The Journal Online reports from Wisconsin. "The secret to Wisconsin's soft landing from the 2000 to 2005 U.S. housing boom? Caution, said Marquette University economist David Clark, whose company has a contract to analyze Realtor data. 'California, Washington, D.C., Virginia and Florida, where they had active new construction with quite a bit of speculative building, those are the ones more likely to see price reductions now,' he said."

"It grates on Badger State realty agents that consumers here seem as alarmed as those in high-flying states. 'People are reading the news, people are watching the news, and it's all about the housing slowdown. You hear it enough and you think the sky is falling,' said Scott M. Heyerdahl, chairman of Greater Milwaukee Association of Realtors."

"What's lost in the hype, Heyerdahl said, is that despite ballooning inventory and slipping sales, metro Milwaukee's market remains strong."

"Milwaukee County's median price rose 2.6% to $162,900. But median price slipped 2.2% to $253,100 in neighboring Waukesha County, however, home to the state's highest prices. North Woods territory took a price hit, Vilas County by 8%, Sawyer County by 6.4% and the Ashland/Bayfield area by 5.1%."

The Wisconsin State Journal. "In Dane County, existing home sales plunged 18 percent to 1,991, down from 2,427 during the same quarter last year. The report is the latest indicator of a shrinking real estate market and is consistent with a sharp drop in housing starts reported over the past several months."

"The county's deeper decline may be because the market was hotter than other parts of the state during the real estate boom, said John Deininger of the Realtors Association of South Central Wisconsin. 'I think we've just had more inventory,' he said. 'We've had more houses being built because there has been a bigger demand here in the past.'"

"'This is the first time I've ever seen a slowdown in the face of low interest rates,' (realtor) David Stark said. 'I think buyers started to get very skittish based on the national reports.'"

The Gazette Extra from Wisconsin. "Rock County joined a nationwide housing market slowdown during the third quarter, but there's no local real estate bubble to burst, according to Julie Raese, president of Rock Green Realtors Association."

"It depends more on the price ranges, because in Janesville there's a 'pretty big' inventory on higher-end homes, she said 'What it causes us to do is do a better job on pricing,' she said. 'There's just a bit more inventory and more too choose from.'"

The Detroit Free Press from Michigan. "Metro Detroit homeowners were hit harder than the rest of the nation in the third quarter. The median price of a single-family home in the area, termed Detroit-Warren-Livonia, fell 10.5% in the third quarter, falling to $154,100. In the same quarter a year ago, the median sales price was $172,100."

"In Grand Rapids, the median price fell 2.9% to $136,600 and in Lansing-East Lansing, the price fell 6.2% to $139,800."

"'And for sellers, it's almost a nightmare,' says (realtor) Mark Hull in Detroit. 'A property can be marketed with every kind of tool you can think of, and unless there are really, really great incentives that make the property 20% below what the market price should be, they're just sitting there.'"

From ABC Local 12 in Michigan. "Real estate agent John Cunningham says more than one-third of the home sales pending right now in Genesee County are in foreclosure. He's personally handing 43 homes that are in the process of foreclosure. 'Buyers have a misconception that people are going to have to pay what somebody owed on the house,' Cunningham said. 'People are owing on this house over $190,000. Now the home's for sale for $149,900.'"

"The downside for sellers is that the rest of the market is competing with all those foreclosed homes and that's pushing down prices. 'Trying to sell and move out is bleak,' Cunningham said."

"Banks are getting very aggressive offering great deals. The inventory is sky high: more than 7,100 homes are for sale in Genesee County alone."

The Herald News from Illinois. "Third-quarter sales of existing homes were down 19.4 percent in Will County, down 13.7 percent in Grundy County, and down 12.3 percent in Kendall County. In Illinois, sales were down 14.7 percent statewide and 18 percent in the Chicago region."

"Robert Zoretich, president of the Illinois Association of Realtors, said the housing market is stabilizing, noting, 'Sellers are offering competitive pricing in line with current market conditions.'"

"The statewide median price dropped 0.5 percent to $209,000. The Grundy County median price was $190,000, down 2.4 percent. In Kendall County, the median price was down 4 percent at $237,000. The Chicago metropolitan region registered a 0.8 percent increase in the median price for single-family homes at $252,000."