I’m sitting here listening to Steve Job’s commencement address to Stanford’s class of 2005 for the second time (on my MacBook).  It’s 15 minutes well spent.  Five minutes into the speech he says that, “you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards.”  He was talking about his time at Reed College and how what happened there would greatly impact the development of the Mac ten years later.

Heeding his advice, looking forward is a speculative business at best.  The Wall Street Journal in conjunction with Case Shiller put this map together of predictive real estate prices between the first quarter of 2012 and the first quarter of 2013.  Portland’s prediction is for a 5.9% increase.  Bend is considerably higher up the list at 13.7% as are some of the other Oregon markets.  Put that with CNN’s report today that interest rates for a 30 year fixed conventional loan are under 4% for the first time ever at 3.94% and you might have a reason feel a little more optimistic.

A note about this table. Width limitations make it necessary to scroll over to the right in order to scroll down the list. If you want the full size of this map, click here. I’ve fixed the embedded image twice now so if it disappears again, just use the link.

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