With articles like this one all over the place, what kind of fool would be out shopping for homes today?

Good article on msn from the msm (ha!) that pointed out the fact that the US median sale price numbers aren't counting the deep incentives being offered by builders, and that prices will drop fastest in the markets that increased the fastest (hello, Phoenix!).

Unless you're out there making 40% off offers, you'd be a fool to buy today.

As the slump in the U.S. housing market picks up speed, homeowners and sellers in the once-hottest markets of the country now face the biggest price declines, say analysts. And even if the U.S. economy remains healthy, it could be a year — or more — before the market bottoms out, they say.

After posting back-to-back years of double-digit gains, housing prices have flattened across the country and in some areas started to decline. Overall, the median price of an existing home was up just 0.9 percent in June — the smallest gain in a decade, according to the National Association of Realtors. Prices fell 1.7 percent in the South and 0.5 percent in the Midwest.

And those statistics may not tell the whole story. Sellers coast-to-coast are now making concessions that don't show up in the official sales price, like picking up the cost of repairs or paying buyers’ closing costs. Home builders are giving away valuable upgrades — everything from fancier kitchens to a free pool — to move new homes.

“So the the effective price is lower and probably already falling, but you don’t see that in the market price,” said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com. “I’m expecting 5 to 10 percent peak-to-trough declines in a third to maybe half of the nation's markets.”