The big summer buying season is coming to a close and we're now getting a much better sense of how 2011 will measure up compared with previous ones. Bottom line: a bad year, but not the worst. Notable themes: Inventory levels are falling faster than prices.

Monday morning the Minneapolis Area Association of Realtor's weekly report said that during the last week of the third quarter (the week ending Oct. 1), the number of new listings in the metro area decreased 21 percent to 1,219, pending sales increased 32.7 percent to 926 and inventory fell 22.8 percent to 23,177.

There will be more news about the market this week. On Tuesday morning Zillow will release its August Real Estate Market Report, which is likely to show that the Twin Cities is seeing price declines that are slightly smaller than the national average. And on Thursday the Minnneapolis Area Association of Realtors will release its home sales report for for all of September for the Twin Cities. I got a sneak peak and here's what you can expect: With short sales and foreclosures still dominating sales, the median sales price of all deals will be down 6 percent to $156,000 and the percentage of original list price received by sellers will increase 0.5 percent to 91.2 percent.