Roanoke-area homes are changing hands slower and for less as the residential real estate industry putts along in a low gear.

Distressing though it is, it's not nearly severe enough to lower property tax bills. It seems assessors built in a cushion that looks fat enough to absorb price fluctuations so far.

The average selling price in September was $195,789, down 16 percent from one year ago when the average was $234,261.

Homes sold fell to 323 from 392, while the number of homes for sale rose to 3,993 from 3,703.

The numbers were contained in a report released Friday by the Roanoke Valley Association of Realtors.

It covers Realtor-listed homes in Roanoke, Salem, the counties of Botetourt, Craig and Roanoke and parts of Bedford and Franklin counties.

For people looking to buy, the slight cheapening of residential real estate is arguably good news -- unless the same individual must sell a home to purchase the next one.

Home sellers loathe a period like this because it is harder to resell at a profit. Buyers are more scarce and there is a relative abundance of homes on the market.

But it pays to remember that real estate goes in cycles, even in the Roanoke Valley.

The good times were not that long ago -- in 2005. Now the industry is contracting. Next year, who knows?

"Eventually it's going to turn around, just like I think the stock market will," said Neil Conner, association president.

"The market's always in somebody's favor," he said. "It was in the seller's favor for a log time, then it corrected itself. Now we're seeing a true buyer's market. The people who are positioned the best have nothing to sell and they want to purchase."

He said the price slippage is clearly evident.

Some sellers are letting go of their homes for less than the property's assessed value for real estate tax purposes.

The mix of starter, midprice and expensive is about the same this year as last year.

But Conner said he wonders whether current real estate assessments fully reflect the market downturn. He thinks not.

The year-to-date picture is not quite as slow or depressed.

For the first nine months of the year, average selling prices are down 4 percent from the same period of 2007. Prices were running 3 percent ahead of the previous year during September 2007, 2 percent ahead of the previous year in September 2006 and 14 percent ahead of the previous year in September 2005.

Lower selling prices for existing homes doesn't automatically mean lower real estate assessments, the values used in setting property tax bills.

Wendel Ingram, the assessor in Salem, said city statistics show home prices in his community are "stable," while commercial property prices are appreciating.

He expects the total assessed value of real estate to climb incrementally, he said. Assessed values recently stood at about 85 percent of actual market value, he said.

So the market would have to take quite a fall -- more than 15 percent -- to lower values to the point where assessments were too high.

At the start of this year, Salem declared that the total value of all property in the city limits, reflecting reassessments and new construction, had increased 5 percent during the previous year.

In the next reassessment, due out in January, he said he "can pretty safely say that the overall [change] will not be that much," Ingram said. "The changes one way or another probably statewide will be as minimal as they've been in a long while."

Susan Lower, Roanoke's assessor, said she would drop assessments if the market depreciated to such a degree as to require that.

But she does not see a need for this.

"I'm not really seeing any decrease yet," Lower said. She added that the assessment team has reviewed property transfers through June, so its work is not done. Assessments in the city recently stood at about 90 percent of actual market value, she said.

"I don't know what the trend will be," she said. "We should know more towards November."

Roanoke County expects its real estate values to grow, though not as much as it anticipated a year ago, said Brent Robertson, director of management and budget.

But budget writers are beginning work unusually early to allow time to digest the changing economic conditions. As a precaution, department heads are planning where spending might be cut, if needed.

As for other jurisdictions, they're waiting because they reassess real estate not annually, but every few years.

Staff writer Cody Lowe contributed to this report.