Today's Real Estate Market in South Jersey

A friend said to me"They meaning you Realtors say prices are going up but what is the real story because there are conflicting reports?"
Well here are the facts: The average price in south Jersey according to TREND MLS is higher than last year. But here is why: much of the really low priced inventory, homes below $100,000 have already sold and homes priced  higher than $500,000 have started to sell and those 2 factors have raised the average sales price.
The number of home sales are are higher than last year but there still is a lot of inventory ( homes currently on the market) and a lot of Short Sales that still have to sell before we will see prices rise.