It's deja vu all over again.

Like the Department of Justice's leak to the Wall Street Journal that allowed reporter James Haggerty to break the news that the DOJ was filing a lawsuit against the NAR on the opening day of the NAR's annual Mid-year conference two years ago, CBS' airing of the nearly undetectably biased 60 Minutes piece "Chipping Away At Realtors' Six Percent " allowed reporter Lesley Stahl to report "How Realtors' Commission Fees Are Under Assault" just in time to embarrass the NAR once again on the eve of its Mid-year conference.

The story was a terrific free ad for Redfin, the online discount brokerage company, as it served as the protagonist going up against full-fee Realtors and their organizations.

Other newspapers picked up the story, including south Florida's Herald Tribune , which wasted no time providing a free ad for its local discount broker, Homekeys.

"For realtors, the six percent commission is sacrosanct. It's remained in place, even as the price of homes has quadrupled over the past 25 years," goes the set-up. "But as correspondent Lesley Stahl reports, things are beginning to change. What happened to travel agents, stock brokers and book sellers -- the encroachment of the Internet -- is beginning to affect real estate agents. And the sacred six percent is under assault from online discounters."

Actually, the six percent commission is not sacrosanct. In some areas it's seven percent, but in most areas it's less, because competition -- brought on by the swelling of agents into an already highly competitive business -- has reduced commissions and gross incomes for most Realtors.

According to an internal report by NAR, commissions typically range between 4.3 percent and 5.3 percent as of 2005. The NAR's latest Member Profile 2007 found that the median gross income for all Realtors in 2006 was $47,700, down slightly from 2004 when the median earnings were $49,300.

In fact, income has steadily declined as membership has expanded in the NAR. In 2004, median earnings had decreased 5.6 percent between 2002 and 2004 while NAR membership increased 26.6 percent to 1.1 million.

Further, members of the trade association include so-called "discount" brokers and agents, which could help explain why commissions have dropped 25 percent over the last 10 years. Unless my math doesn't work, two to eight percent of the membership isn't capable of moving commissions 25 percent, which means only one thing - that it's traditional brokers and agents who are "discounting" commissions as well as discount brokers who advertise their commissions in advance.

If everybody's doing it, then the line between discount and traditional brokers is pretty blurred, isn't it? Not to the agenda of the 60 Minutes segment, apparently. If everyone "discounts," there's no story.

Redfin makes a strong case that other brokers and the real estate associations are trying to put the company out of business. As proof, Stahl dredges up Steve DelBianco, who helped co-found eRealty in 1999.

"No sooner than they were up and running, the local agency in Austin that regulates the industry adopted a new rule that effectively barred e-realty from listing houses for sale on its website," said the CBS report.

"They sued us for breaking the rule they created to shut down eRealty's ability to compete," Delbianco whined to Stahl. Commissions were "the only objection," DelBianco told Stahl. "Realtors embrace the idea of some automation and some use of the Internet. But the minute it cuts into their pocketbooks, well, all hell broke loose."

eRealty's venture capital dried up; the company lost $33 million and went belly up, sums DelBianco.

Is this revisionist history? Realty Times remembers the story a little differently.

What really happened was that eRealty took the Austin MLS feed without permission and put it on its website as a lead generator. While technology allowed them to do so, they didn't have permission from other brokers, which is why they got sued. The suit was settled out of court and eRealty immediately made a deal with Yahoo! to give it MLS listings in exchange for being the exclusive broker. Now, other brokers don't share their listings to give others a competitive advantage; they share to get the listings sold, which was NOT eRealty's first agenda. Their agenda was to create a marketing advantage using other brokers' listings as lead generators.

eRealty didn't go belly-up, but was sold to Prudential. Their CEO Russell Capper works for Prudential today.

Why didn't Stahl do a little fact-checking to find out if DelBianco were telling the truth? Anyone at the Austin Board of Realtors or the Austin MLS would have been happy to explain their side of it, except for a little problem -- they are under a gag order by the court, the same one that eRealty and its principals are under - except when they talk to CBS.

To appear to balance the piece, Stahl interviewed a full fee agent, but all the agent did was supply friendly fire to the ambush.

When RE/MAX agent Deborah Arends is asked how she responds to challenges that she doesn't do enough for her commission, she arrogantly says, "Then I'm not the agent for you."

Uh, that didn't really answer the issue, did it, Ms. Arends? How about a disclosure of what you do, instead? How about an outline of duties, risks, responsibilities, and steps that you take to protect your seller?

"Redfin very proudly says that they returned in rebates $3 million last year to its buyers," Stahl remarks. "You can't boast of anything like that."

"Absolutely not," Arends acknowledges. "I don't know how to answer that one."

Geez, Louise! How about how you work for your client to save them money, Ms. Arends? If your client is getting $1,500 in rebates for a sale they are negotiating themselves, how about comparing what you could get for the client if you negotiated for them? If you negotiated $1,500 off the price of a home, your buyer would get that $1,500 plus the additional build-up of equity amortization from paying less for the initial loan amount. How about the liability and pitfalls you save your clients by looking out for their interests? It's a matter of do you want it now, or do you want more later?

That's how you answer that one, Ms. Arends.

The ambush wraps up by mentioning the DOJ case against the NAR for writing rules that are "fundamentally anti-competitive and harmful to consumers." The story feebly mentions that the NAR says the accusations are untrue, but no one from the NAR or DOJ is on hand to explain their point of view.

"Now the NAR argues that it's their agents who contribute to the MLS. That's their listings, and that they should, therefore, have the right to withhold them since they belong to the agent. Doesn't that make some sense?" Stahl asks, but she doesn't ask it of NAR or a full service broker -- she asks DelBianco, who has a vested interest in disagreeing.

"I don't think so," he replies. "When you hire an agent to help sell your home, you're paying them a six percent commission to put your home in front of as many possible buyers so that you get the best possible price in the shortest time. How does it serve your interest then if they suppress the showing of your home to a whole category of realtors who show it online?"

Brokers work with other brokers to let them know what inventory is available to sell. But they don't owe the other brokers a business model. Their job is to put the seller's home in front of as many qualified buyers as possible, and right or wrong, that's between the broker and the seller to decide.

And let's get something else straight. It's not the associations that allow Realtors to show their listings where they please - it's state licensing law. Check at ARELLO.org and look it up.

Well, I could go and on. NAR has taken some ribbing for sending out talking points (there is no standard commission) to its subsidiaries in case they are called by local media to respond to what they knew would be a negative and brilliantly biased report by Ms. Stahl. To the average viewer, she appeared more than fair to both sides.

But not to the NAR, who not only warned its members about the impending story, it is sending out this letter to its members after the story aired:

Dear Fellow Realtor:

I am disappointed and dismayed at the biased story that 60 Minutes aired on Sunday evening. I want to let you know that we've been working to stay on top of this story.

One of the most difficult challenges we face is educating the news media about today's real estate industry. There's no better example than this 60 Minutes show. For more than a year, NAR worked with the producers who put the segment together and offered several spokespersons to be interviewed for the show, including myself. Yet, NAR's voice was strangely and noticeably absent from the segment though CBS gave time to two critics who disagree with our policies on the display of listings on the Internet.

At times, NAR and Realtors have often been the subject of less than accurate news coverage. Your association and its professional staff is making every effort to get the Realtor message out to the news media. The result is that only a fraction -- less than five percent -- of the vast news media we receive is negative.

We encourage all of you to contact CBS to voice your concerns -- maybe have some of your satisfied customers do the same.

Thank you for your support.

Pat V. Combs
President

Bias has to have support. News media were tipped off about the negative slant on the story before it aired. In fact, the south Florida Herald Tribune story "60 Minutes Puts Realtors On Defensive " running one day before the CBS segment aired illustrates that fact clearly.

Like I said, it's deja vu, all over again.