Dive summary:

• In surveying five criteria in 919 U.S. counties, RealtyTrac concludes that 65% of the housing markets in the country are doing poorly and have slipped during the past four years.
• The five metrics were: average home prices, unemployment, foreclosure inventories, foreclosure starts and distressed sales.
• Using a standard of three of the five criteria being better or worse than 2008, RealtyTrac concluded that 580 counties are down and 315 are up.

From the article:

Sixty-five percent of U.S. housing markets studied by RealtyTrac are worse off than they were four years ago, according to the Irvine, Calif.-based real estate research firm. ...