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Even the relentlessly upbeat National Association of Realtors couldn’t put a happy face on this week’s housing report, which showed a larger than expected 5 percent drop in existing home sales from May to June.

A drop was expected, with tax credits expiring and the economy continuing to wallow. But there was no way to sound upbeat about sales numbers which NAR meekly described as “relatively elevated.”

Jones Lang LaSalle’s latest study found global commercial real estate investment has more than doubled since the dark days of 2009, which makes for a nice headline.

But the real story was the disparity in investment activity from region to region. Asia, for example, saw investment volumes drop by 34 percent from the first quarter of 2010, despite increases in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

The only home Marilyn Monroe ever owned, where she was found dead on Aug. 5, 1962, is on the market.

The Spanish colonial house, built in 1929, is located on a secluded cul-de-sac in the Los Angeles suburb of Brentwood, which was also home for O.J. Simpson, celebrity scandal historians will note. Listed by David Offer of Prudential California Realty, the house, described as a “hidden jewel,” is only 2,600 square feet, relatively small for an A-list Los Angeles celebrity retreat, but the lot is a whopping 23,200 square foot, including a small pool and citrus groves.

Pondering this year’s Best Tall Building award winners, architecture geeks will find much to love and loath.

The annual awards, presented by the Chicago-based Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat, recognize projects that have made “extraordinary contributions to the advancement of tall buildings and the urban environment, and that achieve sustainability at the highest and broadest level.”

In others words, skyscrapers must show something more than a little flash and sparkle to win. To their credit, CTBUH judges don’t simply pander to the outrageous towers designed to gain attention, projects that offer plenty of bells and whistles on the outside, but little engineering on the inside.

That said, skyscrapers are meant to be ostentatious and grand, jaw-dropping and brash, inspiring devoted followings with their flair. Some may disagree, but this year’s regional winners deliver the goods:

After a dip in 2009, international activity in the United States picked up last year, with more agents reporting contacts with foreign shoppers.

From April, 2009, to March, 2010, 28 percent of agents reported contact with international buyers, compared to 23 percent in 2009, the National Association of Realtors’ annual survey of Realtors found. More importantly, 18 percent reported actual sales involving an international client, compared to 12 percent in 2009.

Vanderbilt Residences

Peter de Savary is one of those players other players watch.

The British investor and developer specializes in super high-end properties with a glamorous old world flair, such as Skibo Castle in Scotland and the Abaco Club in the Bahamas. He also has a contrarian streak, evidenced by his efforts to develop Grenada as a luxury destination.

That’s why it’s interesting to note that de Savary is buying real estate again in New England.

U.S. real estate executives sound like bad mystery writers these days. The hot topic of discussion is “shadow inventory,” a mysterious and frightening figure hovering around the corner ready to stick a shiv in the recovering residential market.

Recent debate focuses on a report from Standard & Poor’s, which suggests that it may take three years to absorb the current shadow inventory of distressed properties.

Of the myriad of annual studies measuring everything from home buying habits to the favorite ice cream of billionaires, the Merrill Lynch/CapGemini World Wealth Report is one of my favorites.

The report primarily tracks the number of wealthy people in the world, the volume of people who can call themselves millionaires. Of course, a million doesn’t go very far these days, so instead of measuring the filthy rich, the report really tracks simply those people doing pretty good, the people making money or losing it.

In Telluride there is a sense of normalcy settling over the market, broker Bill Fandel says.

The number of sales in Telluride has steadily increased in the last seven months, he notes, with 231 percent more sales in the fourth quarter of 2009 than the same quarter of the previous year (a.k.a. The Black Hole). And monthly dollar volumes for the first quarter of 2010 are anywhere from 50 to 300 percent ahead of the previous year’s monthly total.

“The more important indicator of a rebound in the marketplace is the fact that the numbers for April are nearly two-thirds of those realized in April 2008,” according to a market report from Fandel, vice president and managing broker of Peaks Real Estate/Sotheby’s International Realty. “At that point in time, sales began to decline sharply with the ongoing economic crises.”

Three years after its grand unveiling, construction is finally set to begin on an ambitious 42-story luxury residential development in Dallas’ fast-growing arts district.

This week developers of Museum Tower, the long-delayed and much-discussed development, announced an agreement with the Dallas Police and Fire Pension System to fund construction of the $200 million project. The pension fund will own the tower; developers Brook Partners and Turtle Creek Holdings will retain an “economic interest,” according to local coverage.

Museum Tower launched with much fanfare in 2007, part of Dallas’ move to a global stage. Marketing plans included an effort to grab some of the international luxury buyers gobbling up high-end properties in cities like New York, San Francisco and Miami.