Our friends at The Warren Group posted their year end sales results for Massachusetts and since they are the "Trusted Real Estate & Financial Information" source everyone picked up on it, including The Boston Globe.

Here is the information as reported by The Warren Group:

"Sales and prices of single-family homes in Massachusetts fell by more than 11 percent in 2008"

"40,124 single-family homes were sold in 2008, an 11.5 percent decrease from the 45,339 transactions in 2007."

"The median price for a single-family home dropped to a five-year low, tumbling 11.6 percent to $305,000 from $345,000 in 2007."

"For the year, the condo sales plummeted 23.1 plummeted 23.1 percent to 20,132 from 26,162."

I am not arguing the validity of these statements, but rather I am raising the point that real estate can not be considered on such a large scale. Massachusetts, although the sixth smallest state in the U.S. does span 7,838 square miles of land.

Locally, the metrowest Boston area has seen numbers that defy the state of Massachusetts' year end sales statistics.

For instance:

Condominium sales in Watertown, MA have has an increase in median sales from $326,000 in 2007 to $345,000 in 2008.

In Arlington, the median sales price for single-family homes has increased $2,500 from $472,500 in 2007 to $475,000 in 2008. Also, the total number of condominium sales has increased from 202 in 2007 to 226 in 2008.

Belmont saw some slight appreciation, as well, in their single-family market. The median sales price has increased from $690,000 in 2007 to $693,725 in 2008.

Although we have not seen huge gains in our housing market, we have not seen the depreciation that is being reported on a statewide level. Real estate is more than state to state and city to city. One really has to dig into each neighborhood of a town to truly understand how that market is faring.