Distress continues to mount across the US, reaching a total of more than $180 billion in the latest reports by New York City-based Real Capital Analytics. And yet, as RCA and others have noted in recent analyses, the investment market continues to improve and prices continue to rise for certain classes of properties, especially trophy assets in top markets. Add to that, the economy is recovering, though its on/off nature raises the specter of a double-dip.

The paradox between rising distress totals and the general improvement in real estate markets seems to suggest two parallel universes. But a case can be made that it's all of a piece: Despite the rising levels of distress, the totals are rising at a slower pace these days, suggesting that distress, in its own way, is improving along the lines of the overall economy.

Data from RCA shows that new inflows to distress totaled $3.1 billion in May, the latest month for which figures are available. That $3.1 billion is half the average monthly inflow of $6.2 billion from the previous 12 months, RCA points out. Granted, patterns in the distress arena "remain fluid and subject to change," RCA says in its latest report, meaning we're not out of the woods yet. But for now, the sum of all of the distress reports and economic outlooks suggests that the distress world and the market-rate world may have reached some sort of equilibrium. As Alexandria, VA-based Delta Associates points out in a recent analysis, based on RCA data, "Outstanding distress-including troubled loans and REO-was essentially unchanged in the quarter, with additions nearly offset by just under $14 billion in resolutions and restructurings." Nonetheless, the distress numbers remain large. Following is a roundup of the distress totals for the six regions tracked by RCA, which also breaks out the data into totals for each property sector within each region.