Home sales in Wisconsin took a steep dive during the first quarter of 2008, down 24.9 percent from the first three months of 2007, according to a report issued Tuesday by the Wisconsin Realtors Association.

The good news was that the median home price statewide showed a more modest decline of 3.8 percent to $154,000, which association officials said indicates home values are holding up despite the market downturn.

The 9,044 agent-assisted sales from January through March were down from 12,049 sales during the same period a year ago, according to the report. Each of the state's six regions reported declines.

The state decline was worse than the rest of the Midwest region, which was down 18.3 percent.

In south-central Wisconsin, including Dane County, sales were down 23.3 percent to 1,838 and the median home price dropped 3 percent to $172,700.

Winter weather was a significant factor in the first-quarter decline, said David Clark, an economist with C3 Statistical Solutions of Milwaukee.

He said real estate agents reported that many open houses were canceled in January and February while others attracted only a few people. He estimated that weather could be responsible for 15 percent or more of the decline.

Although interest rates remain historically low, Clark said the state's job growth has been flat and the labor market hasn't been strong. He said those economic conditions are related to home sales.

Wisconsin's modest median price decline shows home values are holding up in the state, said association president William Malkesian. He said the median price decline is substantially worse in the rest of the country.

Malkesian didn't say whether he thought the first-quarter numbers meant the housing slump has hit bottom, but he said he's optimistic conditions will improve.

"I'm looking in the rearview mirror," he said. "We're moving forward. The bottom is the bottom, but every market is different."

Mike Spranger of Wisconsin Rapids, the association's board chairman and a partner with First Weber Group of Northern Wisconsin, said home sales began to improve in March, indicating that some weather-related first-quarter activity got pushed back into the second quarter.

Phone calls and requests for showings are up in the Minocqua area, said Mike Mulleady, general manager of Coldwell Banker Mulleady Realtors and an association official.

A broker sentiment survey conducted by the association found that more than half of those responding said April and May sales also will be worse than last year. A third of the brokers expect sales to improve in the third quarter.

The National Association of Realtors said that median prices for existing single-family homes dropped in 100 of 149 metropolitan areas in the January-March period, while 48 metropolitan areas saw prices increase and one reported no change.

The price declines in 67 percent of the areas surveyed was the largest percentage of areas reporting declining prices in the history of the survey, which goes back to 1979. Prices had fallen in 34 percent of the cities surveyed in the October-December survey.

Nationally, the median home price — the point where half the homes sold for more and half for less — fell to $196,300 in the first quarter, down by 7.7 percent from the same period a year ago, when the median sales price was $212,600.

Sales of existing homes were down in 46 states. The largest percentage plunge was a 38.6 percent drop in Maryland during the first three months of this year compared with the same period in 2007. Only Alaska, Illinois and New Jersey reported sales increases during the survey period. Data for New Hampshire wasn't available.

Nationally, sales fell by 22.2 percent in the first quarter compared with the same period a year ago.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.