What do you see in your housing market this weekend? Incentives? Growing inventories? Here are some examples from the topics thread and the web. "Tucson and Essex County, Mass. both made our annual list of the most overpriced places in the United States. In fact, Essex County, which lies north of Boston, topped off the ranking."

"'We saw a lot of waterfront property being bought and smaller homes being torn down and replaced by million dollar mansions during the dot-com boom,' explains Sara Young, at the Cape Ann Chamber of Commerce. 'Now you'll find a lot of those homes on the market, and they aren't selling because nobody can afford them anymore.'"

Several readers were from Austin, Texas. "Meanwhile, mini-bubble central here in Austin, TX. 'The booming Central Texas housing market, which is well on its way to a fourth consecutive record year. Out-of-state investors continue to flock to the market, according to broker Peter Sajovich. Sajovich estimates that investors account for as many as one-third of June's 2,980 home sales. 'They are picking up any excess supply that we have,' he said."

One wasn't pleased. "I used to live in Westlake HIlls. I loved it, but I couldn’t afford to buy anything there now. Lots are being bought up by condo developers (!) and large properties broken up to build tract-like housing. Not only are the locusts running up prices, they’re destroying the very thing that was good about the area." Another added,

One posted this from Las Vegas. "We just report what we find out, but it was still pretty scary to hear recently that the FDIC doesn't have 'the historical data' to be sure whether Las Vegas house prices are overpriced by as much as 50 percent.""The agency quoted one econometric model that predicted the recent speculative boom could have artificially inflated house prices by that much."

And this from California. "The population of the city of Goleta went from 30.6 thousand in 2005 to 30.3 thousand in 2006, said Watkins, a decrease of .9 percent. The population of the city of Santa Barbara also decreased during the same period, as did the populations of other coastal cities in the state, including San Francisco and Monterey."

"'We expect Goleta City’s population to decline…The shrinkage is a result of high home prices, changing demographics, and the lack of opportunity for young workers,' states the report presented by UCSB economist Bill Watkins, at UCSB."