NAREE's May Roundtable Recap
/How to Stand Out and Avoid Sensationalism
By Michelle Jarboe
Crain’s Cleveland Business and NAREE 2017 President
Eileen Woods used to line up cover stories for the Boston Globe’s Sunday real estate section three months in advance. Now, building on the ever-shifting foundation of coronavirus, the farthest the newspaper’s real estate editor can see into the future is six to seven weeks.
That’s longer than many journalists can fathom right now, during a pandemic that has upended government, the U.S. economy and large segments of the real estate business – along with the already-ailing newspaper industry.
During a May 7 NAREE virtual roundtable, Woods joined other editors and reporters in a discussion about tossed-out editorial calendars and creative approaches to a ubiquitous story.
At the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, investigative reporter J. Scott Trubey’s longer-term real estate stories are in limbo. For more than two months, his beat has been dominated by the novel coronavirus. He’s focused, in particular, on Georgia’s struggles with testing and tracking.
Plan to Pivot
Trubey said he can plan only in two-week increments. Even on that modest timeline, a story he’s working on can quickly change directions, or end up in the scrap heap.
With news breaking at a frenetic pace, the staff at Multi-Housing News and Commercial Property Executive began holding daily morning news meetings as the crisis deepened across the country. By early May, the pressure had eased somewhat, said Suzann Silverman, who serves as editorial director for both C-suite-focused publications.
The planning meetings had dropped from five to three each week. Reporters and editors were attempting to take forward-looking approaches to stories and to track down sources who weren’t being quoted everywhere else.
Longer-term projects remain the biggest challenges, Silverman said, noting that digital monthly magazine stories can be updated until just before publication. The company’s printed mid-year guides, traditionally distributed at conferences, are another matter.
Beyond questions of relevance, it’s unclear whether conferences will even happen this year – or whether people will think twice about picking up a magazine.
While fielding questions from moderator and NAREE President Catie Dixon, of Bisnow, panelists talked about the importance of standing out while avoiding sensationalism.
Keep It Local
Business journalists are mining data to tally up missed rent payments and lost jobs. They are using social media to put faces on the numbers and chronicling how Americans are living – and inhabiting spaces – differently, from the roommates spending far too much time together to the families separated by fears.
“Our approach is to make everything local,” Woods said. “Local sources for everything.”
At the Las Vegas Review-Journal, reporters have interviewed laid-off casino workers, struggling renters and anxious homebuyers. The newsroom is using interactive graphics to give readers a quick snapshot of dwindling tourism and mounting unemployment claims.
Finding relevant real estate data can be more difficult, since industry reports tend to lag by a month or two, said Eli Segall, the Review-Journal’s real estate reporter.
He’s tried to anticipate the future while reporting on the past, in stories that predicted sagging home sales before the local data looked bleak.
Segall has also been drawing on history, including Las Vegas-area newspaper accounts of the 1918 flu pandemic and the Great Depression, to add colorful and sometimes uncannily familiar-sounding details to articles about potential fallout from this public-health emergency.
Longtime housing and mortgage writer Lew Sichelman questioned whether publications are allocating too many resources to coronavirus coverage. At this point, he asked, is it possible that some real estate readers are tiring of the virus?
“I’m hearing that,” Dixon said. “But the numbers of readership say otherwise.”
Moderator:
NAREE President Catie Dixon, Bisnow Managing Editor
Panelists:
Eileen Woods, Boston Globe Sunday Real Estate Editor
NAREE Board Member
J. Scott Trubey, Atlanta Journal-Constitution Reporter
NAREE Board Member
Suzann Silverman, Commercial Property News/
Multi-Housing News Editorial Director
Eli Segall, Las Vegas Review-Journal Reporter