Some real estate-related news to ponder, in honor of the second annual Advocate Real Estate snapshot. Our authoritative look at home prices in your neighborhood — and not all of Dallas or the DFW area – will run in January. Until then:

• Want to buy a foreclosed home in Highland Park? Doesn’t look to be much of a deal, notes Robert Wilonsky at the Observer, though he does like the site that the house is on: A listing of foreclosed homes in Dallas’ best neighborhoods. Did Mrs. Bush check it out before she bought?
• The Dallas area has become more risky in terms of widespread mortgage defaults, says First American Core Logic, which tracks national real estate statistics. In the second quarter, the Dallas area had a low risk of widespread defaults. The risk was raised to moderate in the new report, ranking Dallas 174th out of the 376 markets in the country. Core Logic ranks default risk as low, moderate, moderately high, and high. The riskiest default market in the country is suburban Los Angeles; the least risky is Louisville, Ky.

• From the department of irony: Property taxes are rising across the country despite the steepest drop in home values since the Great Depression. There are a couple of reasons for this. First, some states, like California, that  capped property tax hikes in the 1980s also capped tax decreases. Second, many states don’t reassess property values annually, so any decrease this year won’t be included on the tax rolls for at least another year.

• Even the British are wringing their hands over real estate, reports the BBC. Home prices have fallen in 2008 by 14.9 percent, and the situation could get worse next year. The survey, done by a British lender, says the average house price has dropped by £31,485, or about $47,000, in the past 12 months.