Southern Nevada - including Henderson, Summerlin, Southern Highlands, Green Valley, Mountains Edge, Anthem and North Las Vegas - has graced the pages of many publications in recent years regarding the improbable real estate meltdown and subsequent mortgage foreclosure rampage here. It usually ended up topping many of the national statistics that measured how deeply these negative housing market conditions have affected the area. That has not been fun reading for the locals. Going from a boom town to a bust town so quickly can be rather deflating.

Las Vegas real estate news have got cautiously better, though, in recent months. And another good piece was just published in Forbes magazine. Altos Research provided Forbes the data that it used to study 20 large housing markets in a somewhat unusual way. It measured the changes in price reductions in homes listed for sale. In other words, if a given market sees a growing number of price cuts, then that area is still getting worse. And vice versa. A refreshing method indeed.

Southern Nevada occupies the number one spot in this ranking of 20 major markets. In January 2009 54% of homes for sale here had seen a price reduction, according to Forbes. Fast forward to September 11, a few weeks ago, and that had happened "only" in 30% of them. A genuine improvement that propelled Southern Nevada to the top of the heap. Obviously this positive change comes from the demand side. When more people are looking for homes to buy, price reductions start disappearing.

Of course, this is just an indication that the housing market in Las Vegas is heading in the right direction, is about to find the bottom. The city is still weighed down by some fundamental problems, like high unemployment and mortgage foreclosures, that will slow things down. But nevertheless, the good news are beginning to appear again and predictably give everybody in the valley a much sought-after lift.