Median prices for single-family homes sold in Boston last year slipped 2 percent to $327,500 from $335,000. But home prices actually managed to creep up in a few city neighborhoods, according to new stats from The Warren Group.

In downtown Boston, which includes posh neighborhoods like Back Bay and Beacon Hill, home prices surged 36.1 percent to almost $1.96 million from about $1.44 million. The good news didn’t carry over to downtown’s condo market, however. Median condo prices in downtown fell 6.4 percent from 2008.

In West Roxbury, median home prices climbed 5.7 percent to $381,500 from $361,000.

And in Jamaica Plain, prices rose to $529,000, a 4.6 percent increase from $506,000 a year earlier.  Median selling prices for JP condos, however, slipped 4 percent from a year earlier.

Allston’s home prices also shot up 41 percent to $380,000 — but the neighborhood only had seven sales in 2009.

In contrast, Roxbury median home prices plunged 33 percent to $195,000 and East Boston’s price dropped 16.3 percent to $180,000.

It should come as no surprise that the cities that have struggled with the highest foreclosure numbers in the last two years were also facing the issue in 2009.

Worcester, Springfield, Boston’ s Dorchester neighborhood, Brockton and Lynn were the cities with the most foreclosures in  2009, according to new data put out by The Warren Group.  Worcester had 505 foreclosures last year. With 503 foreclosures, Springfield wasn’t too far behind.

 Foreclosures in those five cities, however, actually fell in 2009 from 2008, as they did statewide.

But before celebrating, it’s important to keep in mind that those cities were also in the top five for petitions to foreclose, which represent foreclosures that were started in 2009. That means more homeowners in those cities were at risk of foreclosure than anywhere else in the state.

Petitions to foreclose actually climbed year-over-year in those cities anywhere from 9 percent (Lynn) to 23 percent (Worcester).

So is the situation getting better or worse? Some experts think that homeowners with the riskiest, nontraditional mortgage loans, have already gone through foreclosure so the pace of foreclosures will slow.

But there are analysts that fear that persisting unemployment  will drive homeowners with more traditional mortgage loans into foreclosure. 

The big push for loan modifications to help troubled homeowners doesn’t seem to be working.  More than 900,000 homeowners nationwide have sought trial modifications but only 66,000 borrowers have secured permanent modifications.