The Real Story is on a break until January 17. We’ll return with more news that will help you navigate the ever-more-complex realm of real estate.

In the meantime, we reached some new milestones in 2010. Since our launch in 2009, we have published nearly 660 posts and interviewed 89 guests. Popular themes were clean technologies, new attitudes toward retirement and city planning. For your listening pleasure over the break, here are our Top 10 podcast segments during the last year. Enjoy—and happy New Year!

10. Taking leadership to another level. Colleen Edwards interviews Anthony Eggert, Commissioner, California Energy Commission on California’s leadership in alternative fuel vehicles.
9. Retirement with a purpose.Dan O’Brien, area president of Shea Homes Trilogy, describes changing views on the Golden Years.

8. Recycling for rewards. Ron Gonen, a keynote speaker at Cleantech Open, tells Colleen Edwards about a unique rewards-based recycling program.

7. Bringing the old to a new standard. Architect Graham Irwin, principal of Essential Habitat, speaks with Colleen Edwards about Passive House technology.

6. Technology is the game changer. Baby boomers, the first retirement-age generation adept at using the Internet, are using technology to stay connected with family, friends and the world-at-large. Colleen Edwards interviews Dan O’Brien of Shea Homes Trilogy.

5. Boomers shake up ‘active adult’ living. Dan O’Brien of Shea Homes Trilogy tells Colleen Edwards how the Baby Boomers are not like the previous generation of retirees.

4. A new way to look at a proven technology. Graham Irwin, a certified Passive House consultant, describes how this proven European technology is being applied to remodels right here in the Bay Area.

3. Wastewater streams into revenue streams. A report from Cleantech Open introduces a breakthrough technology for cleaning up polluted water.

2. Dynamic ideas for clean water. The value of clean water will only increase in coming years, and Cleantech Open has produced a wastewater filtration system that converts energy-consuming treatment plants into energy-producing resource recovery plants.

1. Embracing change in Pittsburg. Amid the doom-and-gloom stories about municipal economies, Pittsburg has a tale of success.  City manager Marc Grisham talks to Colleen Edwards.

It has been reported that there are now more Americans in the Gen Y or Millennial demographic group (approximately 80 million and counting) than in the Boomer population (approximately 79 million). No matter how you look at it, that means that more than half of the population in the United States is now concentrated in two generational groups.

What will the sheer numbers of people, all in what one could call a lifestyle transition phase, mean to where we live and how we live? The Boomers will be reinventing what “active adult” living is all about, changing America’s vision of a retirement lifestyle, or extending their working years by another decade to make up for their financial losses in the recession. Will they downsize, move away or move back into the cities?

And their Millennial children—who have held off on making commitments to home ownership, marriage and career jobs—what will their homes look like? Will they work the same kind of hours as their parents? How far from home will they be willing to commute? Will they be a generation of renters, or do they feel a connection to their parents American Dream of homeownership?

If you’re considering renting a home while you restore your credit rating, consider this: the home you rent may be a foreclosed property, and the person you are paying first and last month’s rent plus security deposit is part of a real estate scam.

This very sophisticated—and sometimes, very expensive—scam has become so prevalent that the Department of Real Estate (DRE) has now posted a consumer alert about bogus rental properties on its web site: www.dre.ca.gov/cons_alerts.html.

This is a very slick operation, starting with ads listed in the classifieds or Craigslist that attract people looking for a rental home. Drawn in by the location or price of the property, potential renters make contact with “rental agents” who make appointments to meet at the properties, tour them through the homes, provide business card for contact information and present contracts or rental agreements. In some cases, not only does the fraudulent leasing company take the renter’s deposits, but it collects monthly rents—until the real property owner or its agent visits the home to prepare it for appraisal and sale.

The Department of Real estate offers this advice: carefully review the proof of ownership paperwork, ask for photo ID and then go to the DRE website to see if the person representing himself or herself as an agent of the owner is licensed. The DRE has a detailed consumer alert on its site, and a listing of phone numbers for consumers all over the state.

Throughout history, light has played an important role in our winter celebrations. Pagan solstice rituals used fire to light up the longest night of the year. When Christmas, originally celebrated in springtime, was reassigned to the winter solstice (a fallow season) by the early Christians, Yule logs and candles symbolizing wisdom and understanding were introduced into the rituals. The modern translation is the tradition of decorating buildings, homes, trees and landscaping, etc., etc. with lights for the holiday season.

The Bay Area is fortunate to have several unique holiday- and solstice-related events in the coming days, all involving the magic of light. Take a look:

Holiday Lights & Sights Boat Parade
Friday, December 17, 6 p.m.
Fisherman’s Wharf
San Francisco

More than 75 boats and yachts decked out with lights and holiday finery will parade along the waterfront.

Midnight Delight-Total Lunar Eclipse
Monday – Tuesday, December 20, 10 p.m. until December 21,  2 a.m.
Chabot Space & Science Center
Oakland

The ultimate nightlight—the moon—will cross the Earth’s shadow, and you can watch through a giant telescope. The Chabot Space Center is planning a night filled with moonlight madness: stories, myths, music, eclipse-watching and more.

Winter Solstice at Muir Woods
Tuesday, December 21, 3:30 – 8 p.m.
Muir Woods

What better way to mark the longest night of the year than among the world’s tallest tree species! The Visitor Center is hosting an annual winter solstice celebration with crown making, Renaissance music, Morris Dancing and stories. Candlelit trails will be open until 8 p.m.

Well, it turns out that money CAN buy you happiness, according to a report from the New York-based Social Science Research Council. Its study called “American Human Development Report” shows that once people are making approximately $70,000 a year in salary, that their levels of happiness are met.

The study, which measured more than 450,000 people from all around the country, looked at Americans from three points of view: Health, Education and Income. Not surprisingly, it found that where one lives is an enormous determining factor in how well one lives. Connecticut and Massachusetts top the report for offering well-being, and Arkansas and West Virginia come in at the bottom. For Bay Area readers, yes, the charts show that The San Francisco Bay Area region scores in the highest percentile for life expectancy, access to education and salary.

The data, which segments information by state, congressional district, gender and ethnicity, was analyzed before and during the recession, which shows clearly that this prolonged downturn has been hardest on the least educated.

To see the charts, go to www.livescience.com/health/measure-of-america-healthiest-states-inforgraphic-101110

For those who have been wondering why, in the wake of so few new homes being built, there still seems to be so many homes on the market, The Real Story has an answer: even though there have been fewer starts since the beginning of the Recession, there have also been fewer new households set up since the 1940’s.

Between March of 2009 and March of 2010, there was an increase in households of only 357,000—the smallest increase since 1947. Between 2008 and 2009, the increase in households was only 398,000. Compare these numbers to the more robust annual increases of 1.3 million every year from 2002 until 2007 and you can see a trend.

Interestingly, in this Recession, divorce rates have decreased. So have birth rates. But the biggest factor in the decrease in household formation is in kids coming out of college and moving back in with their folks, and in young homeowners losing their homes to foreclosure and coming back home with THEIR kids to live with their parents.

In a healthy market, builders need to add 1.5 to 1.7 million homes a year to meet the underlying demand. That demand is created by the need to replace homes lost to fire and natural disasters, age and wear (about 250,000 units); to second home demand (about 50,000 to 100,000 units) and to household formation increases (about 1.3 to 1.4 million). It will be interesting, as the results of the 2010 census are released next year, to see just how many families were doubled up under one roof on April 1, 2010.