Lereah Responds to 'Why are people so skeptical of you?'

Diana Olick, of CNBC, in today's Reality Check Column asks David Lereah 'Why are people so skeptical of you?'. Here read an excerpt from the story!

Still, NAR's chief economist David Lereah gets a lot of flak. He not only gets hate mail, he's got his own hate site: (link). Actually, there are several not-too-savory sites on David. I called him this morning and asked, "Why are people so skeptical of you?" (That wasn't exactly how I phrased it.)

"Because I'm a shill. Look, they're basically saying, "You're the Realtors, you're in it for the money, you have to say the market is going well." What are you going to do?" says Lereah. "When the market is good, we can say no wrong, and now the market's down and they're getting skeptical and they don't believe it. To be quite candid, we all have really good housing models, and all we're doing is putting the data in and
generating the numbers. There's nothing to hide. My members don't get angry at me if I say sales are down 10% this year. I don't get fired."

David Lereah speaks the truth, but he's also one of the best spinners I've ever met, and after 17 years in this business, I've met a lot. David always finds a way to turn a negative number into a positive outlook. The steep fall in sales is a "correction" to him. Falling prices are "healthy for the market." He's got a million of 'em, but guess what, he's also got real numbers.

Diana Olick attacks Lereah as "one of the best spinners" but also writes that he 'speaks the truth.' Are his cheerleading predictions the truth? Are his half truths and deliberate spins truths or clever deceptions?

Lereah needs to be taken to task by the media. Diana Olick's analysis of Lereah is weak. She lacks the sharp crticism that Lereah deserves for his deceptive remarks, his irresponsible cheerleading, and half truths that he regulary provides to the media.