Well, I guess it depends on who you listen to. Putting Realtors aside for now, consider these two recent reports:
1) Forbes magazine recently examined current home sales patterns and sales projects. They looked at the usual indicators: estimated 2008 housing inventory, sales rates and turnover.
Only one Florida city made the list for markets where sales are likely to increase. Despite a decline in prices for 2006 (2.%), the authors expect that decline to turn around fairly quickly. So, this report says buy!
2) PMI Mortgage Insurance Co., in its second-quarter U.S. Market Risk Index, lists Orlando-Kissimmee as one of the 11 metropolitan areas with greater than a 50% chance for prices to drop over the next two years. So, this report says not to buy!
Why is it that we always look to someone else to tell us what to do? Maybe it's human nature or maybe we just doubt our own abilities to make judgements based on the data. You don't need to be an "analyst" or mathematician, often plain old common sense reigns true. The data that most homeowners need for the analysis is readily available for the asking. The most pertinent data is i) inventory ii) inventory increasing/decreasing over time iii) sales volume iv) sales volume increasing/decreasing over time and v) prices. The last one is actually the hardest. What do you measure? In theory you want to measure the price a given house brings or will bring over time. This same house sale data is difficult to attain so most often we see reported averages and median sale prices. These numbers are easily skewed as different economic conditions can drive sales activity in one end of the market. Bottom line, work with a professional that understands the numbers, can explain them to you, and then YOU decide.
The PMI report went on to say that's it's always a good time to buy. When they studied real estate purchase through up cycles and down cycles buyers always had a positive return on their investment with a 20% down payment over ten years.
This supports my belief that real estate (particularly your primary home) should be purchased to meet your needs and as a long term investment.
Buy low, sell high...inventory is high, prices are low...let's get going!
I think the question of whether it is time to buy or not really is not a good question. I like to ask the question is the property right for you? If so, then make an offer on the property at a price you can afford.
It's like trying to time the stock market. No one is ever going to get the best possible price/deal. If you happen to get near the bottom, kudos for you if not don't fret and worry about something no one can predict. If you have a long term view on the property, historically you're going to be okay. So don't worry about what the market is like now. Buy it and enjoy.