One of the first signs that Washtenaw County’s housing boom was decelerating came about five years ago when the national building companies started to sell off unsold lots.

Pulte started to pull out of Ypsilanti Township, where it had loaded up on lots and options to acquire still more.

Centex slowed there, too. Both slowed their pace near Chelsea, and Toll Brothers dropped some options near Saline.

It was hard to picture the county’s phenomenal growth slowing. But by the end of 2006, new single-family construction had fallen to 513 units, a 70 percent drop from 2004.

And the fall-off continues, becoming particularly acute after the national economic implosion that started in fall 2008.

That’s why I found it particularly notable when the recent national real estate news touted a report that Miami, Fla.-based Lennar Corp. just bought two loan portfolios with unpaid balances of about $3 billion.

The reason: If national, public builders - who have to answer to shareholders - are finding opportunity in failed loans, could a building resurgence be far behind?

The answer seems to be “maybe” for much of the country.

But as I asked one local land broker, it’s still a “no” for Michigan.

“Nobody’s picking up land here,” said Jim Porth, a commercial broker at Thomas Duke Co. of Farmington Hills.

That includes the big companies: “I haven’t seen any sign that they’ll come back to town.”

The Lennar deal is complex, but the bottom line appears to be this: Amid the bank failures and drops in property values, we keep hearing that property will be trading for “pennies on the dollar.”

That is the case with Lennar, the fourth-largest builder in the country.

With this deal, funded in part by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., the pair will acquire the $3 billion in loans for about 33 cents on the dollar. And the amount of equity stake by Lennar will be just less than one-fifth of that.

That means that Lennar is taking control of 5,500 loans, about 90 percent of which are classified as nonperforming, according to reports. About 25 percent are for partially developed land; another quarter is on homes; the rest are for other real estate sectors.

There are plenty of business considerations in this scenario, not the least of which is the fact that Lennar’s stock rose nearly 9 percent the day after this deal was announced.

Real estate recovery will make this deal look like a windfall. And the company’s equity stake means the markets can still fall further and leave Lennar plenty of cushion, whether it forecloses on the loans or modifies them to accept a lower payment.

But back to the land issue: Compelling to me in this deal is how Lennar is taking control of so much more residential land.

Even a mid-February federal housing report showed a national uptick in new construction, giving rise to some hopes that home building could be inching toward recovery.

The Lennar deal adds to that: It now has cheap inventory in states like Arizona, Nevada and Michigan. And as we’ve seen in Washtenaw County, steps taken by the national, public builders can signal the early waves in market turns.

But what could that mean for Washtenaw County? Lennar hasn’t been particularly active here, even in our boom years. Today, its Web site doesn’t even list active developments in Michigan.

And the company’s willingness to pick up cheap lots seems to only extend to other places.

Meanwhile, other companies aren’t shopping, either. And the banks that hold distressed loans on local properties probably wouldn’t find a buyer at any price - at least according to local speculation.

So far, our housing numbers so far in 2010 show no rebound - with 17 single family permits filed through February 2009, we have a total of 19 this year.

But we still need to keep an eye on the national builders. Some day, we’ll see a sign from them that our buildable land is worth a price.

Paula Gardner is business news director for AnnArbor.com. She can be contacted by email or 734-623-2586. Sign up for the weekly Ann Arbor Business Review newsletter, distributed every Thursday by AnnArbor.com, here.