A voice from the Inland Empire

As you may know, I often comment on the L.A. Times' real estate blog, LA Land. Over the years, I've actually developed relationships with some of the other posters. "Inland Empire," one of the regulars, responded to my recent posts stating that the local market seemed to be accelerating again. Here's the post:

"Hi Judy,I don't go to the Times real estate blog much any more but when I do its nice to see a sane voice there (yours). I can believe you when you say things are going fairly fast in your neck of the woods - we probably made offers on 12 houses ourselves this past year only to get outbid. (Riverside Co.)We have a house in North San Bernardino. Its a custom home in a so-called exclusive area (on a hillside, city lights view, lots of custom homes and rich folk with trust funds). We couldn't sell it so we will be renting it out for the duration. We went there today and I could not believe how few for sale signs and foreclosure notices there were in comparison to recent months. Houses that had been on the market for ages are now occupied and show signs of people fixing them up. This was in the streets near our house - maybe a couple of square miles of area. Things are perfect but they are not the pit of gloom lots seem to think we are in.I think the blog [LA Land] is full of people who are either terribly afraid of life in general, fear the future or just plain idiotic. I am "Inland Empire" on the blog."

I love fan mail, Inland Empire!