Maybe it's natural for real estate industry frustrations to intensify in an environment with slowing sales and falling home prices. Worries about media coverage of the housing market downturn have in some instances boiled over into industry uproar about "negative" news and its impact on consumer perceptions. In some cases, industry professionals have suggested that the media is contributing to the downturn by feeding into consumers' fears of market conditions. (See Inman News report.)

The mantra of location, location, location applies here: industry professionals say it's important to remember that local real estate markets are unique. There are markets that are experiencing good, bad and ugly times these days, and national news coverage can overlook the counter-cyclical markets.

Some industry trade groups are investing in PR campaigns to pump up consumer confidence in home purchases. Such efforts seek to dissipate consumers' fears about market uncertanties and attract favorable media coverage about the state of the housing market.

The media, meanwhile, has a challenge in accurately covering national and local real estate market news and keeping its readers informed about actual market conditions. To the media, news is news -- consumers and industry professionals can decide for themselves what's "negative" or "positive" about that news and react accordingly.

A real estate agent who specializes in selling REO properties may find opportunity in a market with slumping home prices, just as an agent who works with first-time buyers may struggle in a market with tightening lending practices and high home prices.

Timely and accurate market information is especially important to consumers and real estate professionals alike when the real estate market slows. And while there can be clashes when media coverage conflicts with industry interests, could there be a common ground among industry and media professionals to provide accurate, timely and spin-free information to consumers about market conditions?

Craigslist, the online classified and community postings site that features for-sale and rental housing ads in markets around the country, is not responsible for users' posts that contain discriminatory language in violation of the federal Fair Housing Act, according to a three-judge panel that considered an appeal by a Chicago lawyers' group (see Inman News).

Inman News received some divided commentary on the topic: one real estate professional lashed out at craigslist, charging that the site is a "glorified FSBO" platform for owners to sell direct to buyers without using a licensed agent, and that "you almost never see blatant fraud, misrepresentation or racism in any Realtor advertising." There are, though, some Realtors who choose to advertise properties at craigslist. Another real estate professional condemned the lawyers who filed the lawsuit against craigslist and suggested that they should be disbarred for filing the lawsuit in the first place.

The court ruling does have implications for a range of Web sites that carry property ads. And the battle may not be over -- the Chicago lawyers' group could petition for the court's full group of judges to reconsider the latest decision.

Eve Mazzarella, broker-owner of Distinctive Real Estate & Investments in Las Vegas, at age 29 was named in Realtor magazine's "30 under 30" feature in June 2007.

Mazzarella is now linked to a mortgage fraud case reported by CNBC on Friday. From that story:

"A Las Vegas real estate broker and her husband are facing federal charges they made millions of dollars orchestrating a mortgage fraud scheme.

"U.S. Attorney for Nevada Gregory Brower says Eve Mazzarella, 30, and her husband, Steven Grimm, 45, were indicted Wednesday on bank fraud, money laundering and aiding and abetting charges."

The story appeared on the NARWisdom blog, where Realtor magazine editor Stacy Moncrieff chimed in to answer a few questions:

"You may be wondering, in light of this news, if or how we vet candidates for our annual 30 under 30 presentation. We put all applicants who make it into the finals for "30 Under 30″ through a screening process, as we did with Eve. We do checks with the local association of REALTORS to determine whether there have been any ethics violations and with the state real estate commission to determine whether there have been any complaints, investigations, or license law violations. Occasionally, as a result of that screening, we drop a candidate from contention. We found no red flags with Eve."

Real estate broker Redfin reported at its corporate blog on Wednesday that Illinois legislation seeking to ban real estate rebates "finally died today," as the legislation did not receive a motion in the Illinois Legislature's Judiciary Committee, according to the post. Bill information at the state Legislature's Web site states that HB 4313 was kicked back, or "re-referred" today to the Rules Committee where the bill was first considered.

The Illinois Association of Realtors announced opposition to the bill, and Justice Department officials were aware of the legislation (see Inman News). The Justice Department's Antitrust Division has taken actions in other states in opposition to rebate restrictions, charging that such policies can impair price competition.

A group called the Homeowners Club of America had lobbied in support of the legislation, the state Realtors group reported. Rep. Robert S. Molaro, D-Chicago, introduced the legislation. Rep. Angelo Saviano, R-River Grove, was co-sponsor of the legislation. Another co-sponsor, Rep. Franco Coladipietro, R-Bloomingdale, was removed as a co-sponsor on March 6.

Redfin does have particular interest in the legislation, as that company is planning to expand services to Illinois this year.

In case you missed it, there was a "what did he say?" moment in a recent commentary at Realtor.org in which National Association of Realtors Chief Economist Lawrence Yun wrote, "NAR membership figures have finally begun to fall.  Whew!!!"

NAR membership grew 83 percent in seven years to 1.37 million Realtors, and is now turning sharply lower, according to Yun.

Most everyone agrees that too many Realtors in the market isn't a great thing for Realtors. It creates so much competition that many agents still struggle for commissions during booming markets. And many complain of lax standards, which contribute to an overall bad image for Realtors.

However, many brokerage models rely on high numbers of agents for profits. And NAR definitely benefits from having more agents. More agents = more members = more dues = more powerful trade group. NAR's swelling membership of recent years certainly has helped the group maintain one of the largest political contributions in the country and the political clout that goes along with that.

NAR's declining membership doesn't come as a surprise, but Yun's statements sound odd coming from a guy who works for NAR.

Also interesting are his comments about newbie agents and sloppiness.

"Given that about ½ million Realtors have less than 5 years of experience, sloppiness in some transactions no doubt exists. A complaint I hear quite frequently from Realtors is about the second-rate conduct of some of their fellow new members."

I've heard that one too. But given the speed of technological change in the industry right now, I'm not convinced that it's all newer members who are creating the "sloppiness" he's talking about. An inexperienced agent with savvy Web skills could build quite a business for himself. And it's quite possible that older members who may not be as savvy with new communications devices and Internet are viewed as sloppy by younger consumers.

I believe that the ranks of Realtors will continue to decline in the next few years, but I'm betting that it's the older agents who will leave the business. It makes more sense. Why stay and fight out another downturn when you can call it quits and retire or semi-retire into something that's not as challenging?

I may be going out on a limb here, but my forecast is that the average age of Realtors will decline as NAR's membership falls.

Sawbuck Realty launched in the Washington, D.C., area today, with a take we haven't seen before.

Sawbuck's business model is interesting: cut down on costs by not acting as a traditional broker (with traditional overhead costs) and instead partner with top agent teams (who work for another broker) and refer buyers their way for a referral fee. Oh, and offer buyers a no-cost mortgage at a low rate and rock-bottom closing costs.

And they're not working under an affiliated business agreement. In fact, co-founder Guy Wolcott said, "We're the anti-ABA."

How do they do that? Check out today's, "New broker model: An alternative to the alternative."

Will it work?

Inman News writer and Coldwell Banker top producer Dian Hymer is a friend of the industry who needs our help. Suffering from cancer, she needs a bone marrow transplant. An initial run of the National Marrow Donor Program registry showed no matches. You may be a match. Registering for the program is simple. Click here.
Thanks

The RE/MAX organization will be profiled in an episode of "History's Business," a television series on the History Channel. The show featuring RE/MAX will air for the first time at 8 a.m. Eastern Time on Sunday, Dec. 2, RE/MAX announced today (show info here).

Company co-founder and chairman Dave Liniger, who was interviewed for the show, said in a statement, "We started RE/MAX with nothing, but an idea we believed in and we worked hard to make it happen. Everyone told us it wouldn’t work and it wouldn’t go anywhere, but here we are after 33 years of continuous growth."

Bush administration appointments have led to a change in the judge presiding over the two-year-old antitrust lawsuit filed by the federal government against the National Association of Realtors. (See Inman News.)

Mark R. Filip, a U.S. District Court Judge for the Northern District of Illinois who was assigned to the United States vs. National Association of Realtors litigation, is a nominee for U.S. deputy attorney general. And the chief judge for Filip's court district has ordered the reassignment of all of Filip's criminal and civil cases in which the federal government is a party while his nomination is pending.

Attorney General Michael Mukasey this month took over the post vacated in the August resignation of Alberto Gonzalez, and Mukasey tapped Filip to serve as deputy attorney general. The Associated Press reported that Filip "is a natural match for Mukasey," at least on paper, as both have been federal judges and are loyal Republicans.

Also, the AP reported that Senate Majority Whip Dick Durban, D-Ill., who has been a Mukasey critic, is a Filip fan.

U.S. District Court Judge Matthew F. Kennelly will handle the DOJ vs. NAR case in Filip's place. Kennelly was appointed as a federal judge in 1999 by then-President Bill Clinton.

So the August resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales touches the DOJ vs. NAR case.

Gonzales had been under fire for the replacement of several U.S. attorneys.

Mukasey's nomination was not without controversy. Members of Congress grilled Mukasey about his stance on waterboarding, an interrogation technique that simulates drowning and  which opponents argue is a form of torture.

Kennelly, meanwhile, last year issued an opinion in a lawsuit that charged AT&T Corp. and affiliates with illegally providing information about customer telephone calls and Internet communications to the National Security Agency. He stated that the federal government has intervened in several similar cases "and has sought dismissal pursuant to the 'state secrets' privilege, contending that allowing the cases to be litigated would damage national security."

While some of the other related cases focused on wiretapping, or the intercepting of communications content, the case that Kennelly considered related to records that the communications company allegedly turned over to the NSA.

Kennelly dismissed the government from the case citing "no public disclosures of the existence or non-existence of AT&T's claimed record turnover ... that are sufficient to overcome the government's assertion of the state secrets privilege," and he found that those named in the lawsuit "cannot obtain the information they would need to prove their standing to sue for prospective relief and therefore cannot maintain that type of claim," according to the opinion. He did allow for the filing of an amended complaint.

LAS VEGAS -- The first rule of business is to know your market and in real estate that means paying attention to things like the annual survey of home buyers and sellers released by the National Association of Realtors this week. Some of the more interesting takeaways from this year's survey, which measured consumer habits from mid-2006 to mid-2007 (so before the deep credit crunch that unfolded over the summer), were:

--For-sale-by-owners, or FSBOs, were little changed at about 12 percent of the sellers surveyed.
--Forty-five percent of first-time home buyers bought with no money down.
--Ninety-percent of sellers who used an agent said their home was listed in the MLS. (Five percent said they didn't know whether their home was listed.)
--Nine percent of sellers using an agent went with a limited set of services, while an additional 9 percent said they used an MLS-listing-only service and the remaining 81 percent chose a full range of services.

Tons more nuggets from this year's survey, but that should give a taste.