Has the real estate crisis ended?  Well, okay, probably not.  But moving from November into December, sales of existing homes rose 6.5 percent, which at least provides a bit of positive news and a sign that some normal Americans still have money.

According to the BBC, analysts thought that homes would sell at an annual rate of 4.4 million in December.  Instead, the exact figure reached was 4.74 million.  So expectations were beaten in addition to those November totals.

We now have to move on to the bad news, though.  The BBC reports, “For 2008 as a whole, sales fell 13.1% to 4.91 million units, the worst year in a decade.”  Also, “The association said that existing home prices fell by 15.3% in December from the same period a year earlier, with 45% of transactions viewed as ‘distress sales,’ where the seller was forced to sell at a discounted price.”

If you can’t stand any more, don’t keep reading, because the BBC then continued, “Housing starts in the US fell by 15.5% in December to hit an all-time low, official statistics released last week showed.  The rate of new construction was down 45% from December 2007.”

Meh.  Maybe January will somehow dig us a tiny bit out of the hole, anyway.