Ryan Peterson sat down with realtor Willie Miranda looking for his predictions on the new year's real estate market in this weeks Your Home.

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As 2011 winds to a close, I sat down with our resident real estate expert for a look back at the year that was, a year that didn't include that popular first-time homebuyer tax credit and asked for his predictions for the real estate market in 2012.

Realtor Willie Miranda said, “In 2009,2010 we had a lot of buyers in the market. They took advantage of that tax credit. In 2011 it just wasn't there, so that made a major dent in the homebuyer market this year.

Miranda said that resulted in lower sales for the year, but went on to say that the market remained relatively stable. Yet, even as interest rates remain at historically low levels, people are still hesitant to buy.

“You would think with the low interest rates that more buyers would take advantage of it, but they haven't. I think the biggest factors have been the high unemployment rate and very low consumer confidence,” said Miranda.

Now next I asked Miranda to gaze into his crystal ball if you will to give us a forecast for the real estate market for 2012. And while he said he expects things to remain stable, a year beyond that, in 2013, is when he really expects things to start picking up.

I think there a lot of great factors going into 2012. Interest rates are going to remain low. I also think that the GDP, gross domestic product, is increasing. Consumer confidence is going to go up. And let's face it, real estate is still a very safe investment, overall, for the long term,” said Miranda.

Miranda went on to say the weather played a role in 2011 as well. Record snowfall in the first quarter coupled with the crippling storms and flooding at the end of the summer made for a rocky sales year.