Does the NY Times Real Estate Section Suck? The Blog is Back.
I've always like this blog, its inception dates back to 2005 give or take. A real two decade look at real estate in the Catskills. A close reader can track my progress as an entrepreneur, a home builder in the Catskills, a writer, and observer and a professional. I like it better than social media; it's sort of old school and not perverted with all the salesmanship and devious teasers and cookies of social media.
I've always used the blog as an expressive, somewhat inappropriate, boundary pushing medium. For instance, this renewed effort of the owner of the Hudson Valley's most unlikely success story to relay our story and journey.
With that preface, Why shouldn't I start with a smack down of the gorilla and pretentious NYTimes, since they once again, shut us out of a story inspired by our efforts in the Catskills. Like leaving Andy Cunonan out of the story of Versaci, or J. Robinson out of the story of racial integration of baseball, or the Rabbit out of a story of vibrators, omitting Catskill Farms from 2 big stories of the Catskills smells of some odious influencers of those green with envy for our continued march of dominance.
I mean, how could Julie Satow (see google search of her here) write an article like this without mentioning the company that has invested exponentially more time, energy, money and creativity than any company she did mention in the article, including one, Hudson Woods, that was included while detailing the owner who lost $300k when selling their home. One can only wonder, as a journalist, how she would justify to her readers not giving them a true reflection of the landscape of 2nd home buyers.
And then you had Sara Clemence write this article about our homes and our clients without ever mentioning the company that created the space that created the network of homeowners profiled.
The point is, in the era of skepticism of all things media, why would two journalists deprive their readers of the primary space of which they write? Do they take their editorials cues from the lesser competitors of the primary player in the space of which they write?
Frankly, it's bad journalism, and for all things it is, it is mostly a true dis-service to their readership, because it reflected a journalistic bias and elitism and pretension that perverted their ability to truly reflect the actual landscape of which they write.
Feeling slighted, since it was in every shape and form a slap in the face, I wrote the Real Estate Section editor a note, copying the paper's editor of course. I copied all my homeowners who have purchased our homes and began their weekly investments into the communities they moved. Looking the email, after it was sent, just the length of the list - 462 persons - was a profound snapshot of the impact we've had for 2 decades.
So, basically, suck it Sara Clemence and Julie Satow. Who needs you, really?







