Wednesday Morning: Homebuilder CEOs Dodge CNBC; “I’ve Never in My Life Seen So Many Freaked Out CEOs”

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A funny thing happened to CNBC real estate reporter Diana Olick yesterday at a Wall Street conference full of homebuilding CEOs: the executives ran away from her like frightened children.

‘I’ve never in my life seen so many freaked out CEOs,’ Olick wrote on her real estate blog. ‘I say this only because not nine months ago I attended a similar UBS conference, where the homebuilder CEOs and their CFOs and their PR reps and their baggage handlers and their mother-in-laws were all fighting with each other to jump in front of our cameras to talk about the recovery shining brightly ahead in the housing market.’

More Olick: ‘So here I am again, same type of conference, same camera, same boring business suit so as not to frighten off all the corporate suits, and all of a sudden I might as well be Osama bin Laden. Apparently, I personally blew up the housing market. Here’s what the CEO of Ryland Homes said when I asked for a quick interview: ‘No, you guys make us look like idiots, absolutely not.’ Said the CEO of D.R. Horton, ‘NO, not now, not after the presentation, NO.’

Things must be pretty bad for the homebuilders, because CNBC is like catnip to most CEOs.

Photo Credit: CNBC