REAL ESTATE

Positive Forecast: If you can’t wait until the 17th, here’s the future--in brief--from real estate economist Walter Hahn of Kenneth Leventhal & Co. accounting firm’s Newport Beach office.

“I see the housing industry recovering, starting in the last half of the year and then going into a fairly substantial building mode for a couple of years as we catch up with the pent-up demand for housing that has gone unsatisfied during this recession. . . . What happens after every recession is that the economic uncertainty diminishes. When people aren’t afraid for their jobs and their income so much, they go out, they form new households, they rent apartments and they buy houses, and all of a sudden you have this wave of demand that hits the market.�