My sister closed 5 days ago on a house in a very desirable part of Mountain View CA. Through their process they had houses with up to 25 bids.
I'm seeing (anecdotally, in the SF Bay Area) a lot of people buying right now. These are generally savvy folks too, they're putting 20%+ down getting awesome fixed rates, and staying well within their means . We may still see a slight dip in prices but my feeling is that we've bottomed out a bit here and on the way up. We think we'll be able to sell our house in 5-10 years and make a profit. That may be wishful thinking, but I'm fairly confident in that position, especially as the tech sector heats up.
The tricky thing about the SF Bay Area however is its very resistent to outside pressures, it was one of the last places hit and will likely be on of the first to recover. Its very hard to time a bottom in the housing market here.