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Like just about every other economic indicator out there, Fairfax County's housing market tells a tale that's part boom and part gloom. It largely depends on where you're getting your numbers and how you choose to decipher them.

Nobody is going to paint the current picture as rosy. There are still too many homes for sale and not enough buyers. The economy is still struggling, and many Fairfax residents remain worried about their jobs.

That said, though, there are some encouraging signs. Optimists among us might point to the fact that home prices are in positive territory for the first time in nearly three years. According to a recent report from Metropolitan Regional Information Systems Inc., existing home sales across Fairfax County in 2009 were up by nearly 9 percent from the previous year. There was also clear improvement in the second half of 2009 compared to a forgettable first half, suggesting the local housing market may have bottomed out last June or July.

Others might say those figures are tainted because most are tied to 2008, the most dismal year for Northern Virginia real estate in decades. It's also worth noting that the hottest segment of our housing market -- homes priced under $300,000 -- has largely been fueled by the federal first-time homebuyer's tax credit of $8,000, an artificial stimulus that's slated to disappear in April.

Rather than allowing the credit to vaporize altogether, perhaps it should be extended to all buyers through 2010. More people would be inclined to buy in the midpriced market ($300,000 to $500,000), freeing up inventory in the ultra-competitive lower end of the housing spectrum. Short of that, we've simply succeeded in packing a whole herd of people into low-cost housing, plugging a Titanic-sized hole left by the financially irresponsible who purchased houses well beyond their means.

More than a few economists warn that extending or expanding these tax credits in any form is a slippery slope that caters to the "you can't fix everything by throwing more money at it" crowd.

To be sure, blindly writing trillion-dollar checks and adding to record deficits isn't a long-term solution. But the current tax credit has allowed thousands of Americans to get in the home-buying game on healthy terms, pumped billions of dollars into a moribund industry and preserved tens of thousands of jobs in the process.

Opening that program to second-, third- and 10th-time homebuyers won't solve all of this country's housing problems overnight, but it is a discussion worth having.