There really is a lot of positive news behind the sobering headlines about the housing market over the past couple of years, according to the CEO of Long Realty, “Arizona’s Real Estate Company.”

Rosey Koberlein, herself a transplanted Pennsylvanian and Ohioan, believes that the Tucson-area real estate market, and golf course homes in particular, are weathering the storm in the housing industry far better than most sections of the country and while the “first half of 2008 will be continue much like ’07, I expect significant improvement in the second half of  ’08.”

Prices have also held much firmer for golf course homes than other higher-end properties, according to Koberlein, with less than a 10% rollback in prices from the highs of 2005 for homes near golf courses, while there’s been up to a 36% price reduction in other homes in the $500,000-plus category. That’s great news, long-term, for those considering moving near one of the spectacular courses in the Tucson-Green Valley area.

Keep telling yourself, only 7-1/2 inches of annual rainfall, 325 sun-filled days per year and more than 200 golf courses. Think you can get your fill of the golfing life in the Valley of the Sun? Maybe they ought to call it the Valley of the Dimpled Ball, the lifestyle is so prevalent. And while over 2-million visitors play golf in the Phoenix area every year, they account for only one-third of all the golf rounds. If you move to Arizona to play golf, you shouldn’t have a hard time finding a game!

Phoenix has been a boom-town for long enough now that it’s the 5th largest metro area in the country with nearly 1-1/2-million people living in the city, 3-1/2 million in the Valley. The Valley of the Sun is also rapidly becoming the worst-kept secret in the golf world, too. Only Florida, California and Texas opened more courses last year than the Grand Canyon State.

To keep up with the demand, an average of 9 new homes a day have been built over the last three years with golf course communities leading the way, ranging from efficient bungalows (remember, the original Sun City is here) to sprawling mountain mansions with incredible golf and Valley views. In short, a style and price for every taste and budget. While average sales prices for single-family homes are still almost 10-percent below the national average, they’re appreciating by close to 6-percent/year. Try making that with your bank CD. And the expectation of over a half-million more jobs coming to the Valley by 2012, the competition for those new residents should remain high, which should be nothing but good news for those who want to spend every day living the life-style that 13-million people come to visit each year.

But Phoenix is more than desert landscape and golf courses. It’s a big-league sports town with big-league shopping (that’s how the Goldwater’s made their name), world-class art museums from contemporary to Native American, sprawling desert botanical gardens and great antiques. You’ll find more water than you think, with six major lakes within a 75-mile drive and incredible contrasts in temperature, foliage and golf courses if you head north toward Sedona. And you can still make a day-trip to the Grandest Canyon of them all. Not bad for a place that not so long ago was a small desert oasis and is now the Golf Capital of The West, if not The World.