Robert White, president of New York City-based Real CapitalAnalytics, has released his analysis of the unofficial anniversaryof the credit crisis. Likewise, so have CB Richard Ellis CapitalMarkets and Torto Wheaton Research. The two reports share many ofthe same observations and conclusions.

White points out that his company's latest sales figures showthat the office sector "has fared better with transaction activitystarting to grow and prices not down as much as for other propertytypes." Overall, however, he observes that "one year after theonset of the credit crunch, recent sales data paint a picture ofcontinuing investor confusion rife with contradictory signals."

Those contradictory signals result from quite a mixed bag ofstatistics, according to the reports by White and CBRE-TortoWheaton researchers. "The monthly snapshot of office sales wasclearly discouraging in July, the latest month for which figuresare available--with sales of office properties off 80%year-over-year, at $3.6 billion, for the slowest July since 2003,"White writes. On the other hand, he points out that more than 100significant office properties sold in July, of which $2.1 billionwere suburban assets and $1.5 billion were CBD properties.