Why is there not a large inventory of homes for sale?

On the vvmls site there is only 1 active regular sale to see. All the others are either contingent on short sales. I don't understand how this can be when there are so many foreclosures %26amp; empty houses out there. We are trying to buy a home yet every time a home is finally listed %26amp; we put a bid on one we are going against tons of other bids. A house we bid on last week had 42 offers. Are they just waiting to release a lot of houses all at once?Why is there not a large inventory of homes for sale?
The problem is that we are not yet out of the recession and as we all know real estate has been badly hit recently. I am not sure of the price of the accommodation you are talking about but the situation is similar in the Laguna Beach realty as well. Although it is a premium market but there is an uncharacteristic drop in the sales and we all hope that things would soon start improving.