In December, 2011, the NAR announced that the annual level of home sales was revised downward by 2.95 Million units.
Oops! This dramatically drops how bad things got during the lows of 2007.
"According to NAR, the three main reasons for the overestimate of sales prior to the re‐benchmark were
1. Expanded coverage by MLS due to geographic expansion, which lead to an increased number of sales as the MLS
covered more geographic areas.
2. MLS databases used in the calculations saw an increased occurrence of multiple counting of the same property,
particularly as market conditions deteriorated and agents/sellers listed the property in multiple MLS systems
within the surrounding geography. Since there were multiple for‐sale listings, the system registered multiple
counts when the single, multiple listed property is sold.
3. Over time, the MLS captured fewer For Sale By Owner (FSBO) properties, which created an upward bias in the
sales estimates." as published by the Mortgage Bankers Association.
