Housing Slump? Are You Kidding?

A blog posted this week on Palo Alto Patch suggests that the city's housing woes are over and that the real estate market in Stanford's back yard is fully recovered.

It also informs readers that the median price of a single family home in Palo Alto topped $2 million in April.

As Sheldon might say on The Big Bang Theory: "Bazinga!"

The author of the Patch blog is local Palo Alto realtor Michael Talis.

To support the MLS data, Talis points out that homes are now selling faster than at any time since March 2005, just shortly before everything went into the dumper. In fact, homes are now on the market an average of 14 days before they have a committed buyer.

Is it the Facebook phenomenon? Are those who are about to become fabulously wealthy making the search for a new home incredibly difficult for the rest of us? And is it just Palo Alto? Or has the market throughout San Mateo County become nothing but a broken American Dream?

Foreign investors - particularly Chinese - continue to flood the area with cash offers on pricey homes. Startup companies are selling for large sums of money, creating more and more independently-wealthy local residents.

Where does it all end? Is there (home) life left for the 99 percent? Can agencies attempting to create affordable housing succeed in this climate? Are we heading for a lifetime of landlords and slumlords? Or is what we're witnessing simply good economics, supply and demand? A testimony to those who work hard to succeed.

Tell us your feelings in the comments. And vote in the poll we've included below.