Real-estate agents in Flathead Valley are doing what most people are doing to weather the recession: tightening their belts and holding on.

For established agents and brokers with more than 10 years in the business, it hasn't been a boom year, but it's not dire straits either.

"I'm having a fair year," Re/Max Realtor Doug Denmark said. "It helps to have 30 years' experience. This isn't [my] first rodeo. This is the most interesting and difficult market we've had. A lot of Realtors are going out of business. Most Realtors are doing the best they can to keep their heads above water."

Denmark said he and other real-estate agents who've been at it awhile are able to market aggressively, appropriately expose properties and provide clients based on their experience. But, he added, "this is not gravy time for anybody" and that industrywide real-estate agents are reeling by the depth of the housing-market slide.

In Bigfork, Glacier Sotheby's International Realty broker Hilary Shepard said that homes in the $200,000 or less range are selling, while more expensive homes remain on the market. However, as sellers get desperate to jettison houses, things are picking up.

"We're starting to see sellers become realistic," Shepard said. "With the banking regulations, a cash deal speaks volumes."

Cal Scott, the director of Encouraging the Homeownership Ideals for Communities, said he feels that real-estate agents who work hard are better equipped to make it through hard times.

"Realtors that have maintained a work ethic and have built a foundation built on knowledge of lending programs available in the last 34 years are doing better than the rest," Scott said. "Those who entered the business in the last two to eight years have some catching up to do."

Chuck Olson, owner of Chuck Olson Real Estate Inc., said that he's generating business by marketing foreclosed homes.

"A lot of investors are coming in and picking up foreclosures," he said, adding that he manages about two foreclosure transactions each week in Flathead and Lincoln counties.

"It's tough. You really hate to see people lose their houses," Olson added.

Denmark noted that a troubling aspect of the current housing market is the glut of distressed sales and foreclosed homes for sale, which edges out people who are simply selling their homes for normal reasons. And with home values reduced to 2002 levels, those who purchased homes during the housing boom several years ago stand to lose money should they try to sell.

He predicts the housing market is a year to two years away from recovering, but that when it does, the improvement will be exponential.

"We're starting in a new direction," Denmark said. "We'll start healing."

He encourages people in a position to buy a home now to do so.

"People should be looking at buying homes right now because there are some incredible opportunities," he said.

The first-time homebuyer tax-credit program - a part of the Worker, Homeownership and Business Assistance Act, which originally was set to end Nov. 30 but has been extended through April 30, 2010 - is one opportunity that many feel has helped the housing market start to climb again.

"I think it's been very positive in regards to encouraging people to purchase homes with lower home prices," said John Sinrud, government-affairs director for the Northwest Montana Association of Realtors. "There's a lot of support for the tax credit. It encourages the market. We've seen an increase in sales. With the market as it is in Montana, we are surviving and moving forward."

Denmark has a different view.

"The tax credit has helped some first-time homebuyers," Denmark said. "Probably not as much as the incentive of low-price homes."

Shepard also has another opinion: "The homebuyer tax credit is providing the opportunities, but there's still hoops to jump through with banking. Here's an incentive, but it's harder to get a loan."

The homebuyer tax-credit program originally gave people purchasing a home for the first time in three years or ever an $8,000 tax credit. The extension has been expanded by raising the income limits and by offering a $6,500 tax credit for people who have lived in their current home more than five years and want to buy a new home.

U.S. Sens. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., and Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., who spearheaded the extension, contend that while the housing market has improved and stabilized in many areas, the market remains fragile.

National Association of Realtors research suggests that as many as 355,000 sales this year can be directly attributed to the availability of the credit.

"The tax credit is an excellent program," Scott said. "There has been some fraud and misrepresentation, but in general it has been a shot in the arm to the economy and to the industry to allow people who haven't owned a home to more readily afford a home.

Scott notes that the home deal must close by June 30, 2010, for buyers to take advantage of the tax credit.

The extension will cost an estimated $11 billion, on top of the $10 billion spent so far.

Reporter K.J. Hascall may be reached at 758-4439 or by e-mail at kjhascall@dailyinterlake.com