The Board of Directors met today at the NAR convention in New Orleans and Jim Lee posted about one change to the Code of Ethics that I'm glad to see.  In regards to presenting a true picture in advertising (Article 12)

Newly adopted is this wording. "Realtors obligation to present a true picture in their advertising and representations to the public includes the URLs and domain names they use, and prohibits Realtors from:

1. engaging in deceptive or unauthorized framing of real estate brokerage websites;
2. manipulating (e.g. presenting content developed by others) listing content in any way that produces a deceptive or misleading result; or
3. deceptively using metatags, keywords, or other devices/methods to direct, drive, or divert Internet traffic, or to otherwise mislead consumers."

While I think this is a great addition to the code, I'm somewhat saddened that it had to be made.  I prefer to think that all the Realtors® out there would play by the rules and not be deceptive.  Obviously, if it had to be added, some of them won't.

So what or who is to blame?  Gas prices? interest rates? The war on terror? The war in Iraq? The "bubble" that all the "experts" keep talking about?

NAR has  reported that July 2006 single family home sales fell 11.2% compared to July 2005.  I'm sure the agents in our local MLS wish that was all that home sales had fallen.

With just over 100 Realtor^® nembers, it's not a large MLS, but here's a look at what's happening in our part if the world. 

July 2006 Sales vs 2005 Sales

Residential Sales	Down 35%
Sales Volume	Down 37.18%
Average Sales Price	Down 17.9%
Median Sale Price	Down 33.7%

This MLS serves an mostly rural area with a population if probabky 40,000 oeople,  Their haven't been any significant employment related issues that would account for the change,In talking to the top agents in the MLS, some of whom have been in the business for 25-30 years, none if them can explain the huge drop in sales.

This should be interesting to see how it shakes out..