A year in real estate

The number of homes sold in Anne Arundel County fell 27 percent last year from 2007, but sale prices held relatively steady as a recession swept the country.

Metropolitan Regional Information Systems figures show that 4,459 county homes were sold in 2008 compared with 6,182 in 2007.

Meanwhile, the average median price for a home sold in the county in 2008 was $322,970, a 5.59 percent drop from the $342,108 average median price the previous year.

The year-end figures illustrate how Anne Arundel's sluggish market continued to fall after the area's skyrocketing real estate years of 2004 and 2005 even as local...