Why we should care about inflated real estate numbers

Scott van Voorhis of the Boston Globe writes Friday about the reaction to the disclosure that the National Association of Realtors has inflated home sales data by 14 percent since 2007.

Van Voorhis writes, “Basically, no one believes NAR’s numbers in the first place, so what’s the big deal?

“That’s not true, though. The trade organization’s numbers are widely reported in the business press and scanned for clues as to the direction of the housing market by many others as well.