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The real estate market still sucks, in case you haven't noticed. According to reports issued by a handful of the city's biggest brokerages today, home sales were off 50 percent during the second quarter compared to same time period last year, and prices took a beating as well, naturally: The average sales price of a Manhattan apartment is now $1.31 million, according to Prudential Douglas Elliman, down 21 percent from a year ago. And today's report on unemployment courtesy of the U.S. Labor Department won't do much to lift your spirits. The jobless rate rose to 9.5 percent in June as the U.S. economy shed another 467,000 jobs. So is there anything good to report to offset all the bad news? We can't think of much, but we'll let you know if we come up with something. [Real Deal, NYT]