A couple of weeks ago, I was part of a new-homes panel sponsored by Hanley-Wood. My role was to be the local voice, just to answer questions from the audience, which got me out of preparing another power point for another meeting.

The first question came from the moderator. I don't recall the exact phrasing, but before it made it to the question mark, it rode past a suggestion that Matt Lauer be punished every time he mentioned housing on the Today show.

"What is the media's role in the housing market?" was the question.

In general, the media works in sound bites, and if you can distill the complexities of whatever you are talking about into four minutes, you've reached your goal.

I learned that my first day as "The Gadgeteer" on the now-defunct Home Matters show on the Discovery Channel, but you have to understand that you can actually explain the basics of cleaning a deck or a robotic lawnmower in that window.

Housing issues, on the other hand, are as complex as the war in Iraq, yet are relegated to the same four-minute window.

Slow news days generate housing stories reported by people who tend not be capable of understanding that existing-housing comparison are made this year to last year, and, with the variables of weather and other elements thrown in, should be looked at quarterly year to year for trends.

My answer: We need to tell the truth without the hype. We need to have a basic understanding of how the market works, how the figures we use are obtained and compiled, how the overall economy of an area fits in with the housing sector and vice versa.

We also have to realize that real estate is local, not national, and that every market behaves differently. In some areas, it can be street to street and block to block.

Housing is a story that concerns everyone, but any reporting has to be supported by fact, not just sound bites. I'm sorry that a few people are bilked by one unscrupulous contractor, but the way these stories are reported, one would think that all contractors are guilty.

I've had bad contractors and I've had terrific contractors, just as I've had bad bosses and good ones, good pastors and not-so-good ones, and I wasn't always a dutiful son.

There was a study earlier this year -- I'm thinking by the National Association of Homebuilders -- that suggests the typical consumer isn't necessarily swayed by what he's told about the housing market in the media.

I'm not really sure that's true, since, almost two years after rising inventory has turned most markets around, some sellers are still demanding more than what their neighbors' house sold for six months or a year ago.

Someone once suggested that greed was always more powerful than common sense, and I can almost believe it in a lot of these cases.

In the days when I regularly covered national meetings of the Counselors of Real Estate, that august body of the industry's select talked a great deal about transparency and how realty transactions, at least on the non-residential level, had become more so than ever before.

I did see more of it especially in the investment end. There was a big push for it in the global market, especially in the independent countries emerging from the wreckage of the Soviet Union where there was big money to be made.

There is more transparency in the residential sector as well, helped by agency and similar legislation, and developing controls for services connected with the housing industry.

So when I was asked by real estate agents to say something about the 60 Minutes piece on the industry earlier this month, I simply outlined the changes I'd seen in the 20 years I've been covering the industry -- helped along by the technology and the Internet.

I also addressed a couple of points made in the report. Although commissions are negotiable, there are some real estate agents who aren't aware of it, and some who react badly when a seller mentions it because, they think, they are being told that their services aren't worth what most other agents are getting.

Most agents, however, follow the NAR's standards and practices and are more than willing to negotiate. Some agents have unbundled services and have a sliding scale of charges.

There are other points in the 60 Minutes report that show the producers were not all that concerned with accuracy, but I don't think the real estate community really needs to get all bent out of shape about it, because the more noise you make, the more people take notice.

I missed the report and had to get a copy from someone, even though I knew that it was on its way when I saw the CBS crew skulking around the New Orleans NAR convention in November.

I don't watch 60 Minutes as a rule. According to the ratings data I've seen, the show is averaging 13.1 million viewers this season. When you consider the U.S. population is 300 million and probably five percent of them didn't like real estate agents to begin with, what CBS had to say will have no long-lasting effect.

Published: May 31, 2007

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Al Heavens writes about real estate and home repair and improvement. He is the author of What No One Ever Tells You About Renovating Your Home: Real-Life Advice For Hassle-free, Cost-Effective Remodeling.