The blogger brigade

Dust-ups between the bubble bloggers and the real estate industry bloggers are frequent, and disputes fall along predictable lines: Agents put a more positive spin on the market; bubble bloggers predict economic catastrophe. The two groups distrust each other, and some bloggers claim to fear repercussions from the other side. Few would disagree that bubble bloggers are angry victors whose "I told you so" message is often delivered with a cyber finger-poke in the chest.

The loudest bubble blog, by most accounts, is HousingPANIC, run by someone who wants to be identified only as Keith, who says he sold his home in Phoenix, which he described as "housing bubble central," in 2006 and moved to London. He has since left London "to travel the road."

Tamer in tone and written by 43-year-old Ben Jones is the Housing Bubble. Jones started the blog in 2004 when cracks first started appearing in the sub-prime market. He dismisses some of the bubble bloggers as "crazy" and prefers not to be associated with them.

Written out of northern Arizona, www.thehousingbubbleblog.com can get 40,000 to 50,000 unique visitors on any given day depending on the news, Jones said. It includes a group of regular posters -- some grateful to the blog for persuading them not to buy, others taunting and vindictive-sounding about those who did. The blog accepts ads and has, in fact, become Jones' day job.

And then there is Housing Doom -- written from Austin, Texas, by Debi Averett, who sold her Phoenix-area home "in 15 minutes" when she thought her husband had a job out of state. The job offer fell through just days before escrow closed, and the buyer held the couple to the contract. Averett and her family wound up renting and, given the rapid escalation of housing prices in the area, couldn't afford to buy again.

Widely credited with building the real estate blogo- sphere's infrastructure is 31-year-old Dustin Luther -- whose Rain City Guide about the Seattle real estate market was the model for many respected agent and broker sites.

Luther, who now lives in and runs the site from Calabasas, created it as an inexpensive marketing tool for his wife, a former Seattle realty agent.

What makes it unique is that it has topic experts blogging their opinions. It quickly became a go-to site with a national audience.

Phoenix realty agent Greg Swann, founder of the popular Bloodhound Blog, says Luther's effect on the real estate industry can't be minimized.