Here is a sobering fact supplied by the The Wall Street Journal: "In 2011, only about 300,000 newly built homes were sold in the U.S., down from a peak of 1.3 million in 2005, and the fewest since records began in 1963."

In the newspaper’s Developments blog, writer Nick Timiraos lists five issues that he expects to be deciding factors in the housing market this year – confidence and jobs, foreclosures, rents, mortgage credit and rates, and regulation.

The blog cautions that talking about a “national” housing market isn’t useful this year, since local or regional  markets are coming out of the downturn at different speeds. 2012 will be the year of the localized housing market, Timiraos suggests.

In a different post, writer Justin Lahart says, "It is beginning to look as if this will be the year when some housing bulls are actually right – with the caveat that, as always with real estate, location matters."