This month's grand prize for stating the obvious goes to Standard and Poor, when they said the following in a recent research report:
"As the global housing market shows some signs of recovery, markets are re-emerging at different speeds, depending on the strength of individual real estate fundamentals."
Well, dah! Of course property markets in different countries are going to recover at different speeds, just as prices grew at different speeds before the crunch, and fell at different speeds during it.
They also said that the recovery is likely to be hindered by caution from companies and industries surrounding property markets waiting for clearer signs of recovery before slackening their purse strings.
This more than likely refers to developers and house builders, and in the UK and US property markets. I say this because development was kick-started in most parts of Asia some months ago, when developers realised that they had neglected the massive domestic demand for affordable housing while they focussed on the foreigner.
The report had a common theme, things are good for now but the recovery is precarious. In fact the only place where more falls aren't a distinct possibility out of those mentioned is France, where they say prices have hit bottom and are likely to stay there for a while. The US, Japan, UK, and Ireland are all okay for now, but not out of the woods yet according to S&P.
I know I was a bit critical to begin with, but S&P is one of the best analyses of global housing trends that you will find. OK, that may just be because they agree with a lot of what I think current indicators mean, but hey, that's life.
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