We can’t fire sale the house where we’ll lose money on it,' he said. 'We can’t do that.' Teresa and David Diluzio are in similar situation. They put their house on the market and bought a smaller one in the same neighborhood."

"Ask Teresa Diluzio how long she and her husband, David, have been trying to sell their home and she laughs. She asks her husband. He laughs, too. They compare notes and decide their four-bedroom, 2.5-bath home in Raintree Estates near Bluewater Bay has been on the market for at least six months. The price has come down. Traffic has picked up a little. They try to stay optimistic."

"'We just missed the craziness,' Teresa says, referring to last summer’s lucrative seller’s market. It’s been months and their larger house hasn’t sold, so now both of the Diluzios’ homes are up for sale. 'Now what we’re having to do is we’ve had to put both of them on the market to see which one sells first,' Teresa says."