NAR’s David Lerah: America’s most hated economist [The Real Estate Economy]

I was struck by the quote by National Association of Realtor’s (NAR) economist David Lerah last Friday that housing sales in 2005 constituted an "unsustainable frenzy." Funny, I didn’t hear him making that kind of assessment at any time last year. Google the record and you’ll find more anti-Lerah sites and online Scuds than Christian puritans have launched against Madonna.

Lerah is routinely tagged a "back-pedaller,"  liar — and on the blog, David Lerah Watch, an untrustworthy "paid shill" and "discredited chief economist propagandist." It’s hard to imagine that volume of public vitriole around any other industry economist — say, the National Association of Manufacturer’s respected David Heuther. Actually, it’s a remarkable feat for any economist to inspire any kind of passion about anything — ever.
 

So Lerah’s and NAR’s forecast last week that "the bad news is just about behind us" was duly reported but simply irked a lot of people. It says that housing starts and single-family home sales will bottom over the next two quarters and recover by the end of 2007. If NAR looks more and more comprised every day that it tries to talk down this macro trend, it doesn’t help itself by juxtaposing these releases with their recently launched "Buy Now" ad campaign, currently featured on their home page with these rather transparent talking points:

• Conditions are now ideal for buyers. Interest rates are comparable
  to 40-year lows, and inventories are higher than they have been in
  decades. Consumers have exceptional choice. But these conditions may
  not last. August pending home sales rose 4.5 percent, and prices are
  expected to rise again next year. Even the vice chairman of the Federal
  Reserve says that the housing market outlook is improving.
• Real estate is an outstanding investment. House values rose 88
  percent on a national average over the past decade. The number of U.S.
  households is expected to increase 15 percent during the next decade,
  creating a continued high demand for housing.
• Conditions are improving for sellers. This year will be the
  third-best on record, and prices are expected to rise modestly next
  year.
• The campaign opens on Friday, November 3, 2006, with full-page advertisements in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today, and will run Sunday, November 5 in the New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and Chicago Tribune. It will run in the same six newspapers again on the weekend of November 12.