Monday, November 20, 2006

Realtors at The Crossroads

This must be a particularly confusing and distressing time to be a Realtor, especially for some of the newer association members.

On one hand, you have your own experience of witnessing the stark almost knee-jerk turnaround to the nations housing market showing sales of new and existing homes dropping like a rock while inventory and months supply climb to all time highs.

On the other hand though, there is your associations trusted Chief Economist who, although sounding convincing, has just spent the better part of a year slowly massaging his outlook from “the sky's the limit” to “we've hit the bottom”.

What is a Realtor to do?

Well, theres certainly no point in getting all depressed. Besides, that mood is not very conducive to sales.

Instead, why not attend the National Association of Realtors annual Conference and Expo, be wooed by two former presidents and after knocking back one too many gin fizzes, slide into a nice soothing presentation of classic Lerenomics.

That should completely cleanse you mind of any of those distracting little negative numbers...

And so went the show down at NARdi Gras 2006 and with it, David Lereah's latest, and possibly most creative attempt at crafting a better reality.

It seems that Lereah is not merely capable of spinning the boom but also shows a great proficiency at narrating the bust.

Just peruse the 70+ slides of his latest presentation entitled “The Road to Recovery” to discover just how Lereah plans to sell the concept of market stabilization to both his fellow Reators as well as consumers at large.

Some key slides include titles such as:

  • Stabilizing Pending Home Sales
  • New Home Sales Bottomed
  • Existing Housing Inventory Beginning to Fall
  • New Home Inventory also Falling
  • Months Supply Inventory Past Peak
  • Stabilizing Mortgage Purchase Applications
  • Upturn in Housing Affordability
  • Fundamentals are Improving
  • Unemployment At or Below Natural Rate
  • Record Dow Jones Industrial Average
  • Record Household Wealth
  • Buyers on the Sidelines (need to understand the buyers market will soon end)
  • Negative Media
  • Renters Beginning to Get Squeezed
  • Wake Up and Smell the Equity!
  • Corporate Profits are Strong
  • Buyers are Missing Opportunities if They Postpone


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