Will the real San Francisco housing market please stand up?

"Just as a weather forecast quickly becomes unreliable in a matter of days, sales predictions are unreliable more than a few months down the road. Typically though, a "housing recovery" goes through a stagnant period of several years, followed by a gradual improvement. Given all the challenges this market has to work through, stagnant, followed by a gradual improvement seems more likely than "roaring back""