Damon Darlin over at The Walk Through, the real estate blog of the New York Times, audits the predictions of the National Association of Realtors over the past few years in a fascinating post.

He finds that the forecasters tend to be on the negative side, each year forecasting a decline in real estate and each year being proven wrong with a rise in sales volume. In fact during the last few years their predictions of decline have differed by as much as 14% in reality.

Each year they have argued it is different and that this year sales will decline. But history keeps proving them wrong.

The housing bubble that never was?

As you might expect, data holds a special place in our heart. And so do others who hold a similar opinion like Nate Sumner, a real estate broker in Marin County of California, just outside of San Francisco.

Nate has created an index that looks at the number of sales (actual and pending) that occured in the past 30 days and divides that number by the number of homes available for sale at that point in time.

In effect, the index looks at whether inventory on a market is drying up or flooding in. A high number means there are more buyers than people willing to sell and vice versa, a low number means there are more sellers than buyers (oversimplifying things).

As you might expect, the fourth quarter in Marin county represented a tipping point where the favored negotiating position went from the seller to the buyer.

Nate does a great job on the cities in Marin and we might extend his great efforts in the coming weeks and start to look at other communities in California. If you’d like us to take a look at yours, just comment on this post.

There are many more factors that help drive the final sales price than engaging the best realtor. CNN Money had a good article over the weekend describing four items besides Homethinking a home owner might explore in a slowing real estate market.

One of those, home staging, featured Debra Gould of SixElements. Debra runs a fascinating business that helps clients achieve the maximum sales price by decorating and co-ordinating the design of a house about to be listed for sale. Debra says that home staging can add tens of thousands of dollars to the final sales price for an investment of far less. And no doubt the demand for her services is sure to rise as selling a home becomes increasingly difficult.

Debra is also now helping others start their own home staging businesses, and has begun compiling a directory of home stagers.

If you’re considering selling your property, or even feel the entrepreneurial spirit within, be sure to check out her site.