Media Coverage of Housing Trends

Posted on Wed, Dec. 19, 2007 10:15 PMreprint or license print email Digg it del.icio.us AIM Media coverage of housing trends faulted
By JEFFREY SPIVAK
The Kansas City Star

The media report too much on nationwide real estate trends, usually without perspective, says Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors.
Falling supply of homes for sale raises hopes for KC housing market
Media coverage of housing trends often gives the impression that the market is worse off than it really is, according to the chief economist for the National Association of Realtors.

Lawrence Yun, in presentations Wednesday to Kansas City area real estate agents, said the media’s biggest mistake was too much reporting on nationwide real estate trends. National trends alone, he said, don’t apply to many parts of the country, and reporting of them usually lacks perspective.

For instance, Yun reported that the national median (or midpoint) home price this year was on its way to its first overall decline since the Depression. Already, he said, the media drumbeat is repeating the word “depression,” thus depressing consumer confidence and keeping potential homebuyers out of the market.

A more accurate perspective, he suggested, was that this year’s down market was merely a blip in the long-term growth of housing prices in the area and elsewhere. He said anyone who has owned a home for more than a couple of years has seen good housing appreciation overall.

“It’s been 50 steps forward and two steps backward,” he said.

Yun noted a recent newspaper article about the high level of foreclosures in Ohio.

“People read it and think the situation here is the same as there,” Yun said. “… All real estate is local, and what’s occurring nationally, particularly on the coasts, may not be indicative of what’s happening locally.”

Metropolitan Kansas City, he said, has never