The folks at Harvard have just released their latest housing study: SON (State of the Nation’s Housing) 2008. If you would rather check out a quick overview, check out their fact sheet.

In case you were wondering, yes, we have problems all across the country. Since this is a “current assessment” of the housing market, it can be viewed not as a media report but as scientific data. And yes, it’s discouraging.

Ready for some highlights lowlights? These all come directly from the fact sheet that you can read by clicking the link above.

• The months’ supply of unsold new single-family homes rose to more than 11 months in late 2007 and early 2008—a level previously not seen since the late 1970s—before dropping back slightly. The months’ supply of existing single-family homes for sale rocketed to 10.7 months by April 2008.

• By the end of 2007, the nation had 232,000 fewer construction jobs than a year earlier, dragging down employment growth in many states with previously booming housing markets such as Florida (74,000 construction jobs lost vs. 52,000 other jobs added) and Arizona (25,000 construction jobs lost vs. 23,000 other jobs added).

• The number of homes in foreclosure proceedings nearly doubled to almost one million by the end of 2007, while the number entering foreclosure topped 400,000 in the fourth quarter alone.

• In 2006, the number of severely-burdened households—paying more than half their income for housing— surged by almost four million to 17.7 million households.

I don’t think much more needs to be said about this study at this point. It is an interesting read, especially if you are having a great day and don’t like feeling so positive all the time.

I recently attended a breakfast featuring Lawrence Yun, the chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, as keynote speaker. Dr. Yun recently received the honor of being named to the USA Today’s top 10 economic forecasters (NAR’s press release). As the release states, “The National Association of Realtors® Chief Economist Lawrence Yun has been named among the top 10 economic forecasters by USA Today. Yun is ranked fifth on the list and is responsible for NAR’s real estate statistics and economic forecasting. The annual list recognizes accuracy in forecasting.“

Yun spoke about the state of the current market and backed up his forecasts for the near term with statistical charts and graphs which were very helpful. He believes there will be a modest increase in home sales in the second half of 2008, but because of negative buyer psychology right now (i.e. prices are going down, have been going down, and might continue to keep going down, so why buy now?) the gains in home sales may not be very big. Yun essentially believes that the market is bottoming out right now and should stabilize by the end of this year and start gaining ground again in 2009, though not very rapidly.

It is interesting to note that prices fell nationally 1.5% in 2007. The NAR started keeping market statistics in 1967 and this had not happened in their entire time compiling this data. Dr. Yun believes, as do many others, that this is the first time prices have fallen year-over-year since the great depression in the late 1920s and early 1930s. I must caution you that we are nowhere near entering such a time this time around. The unemployment rate has risen, but nowhere near as drastically as back then. Inflation is steady. Many areas around the country are creating jobs, while the public has experienced the greatest amount of job loss in the midwest due to the struggling auto business and manufacturing/industrial decline in that area.

Yesterday, the Massachusetts Association of Realtors, based in Waltham, released housing data for July 2007. Here are the numbers:

Detached Single-family Home Sales and Median Selling Prices