Good news expected Thursday from Real Estate report

A morsel of good news for the beleaguered real estate industry is expected to emerge Thursday from a closely watched quarterly government report.
While the report from the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight probably will show an increase in U.S. home prices for the third quarter compared with last year, it may be the last time the index rises for quite a while, economists say.
A separate report Wednesday from the National Association of Realtors said the median price of a home sold in October declined to $207,800, a drop of 5.1 percent from a year ago, the biggest year-over-year price decline on record.
But many economists consider the OFHEO and Case-Shiller indexes to be better measurements of the housing market than the Realtors' report.
That's because both indexes examine price changes for the same properties over time instead of calculating a median price for houses sold during a particular month or quarter.
Doing so prevents the data from being skewed by changes in the mix of houses sold. For example, sales of more expensive homes in any particular month or quarter would push median prices upward.
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