I note that both the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times said this week that it would appear that housing is making a comeback. Please note that REAL Trends has reported eight consecutive months of increased housing sales and three months of increasing housing prices. NAR has reported increased unit sales nearly as long and are also showing prices firming.
But as you would expect, until Case Shiller said that prices were turning around, neither of these news organizations would report such a thing. Perhaps that is just as well as it took them nearly as long (12 months) to report that housing was headed down (they still report the downturn as spring/summer of 2006 when the actual downturn started in fall 2005 when unit sales headed down on an annual basis.
Don’t expect the media to be fair or accurate in their reporting. They don’t likely have the time or the inclination to really research any sources that don’t fit their preconceptions. It has been happening for years now as large media firms cut back on their professional reporting and research staffs.
Thus the over-reliance on Case Shiller and others like them mask a real turnaround in most housing markets. Thanks to housing consumers and investors alike, housing is starting the long road back to health. While we are not predicting a huge breakout of double digit housing unit sales and prices the evidence is now overwhelming that housing is on the way back (as if our readers didn’t already know!). And we don’t need the Journal or the Times to tell us. Nor evidently do consumers.
Tracey C. Velt is a writer, blogger and editorial strategist who specializes
in the business of real estate. For the past six years, she's been writing
and editing for REAL Trends, is the editor of the REAL Trends blog and the editor of LORE magazine. Prior to that, she served as an editor for
Florida Realtor magazine and continues to contribute to multiple real estate
publications, both in print and online.
