[quote author="nefron" date=1229818923]Okay, forgive me for being naive and not reading every post, but what is this Case Schiller index and what's the significance of it dropping below 200?</blockquote>
<strong><a href="http://www2.standardandpoors.com/portal/site/sp/en/us/page.topic/indices_csmahp/0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,2,1,0,0,0,0,0.html">Link to S&P/Case-Schiller Index description</a></strong>
<strong><a href="http://www2.standardandpoors.com/spf/pdf/index/SP_CS_Home_Price_Indices_Methodology_Web.pdf">Link to S&P/Case-Schiller methodology</a></strong> - *
* there is important information regarding eligibility criteria (p. 6) and index construction (p. 7-8), namely that they choose to divide the data into 3 different price tiers, and that they exclude condos and comparisons to new construction sales.
<strong><a href="http://www2.standardandpoors.com/spf/pdf/index/CSHomePrice_History_112555.xls">Link to S&P/Case-Schiller Historical Data</a></strong>
Ipoplaya has taken closing data for Irvine and some surrounding areas and created a micro-market (Irvine-specific) targeted data set.
An index number below 200 indicates that prices have rolled back to pre-May 2004 levels.
Link to <strong><a href="http://www.ipoplaya.com/iposhiller.pdf">IPO-Schiller site</a></strong>.
Hope this helps.
-IR2