Much local and national media coverage has been focused on the very active home sales market recently.

The questions often asked are:

1. "Is this a housing bubble?"
2. "When will it break?"
3. Should I buy or sell now?"
4. Where is the market going next?'

I will give my opinion on these and other issues in this and future articles. Let's start with, Is this a bubble?

Phoenix real estate has long been undervalued in comparison with other major U.S. cities. Examples of this from CNN are:

• Phoenix median home price $268,000
• Los Angeles median home price $553,000
• San Francisco median home price $721,900

In spite of a 40 to 50% increase in resale prices in the last year, home prices are a good buy in the Phoenix area. The values on a per square foot basis are still 30 to 70% less than other major western cities.

It is my opinion that recent resale price increases represent a market adjustment that brings prices in Phoenix closer to parity with other metropolitan housing markets.

Recent trends show the rate of price increases to be little or non existent. The market seems to need time to digest what has happened, like we will need time to digest Thanksgiving dinner.