David Lereah profiled in WSJ

Former National Association of Realtors chief economist David Lereah is profiled in The Wall Street Journal. Some highlights:

Once one of the world's most-visible housing experts, Mr. Lereah is disconnected from his old life. The former chief economist for the National Association of Realtors says the group's top executives won't return his phone calls. He says he wasn't invited to the association's 100th birthday bash last May. ...

Mr. Lereah continued to make rosy statements amid growing signs of a housing downturn -- like this declaration in January 2007: "It appears we have established a bottom." ...

Mr. Lereah, who says he left NAR voluntarily, says he was pressured by executives to issue optimistic forecasts -- then was left to shoulder the blame when things went sour. "I was there for seven years doing everything they wanted me to," he said, looking out his window to his tree-filled yard in this Washington suburb. Mr. Lereah now works at home, trying to rebuild his career and saddled with a sagging portfolio of real-estate investments.

A spokesman for NAR says Mr. Lereah used the same kind of forecasts in his book, which wasn't an NAR publication. ...

Soon, mainstream economists and the press were calling him out. "I thought it was criminal that he kept saying we'd reached bottom," says Ivy Zelman, former housing-market analyst at Credit Suisse and now head of her own housing-sector research firm. She says she dubbed Mr. Lereah "Mr. Liar-eah."

Mr. Lereah says he was starting to worry about the housing market and tried to tone down his optimistic comments.... He says his critics nevertheless "became vicious."

Mr. Lereah admits to one mistake: believing there would be no national housing crash. "I have to take the blame for that," he says. "I never thought it would be as bad as this." ...

Mr. Lereah's real-estate portfolio has taken a hit. He says his 3,068-square-foot five-bedroom, 5½-bathroom brick house has lost about 20% of its value in the past two years. ... His condos are down, too. He now says housing prices won't recover for some time.

The article also says he likes to drive to Dunkin' Donuts or McDonald's every morning. The Dunkin' Donuts shop closest to his home is right across the street from GMU's main campus. If memory serves me correctly, there's a McDonald's in the same shopping center.

For more on David Lereah, read David Lereah Watch.