Tom Stevens

I’ll admit right at the top here that what I’m about to do is cheesy, but honestly, I just can’t resist. A little over a year ago, mid-September 2006, there was a little blurb in the Washington Post about the then-president of the National Association of Realtors, Tom Stevens, not being able to sell his Virginia home.

It was really the beginning of our coverage of the housing downturn, and so we found it marvelously ironic.

The house had been on the market for a year, with an unchanged price of $1.45 million. Being the annoying reporter that I am, I cornered him (see video clip) after a hearing on the Hill, just to needle him a bit and see what he’d say: “I didn't listen to my agent. That's what consumers need to do. They need to listen to their agent. If the agent says you need to adjust the price, then you need to adjust that price, we're in a different market today,” Mr. Stevens admitted politely.

And it’s an even more different market today. Stevens, who is a Senior VP of NRT, the nation’s largest residential real estate brokerage, still can’t sell the house. I have to give a shout out to whoever is behind the handle who pointed out the info in www.paper-money.blogspot.com (I’m so netty!).

Mr. Stevens pulled the house off the market in early 2007, and now it’s back for $1.285 million. So if you start from the top, that’s approximately 766 days on the market, $165,000 price cut, and still no bites. Talk about a REALTY CHECK!! (check out the listing here)

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