CNN/Money: Housing Myths Exposed (Run, NAR, Run!)

Part of that great series the other day in Money, this one covered all the BS that the NAR and realtors spout when trying to get that "last sucker in".

Well, when the MSM is reporting on the BS, you know their days are numbered.

The question is, will David Lereah do a frog march one day? Has he violated any laws, like folks who pumped and dumped Enron stock?

Real estate survival guide: The sudden shift in the nation's housing markets is exploding some long-held beliefs. Here's the conventional wisdom you should ignore.

The first is that a scarcity of buildable land on the coasts keeps a cap on supply and prevents prices from falling. But high prices inevitably work their magic, encouraging more people to sell existing homes and sparking new construction.

Sure enough, prices are already tumbling in Boston, where a swarm of downtown condos is swelling the number of properties for sale and punishing the price of all housing.

A second myth is that today's big homebuilders learned their lesson in past downturns and now launch projects only when they have firm buyers lined up. But housing starts are still running at near-record levels of some two million units a year.

Big builders, notably D.R. Horton and Pulte Homes, are starting 20 percent to 30 percent of their units on spec, without signing up buyers in advance. Risky move.

A third tenet holds that home values never drop in areas where employment is rising. But today some of the hardest-hit regions rank among the strongest job machines, notably Northern Virginia and San Diego. The reason: Young buyers filling those jobs can't afford the houses for sale.

The current boom has spawned one new myth of its own: Hot markets will glide to a soft landing.

"It's a good sign to see home sales holding close to the level of a strong rebound in the month before," said David Lereah, the NAR's chief economist, in a statement accompanying the latest data. "This is additional evidence that we're experiencing a soft landing."