Want to have some fun with the latest news? Go to the government’s housing price databank and get a much clearer picture of the situation than the headlines will give you. Today’s headlines are blaring that home prices just recorded their biggest drop ever—minus 4.8% this past quarter. Oh woe, oh woe. In the gloom, reports barely mention that a few states are showing some mild improvements in prices.

A US government home-price index has posted the sharpest decline in its 17-year history – and analysts say things won’t get better until at least 2009.

Home prices fell 3.1% in the first quarter compared with last year, according to The Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight. This from AP:

Declines in the government index, which focuses on less expensive properties and includes fewer houses bought with risky home loans that have gone sour over the past year, show the depth of the housing market’s troubles.

U.S. home prices suffered their worst decline on record, skidding 1.7% in the first quarter, the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO) announced today (Thursday).