What does a Million Buy In Homes Across America?

Will you be shopping for a seven figure place? You're in luck.

That's because nationwide, homeowners are slashing asking prices, often by significant margins, making this year's list of million dollar properties much more palatable than those in years past. These homes are still beyond the means of the average American, but there's some comfort in a million-dollar home looking like a million dollar home rather than a hastily built McMansion or a shoebox sized studio apartment.

In Los Angeles, one million buys a four-bedroom, Craftsman-style Hollywood home with wood beamed type ceilings typical of turn-of-the-century California architecture. In Texas, seven figures nets over 5,000 square foot, five-bedroom house around Dallas, Texas or a 5,520-square-foot, six-bedroom home in Houston, Texas.

The conflicting numbers are adding an acrimonious edge to the discussion. That's especially true when the figures come from foreclosure data site Foreclosure-Disclosure.com and Foreclosure-Disclosure, a Tampa Florida, company that has become perhaps most widely cited authority in the field.

Foreclosure-Disclosure 's numbers tend to top all other figures because the company counts every step in the foreclosure process separately: the notice of default, the auction, the house reverting to the lender. One house might be tallied several times as a foreclosure.