Many national housing analysts suddenly have bottom on the brain. I refer to this week's multiple predictions that housing prices were about to kiss the proverbial floor.

The Associated Press was one such housing cheerleader. Its proof? One renowned home price index, the S&P/Case-Shiller, showed housing prices in Tampa and 19 other cites fell by an annual rate of 19 percent in January but "only" 18.6 percent in February.

Feeling giddy yet?

In the Tampa Bay area, economic signs suggests that prices won't stop sliding before 2010. Are there good deals to be had today? Of course. But the overall trend is still down:

• The inventory of unsold homes may be declining nationally, but it's painfully high in the Tampa Bay area at more than 35,000. In fact we have an ever-lasting gob stopper of inventory as new foreclosure homes flood the gaps left by recent home sales.

• Home price declines are accelerating in markets spared the earlier cataclysm in Florida. Why does that matter? Many of these are feeder markets for Florida. Cleveland was one such home price loser, and Ohio has been a large supplier of residents to the Tampa Bay area.

• If a decline in inventory had begun, builders would have to start filling the presumed shortage. That's not happening. In fact, the number of empty new homes in our region stands above 2,000. That surplus remains a strain on the market. The proof is in the rash of local builder bankruptcies and failures.

• Did you know the government, through the Federal Housing Administration, continues to subsidize mortgages to people with low credit scores who put no more than 3 1/2 percent down? Just when you thought the Feds were quarantining the sick housing market, you find out they're actually sneezing into the air conditioning ducts. Some of these high-risk deals will be next year's foreclosures.

• Our unemployment rate tops 10 percent. Unemployment crimps housing demand. You rarely buy a house without a paycheck. But the jobless rate also boosts supply as the recently unemployed leave the area in search of work.

Believe in the price bottom all you want. I just think the positive prognosticators are fishing without bait.