It is no secret that it’s been a rough four years for real estate in all pockets of the United States. It seems that no community was immune to the plague of foreclosures and tanking Home values. Cities that were once golden children of the real estate boom became the poster children for the bursting housing bubble. So, it has been a dark era for the real estate sector for several years, but now there’s a light at the end of the tunnel. Ten standout cities are leading the turning tide, hopefully becoming bellwethers for the general recovery and stabilization of the housing market nationwide. Realtor.com has selected these ten cities based on year-over-year improvements in three areas: increasing median home prices, decreasing length of time that houses sit on the market unsold, and decreasing unemployment rates.

This is certainly good for the nation, but doubly good for our community considering the difficulties the Michigan economy has faced in recent years. Number ten on Realtor.com’s list, proudly representing the Midwest, is Ann Arbor, Michigan!

Ann Arbor has seen its home prices climbing steadily. In fact, according to data compiled by Realtor.com in October 2011, the median prices of listed houses went up more than a whopping 8 percent from October of last year. Meanwhile, inventory has gone down, almost a full 25 percent. This means the supply of homes is virtually in balance with the demand—good news for folks trying to sell their homes! The prices at which homes actually sell are also going up steadily, rising nearly 5 percent for the year.

A top-ten ranking as a turnaround town is just the icing on the cake for Ann Arbor, a city already special on many other counts!