Dr. Mike Walden, North Carolina Cooperative Extension economist in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at N.C. State University, responds:

"Well, I don't think it's luck. I'll say economics obviously. And you're right, our markets have not suffered as much. In fact, the markets that have suffered the most, in areas like California, Washington, D.C., Florida, typically have something in common. And that is that there is limited supply of land due to some natural barriers or due to some amenities that people want to be nearby, like water, or due to regulations. And the good thing about North Carolina is for the greatest part of our state, there are no natural barriers for building, and regulations are milder than many other states. So as we went through this housing boom in the early part of this decade, and residential building increased in our big metropolitan areas especially, builders could simply expand easily by moving out further and further into the suburbs. And you didn't have those big run ups in prices as you did, for example, in a coastal community where there were no suburbs to move out of because you wanted to be near water. Now that means that there is one area of our state that has suffered perhaps on par with the rest of the nation and that is those segments of our state where there are natural barriers, particularly some coastal communities and some mountain communities. And we have seen big declines there is prices. But this, I think, says that there is something to be said good about not being in a boom economy. We're benefiting from the fact that we didn't have that big booming housing market earlier this decade."