BloodhoundBlog

There’s always something to howl about.

Author: Teri Lussier (page 3 of 6)

Rust Belt Realtor

June 7, 2009

Unchained Melody at Heaven’s Gate

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

I’m spending time in a hospital as the mother of a patient, but this is not about transparency. You can send a good thought or well-wish in our direction, and I will truly appreciate it, but I’m not here to petition for sympathy or prayers, and I’m not here to share my personal life.

So much of my life includes a musical soundtrack of some sort or another and I’m always selfishly sharing them here mostly because I often struggle with words- music can say what I cannot, so I’m posting a remarkable clip from a movie that is about property rights, but also about independence and passion for life- it’s very appropriate for this real estate blog. Bloodhounds know about living life with passion: Purposeful life as defined only by our independent selves, and I find that life in a children’s hospital is very similar: Raw, painful, staggeringly beautiful, and always remarkable.

Today is Sunday, a day of the week that might have you contemplating higher thoughts, or the meaning of life, or might have you preparing to conduct serious business. Today, for four minutes, a break from real estate, a respite from the hard times in life, to give yourself over to an unbridled celebratory lust for life.

May 25, 2009

Under all is the land: Celebrating property rights wherever you live

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

I think about this every now and then. Under all is the land- real estate not as business, but as a sort of philosophy, a big idea. Greg wrote an incredible piece about this in his usual big thinker style. I can’t take this on from the place Greg’s at, but I can see this from the street level- from where I’m working.

My transactions with first time buyers and with HUD owned homes are teaching me a few things. You may not deal in that market. It’s very gritty. Not everyone wants to get their hands that dirty, or do that much work for a couple hundred dollars, and believe me when I tell you that there are times I understand that completely. But le cœur a ses raisons que la raison ne connaît pas, so against the best advice of some of the best brains in the business, I’m working with the people who do not take home ownership for granted, they didn’t grow up assuming they will ever own a home. And in spite of all this collective intelligence pointing me elsewhere, I love working with people who are excited about owning property. Do you know what I mean when I say that?

Think about how incredible that statement is: Owning property. Land. Something that can’t get moved, can’t be taken away. I know eminent domain exists. Forget that for just a moment and think about the history of man. Property ownership equals freedom. The right to own property? That’s extraordinary! So while I understand I could make more money with less work if I worked at real estate differently, I get a huge kick out of helping people who see what I see when they buy a home.

These are people who may have grown up under circumstances that would not have precluded home ownership. They may have grown up in parts of the country that have become too exclusive for the average person and they have been shut out of a life they literally helped build. Perhaps they are not children of privilege but children of other circumstances. They Read more

May 19, 2009

NAR midyear: They’ve got a lot of what it takes to get along

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

Did midyear throw you for a few loops? Why?

We real cool, but for all our coolness, our cutting edginess, our self-important bellowing, we belong to an enormous *ahem* trade organization. So step back a moment and let me break it down for you.

A trade organization exists to represent its members.

All decisions it makes will be in the best interest of the majority of its members. Why? Because a trade organizations exists to represent its members. The end.

If you are not in the majority then your edgey place represents one of two things to a trade organization: Something to be ignored, or something to be absorbed. There are no buts.

“But they twitter!”

“But they leave comments on my blog!”

“But I met them at REBC and they were nice!”

They represent their members. They speak on behalf on their members. You may wish and hope and want to believe that things are different, however, facts is facts. It is what it is.

Meanwhile, how about those “Transaction Fees“? I don’t pass transaction fees on to my clients. I would hate it if it happened to me. So as the NAR creates a song and dance regarding Busby v. JRHBW Realty, Inc. (members only, sorry) thereby protecting the majority of its members, here’s a little toe-tapping number dedicated to the wackadoodle world of the NAR. Appropriately, she’s singing in pig latin!

May 10, 2009

A real estate recipe for success: Scripts and Luck: Practice makes prepared

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

I got lucky. I know it. But being prepared means you increase your luck, right?

So I got a call yesterday about a property I was advertising. It’s a HUD home, and one thing I love about HUD homes is that any broker who is signed up to sell them is encouraged to advertise them. So I have been doing just that. And it generates calls.

I received a call about one of these properties and I threw the play book out the window and just started talking to the caller. Just talking about the property- how much work it might take, and by the way, do you understand the HUD buying process? No? Well it’s different and here’s how… And are you in front of your computer? Okay then, go to this site and where it says Ohio, click there, and by the way, my site is The Brick Ranch so you can see more photos there, and Oh! you just bookmarked my site? Great! Thanks! So here’s more information and….

Suddenly. After 10 minutes of walking the caller through the process, and pointing them here and there, educating and giving away all the information I could in that time period, it occurred to me that maybe they were working with a Realtor. D’oh.

“Are you working with a Realtor?”

“Well.”

Darnitall. I braced myself.

“We have a Realtor who is selling our house.”

Gah.

“But, ” her voice lowers, “we really aren’t happy with the job he’s doing, so we are looking for someone else to help us buy another home.”

Oh. Okay then. I remember this part of the script.

“Would you like me to email you a list of homes as they become available?”

“That would be great!!”

Perhaps the beauty of knowing scripts is that it enables you to do a better job of just being yourself.

April 14, 2009

Susan Boyle shows us how to skin a cat

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

Something light for a Tuesday afternoon.

I’m a sucker for the underdog. I’m a sucker for delightful surprises. I’m a sucker for big dreams and never giving up and making things happen when everyone else tells you it can’t happen.

Do you remember Paul Potts, who brought us to tears? In that tradition comes Susan Boyle, who dreamed a dream. I can’t embed the video, but please click over to watch. I dare you to tell me that you are not feeling inspired, uplifted, ready to take on the world, and empowered to Battle Back after watching this.

What’s the real estate connection? Oh honey, to me the connections are many, but please feel free to tell me what connections you find. I suspect different people will be able to pull different things from this performance.

May the Susan Boyles and Paul Potts of the world continue to show us how it’s done.

April 11, 2009

A fertility celebration from a dying city

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

An Easter egg hunt in Dayton Ohio?

There is a name for it: Detroitification. The slow urban decay and decline that leaves once glorious buildings to crumble into a state beyond disrepair. What do we do with abandoned buildings? Neglected neighborhoods? Desolate cities? This is not rhetorical, I’m asking a real question. We don’t know the answer. Bloodhound Realty would like us all to move to Phoenix. Sorry Odysseus, that ain’t happening.

I love my little city. Somewhat dejected, and neglected, and confused as it is, it’s home. It’s got an ebb and flow here that I get. It’s got a history that ebbs and flows through my blood and drives my heart and focuses my mind. It’s part of me and Phoenix will never be part of me. Or San Diego. Or any other boom town.

If you bailed out of flyover country as soon as you were mobile, you won’t understand why I would choose to live here. Without sun half the year. With the possibility of snow for 4 months. With an uncertain future for the city. Why? Why not move to where the sun shines so often you only notice when it isn’t there? Or jobs are so plentiful you are shocked at the first round of layoffs. Boo hoo. Yer best bud has to make his own damn coffee? Man up, Sparky, things are tough all over.

Dayton is a few months from double digit unemployment. We don’t flinch at this news. We aren’t boo hooing into our Starbucks, we are rolling up our sleeves. We know what y’all don’t know- that things change and you can be happy and you can survive, and there’s life and love and joy and home is any damn place you call home.

If Detroitification is your darkest fear, if none of this makes any sense to you, I can’t help you. These are extraordinary and unprecedented times- exciting in their own right, and ripe with opportunities that haven’t been invented yet. I don’t have all the answers, but something here is happening, and I feel so fortunate to live in a city that needs Read more

March 8, 2009

A few thoughts about freedom and real estate from the middle of an undisclosed cornfield

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

I am Bloodhound hear me howl! Or, something like that.

I went to a farm forum yesterday and learned about the state of farming in Ohio. I think Ohio is returning to it’s agricultural roots. We are becoming the Green Belt, and I welcome that change. You have my permission to snicker at corn fields and pig farmers. You have my permission to make jokes about farm folk. You may snort behind your hands at the thought of working with the land in order to create a world of your own. We should all be so lucky. I’m not here to romanticize cornfields, but I can think of few people who live a life of more independence and take more risks than Ohio’s entrepreneurial farmers.

It got me thinking about my own life among the cornfields of Ohio, and my own sense of independence and freedom, and I wonder why it might be different for you.

We are all here, online- the great equalizer, btw- reading this. Maybe from a farmhouse in the middle of corn-fed world that your own hands and hard work have created, but maybe from a loft in a world of concrete that you did nothing to create. Most likely you are reading this from a tract home on a piece of dirt that will never produce for you. Wherever you are reading this, Welcome to your future. Now what?

Freedom is the reason I became a Realtor- my freedom, but also my client’s freedom. Wasn’t that part of the attraction for you? The freedom to think your own thoughts, have your own life, decide for yourself how you choose to live. I decide how many hours I work, how much money I make, where to spend that money- it’s all in my hands, I get to live or die by my own sword, just like you. So here’s my question: Why shouldn’t I take offense to an organization that is created for the purpose of restricting freedom? Or, more to the point, why wouldn’t you?

Why would you willingly allow someone to curtail that freedom? Why would you choose to follow Read more

February 27, 2009

How does a success like REBarCamp avoid the shoe pinch of growing pains?

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

Rob Hahn is at it again. He likes to instigate, but since he’s so charming, I fall for it. However, unlike our Fred v Gene cage fight, this time I’m serious.

Rob thinks a clearinghouse for national sponsorships for Real Estate Bar Camps is a fine idea, and suggests BHG, or Trulia could step up to the plate.

I don’t think it should become the organizer, or start putting rules and such into place (except the obvious unavoidable ones, like “don’t run off with the money”). But it would be helpful for those of us interested in sponsoring REBC’s.

I vote eek.

I like the idea of BarCamp- loose, free, perfect fit for my brain. And I like that it’s organized by passionate people. I have years of volunteer experience under my belt- big, national organizations, and little local organizations. I can appreciate and respect the time and talent that goes into creating a successful event. My concern with Rob’s suggestion is the fact that sponsors do get preferential treatment. Often this type of arrangement is benign, as in local businesses contribute $20.00 worth of coupons to help fill out a PTO raffle, but we are not talking about that. Although, as an aside, if REBC organizers are not looking at the local businesses- local inspectors, local lenders, local photographers as participants (and maybe they do?) then they might be missing some extraordinary partnering possibilities. Looking at the REBarCamp/Seattle site, it’s all national sponsors. Getting local companies involved would truly be in the BarCamp philosophy, wouldn’t it?

Back to the point. Here’s the thing: Corporations don’t give to organizations, or un-organizations, out of the kindness of their hearts. They just don’t. They give because they expect something in return. Always. Their name here or there, their “presentation”, their branded junk, their “let us help you use our product” panel. BarCamps are free flowing and loose, the sponsor is twittering away with us, and golly darn-it, they are super nice! They bought us drinks at that other wingding- don’t you remember? What can it hurt if they become the go-to guys?

It hurts because you can’t speak out Read more

February 24, 2009

Quietly going about our business

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

We go about our business, most of us, very quietly, with an attempt at dignity. One foot in front of the other, moving forward, striving, reaching, yearning to be the best we can be. We want to provide for our families, do right and do well for our clients. We want to put our heads down on our pillows at night, satisfied with the day’s work, and wake up the following morning excited to do it all again.

We don’t, most of us, want to be rock stars in the blogiverse. We want, most of us, to be appreciated for what we can offer, allowed to give freely without grief, and left to go quietly about our business.

I don’t agree with everything written on real estate blogs, and I don’t much like some of it, but the people who read these national blogs, the people I meet at Unchained, and the real estate professionals who email me to share their own triumphs- these people are inspiring. They are just like me, quietly going about our business, picking up information like sponges, moving forward, learning, striving, laughing, loving- just people, just real estate agents (without big hair).

I’m disturbed by the idea of a NAR Social Media Director, when I think about it. But the thing is, I don’t think about it. I don’t care. I don’t wish the new SMD any ill will, I don’t wish them anything at all because it really doesn’t matter to me. By the way, I’m going to call this position The SMeD, just because it makes me giggle.

So The SMeD will have a job to do, but none of it matters to me because I have my job to do, and as Greg points out, “All we have to do is keep doing what we’ve been doing — and keep getting better at it — and the Boojum under the bed will be gone forever.”

I’ve always believed this, and it’s always proved true. Anything that we have given power to, in our own minds, can easily be dethroned, defrocked, destroyed, by doing exactly what we do so Read more

January 29, 2009

Social media marketing: As the Whores of Babble On take over, I’m re-enrolling at the Old Skool House

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

I’ve changed my mind about this. I mean, I don’t hate twitter, but I do hate what twitter has become.

See, I have this thing about advertising. I think it’s safe to say that my online reading, my television viewing and my radio listening, are driven in large part by the absence of advertising. Funny, because I love advertising and a good ad is a work of art. But here’s the thing, how often do you see a good ad?

If you follow me on twitter you know that one of my favorite television channels is TCM- Turner Classic Movies. Yeah, I like movies, and TCM is commercial free. It’s hours and hours of commercial free television, and I love that.

Pay Per Click would never work with me because I have trained myself not to look at the right column of my online viewing. The ads you put on your blogs? Couldn’t tell you what they are- I refuse to look at them- it’s just a lot of visual noise. Slam too many ads up there, and I’m no longer a reader. Am I alone?

We love social media, but we are getting it all wrong. Social media- a way to connect with a mass of people- has become a giant cesspool of vendorsluts and their ads. There is a huge difference between you and I connecting, and you and I selling and buying. If I buy a magazine off the news stand, I know I’m paying for advertising, but I’m also not trying to create a relationship with the publisher. However, if I stop by your blog, or follow you on twitter, or friend you up on facebook, I, being the nice warm person I am, really would like to get to know you better. I naively make that assumption about you as well. So when you start pimping your blog on twitter, or advertising products, that puts me on guard that you might be more interested in selling something. Is it just me who thinks like this?

Putting ads all over the place? Fine. You don’t have to defend yourself to me. Pimping Read more

December 29, 2008

2008 in Dog Years

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

2008 rocked! Yeah, the economy tanked, but I do believe that crisis means opportunity so I’m not sweating that right now- I’m looking for ways to make the best of this situation.

Professionally, this year has been productive. That shouldn’t be misunderstood to mean that I’m swimming in transactions, because I’m not. But I’m not in debt and I’ve grown professionally through some experiences. Due to my own failure to communicate, I experienced a painful wake-up call from some clients while I was at BHBU in Orlando. What can you do when you are 1000 miles away? If you are me, you stop what you are doing and communicate. And communicate. And communicate. And you do what you need to do to make things right- and I have. And then you take a drive to Coco Beach with your husband and have one of the most wonderful dinners of your life. I’m grateful for clients that let me know their thoughts and let me work to fix things. So now I’m stronger, smarter, and more prepared than I’ve ever been- that’s progress, that’s productive.

For many reasons, mostly of my own creation, I have never been focused on my business the way I need to be. This fall a family situation changed and suddenly I had the opportunity to see things a bit more clearly. Uninterupted time is now mine. Goals? Time management? Focus? It’s mine all mine! And now I can take the tools, tips, and techniques I’ve been surrounding myself with and slowing honing and really get to work. This is good. This is very good. 2008 rocked but 2009 should be slamming and if it’s not, I’m hanging up my license.

This was a dog’s year for being online. It was amazing to meet so many people on twitter, at conferences throughout the year, and through emails. And to all the people who have vented publicly and privately about BloodhoundBlog, thank you. I’m a better and stronger person because of you, I hope each of you can say the same.

Greg Swann, this week, and this post, this post, and this Read more

December 9, 2008

Dear Rob- It’s not perfection vs. authenticity, it’s authentic perfection!

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

“The question, really, is one of perfection vs. authenticity.”

Nice try Rob, but yer still wrong. 🙂

The Notorious ROB Hahn wrote a post in which he called me out for a little discussion we had- who’s “better”- Fred Astaire or Gene Kelly, and he drew some parallels to real estate marketing.  As far as who’s better- in the end, it always comes down to taste, which, as Rob clearly illustrates, there is no accounting for. But he’s young, so I’ll give him a pass for now. Rob Hahn is a smart and funny guy who likes to push the discussion forward, so I’m willing to bet he’ll take this ribbing with the good humor that’s intended, but if not, he’ll probably be blogging about it, and as for me, I love that I have a reason to post some of the finest dancing ever committed to film.

My take away from our discussion and how it relates to real estate is different from Rob’s. It isn’t one of perfection vs. authenticity, the bigger question is from whom can we learn the most and how do we apply it?

Warning: The rest of this post draws parallels between movie musicals and real estate. If that is something that will make your eyes glaze over, this would be a good time to stop reading.

Fred Astaire was famous for his quest for perfection. It was authentic to him. It’s what made Fred, Fred. You might, as Rob Hahn does, find Astaire’s perfection intimidating, but we can learn something about business from him. We can understand that practice does make perfect. That paying attention to details is extraordinarily important, and that perfection is not a bad word.

A white tie and tails in an Art Deco world may not be your thing, here in 2008. But Astaire knew his audience and he knew what he was selling. His audience, 1934, was dealing with a depression. They wanted fantasy, they wanted romance, they wanted to escape, if only for a few hours, from the reality they faced everyday. They wanted to see beautiful people in beautiful clothes, living a beautiful Read more

December 4, 2008

Rustling up some Frontier Spirit in the old midwest

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Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

From The Wall Street Journal’s Op-Ed page: America Needs Its Frontier Spirit. Daniel Henninger spells it out. And quite nicely, I might add. An excerpt:

The greatest danger in the current economic crisis is that the United States will lose its historic appetite for risk. The mood now is that risk-taking got us into this mess. Risk, though, is the quintessential American trait that built the nation — from the Battle of Bunker Hill to the rise of the microchip. If we let risk give way to a new ethos of commercial reserve and regulatory restriction, the upward arc of the U.S. ascendancy will flatten. Maybe it already has.

By “we” I mean the policy makers in Washington who will write the new rules of finance, our stunned bankers and businessmen, and the average Joes of Main Street who with reason have lost confidence. If all lose faith at once in the American idea of risk, refinding it when the recession ends may prove difficult.

This is the moment for Americans to rediscover the “frontier thesis” of Frederick Jackson Turner. In a seminal paper delivered in 1893 to the American Historical Association, “The Significance of the Frontier in American History,” Turner argued that the U.S. found its identity as it pushed away from the Eastern seaboard and crossed a series of frontier “fall lines”: the Allegheny Mountains, the Mississippi, the Missouri, the plains, the Rocky Mountains and California.

Every American absorbs the frontier experience from reading biographies of great Americans or from movies. Frederick Turner, however, made it clear that with this effort to transform the wilderness the Americans broke decisively with what he called, believe it or not, “old Europe.” “Here is a new product,” Turner wrote, “that is American.”

“From the conditions of frontier life,” Turner believed, “came [American] intellectual traits of profound importance . . . coarseness and strength combined with acuteness and inquisitiveness; that practical, inventive turn of mind, quick to find expedients; that masterful grasp of material things, lacking in the artistic but powerful to effect great ends; that restless, nervous energy, that dominant individualism, working for good and for evil.” Read more

November 28, 2008

On giving thanks: The Thanksgiving Scenius and the Thanksgiving scene and the abundance of love

by

Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

This was a tough week for our house for a few reasons. One is that I am working through a contract, a situation in which my ability to communicate with my clients was all but shut down. This was a first for me, and painful. I understood what was happening, but not necessarily why it happened. I knew I had to keep plowing ahead though, and Wednesday we finally got back on some solid ground, something to be thankful for and grow from.

As bad as that was, the toughest thing we dealt with was a death. A teenager- a beautiful, intelligent, funny, and sweet child of 16, we had known her since she was 3, one of the few people in the world who was a friend to both of our kids, died in an automobile accident. She was a passenger on a sunny morning drive in the country, in a car with her girlfriends- cranking up the music, singing, goofing off, celebrating life with the joyous freedom that only teenage girls are capable of. I can’t help but smile when I picture a car full of girls, laughing out loud, full of life, full of hope, full of happiness… Then the driver ran a red light.

She had moved to a small neighboring community, and we didn’t see much of her any more, still, the friends of your kids hold a special place in your heart- as any Mom will tell you. The tiny community she lived in was shaken to it’s very core. The ripple effect- so many families knew everyone involved- the girls in the car as well as the couple who had the green light and hit the girls. It will take years to heal from this, and yet, and yet… The viewing was full of life. Yes, young people came to say good-bye to their dear friend, but teenagers are life itself- it oozes from them, they can’t contain it. Memories and testaments to this child and the special place she held in the hearts of so many people were everywhere you turned and this funeral was Read more

November 11, 2008

How I spent my Orlando vacation, or; The exquisite feeling of an exploding brain

by

Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

I completely by-passed the NAR, Orlando is big enough to do that. I was in Orlando for BHBU, and as a participant in both BHBU I and BHBU II, I can say that Orlando out-rocked Phoenix, but wait, there’s more! Greg and Brian are about to blow your mind. How do I know? I experienced it myself.

The presentations were great, but the scenius rocked my world.

You ever walk into a room that crackles with energy? Ever had the privilege of hanging out with the very best at anything? You know that synergy that ignites and sparks ideas and discussion? Hanging out with the Bloodhounds was an incredible experience for that. Watching these minds toss out ideas and information to each other was a real treat. Yeah, I was there, but I felt like a fly on the wall most times- I can’t keep up with these guys. They would dial back occasionally, just as my brain exploded, tangent off to another subject and- cue the squealing tires- 0-60 in 3 seconds. They have Ferrari brains and Lamborghini brains, while I have a minivan brain. 

As the resident X chromosome, it was a joy to not have to suffer through a pissing contest. These guys seriously respect each other for their unique outlooks, their unique strengths, and most wonderfully, they respect an atmosphere of sharing. If you are used to a world where hording information and knowledge is the norm, Bloodhound is a luxurious foray into a rain forest of ideas.

I was lucky if I got 4 hours of sleep a night, but I am energized by the weekend, and ready to tackle the work that I need to do and take on the world- that doesn’t happen too often at a conference, not to me anyway.

I am a very fortunate girl, I understand that more than anyone else. But you have an opportunity to put yourself in my shoes for a few days. If you’ve ever thought that one-on-one training or hanging out with the resident brainiacs and salesmaniacs sounds like a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and it is- then jump. Unchained is now Read more

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Inventing Real Estate 2.0

Welcome to BloodhoundBlog, the national real estate industry marketing and technology weblog written by, for and about real estate professionals. Better yet, welcome to the wired world of real estate. We are busily inventing Real Estate 2.0 – technology, marketing, service and salesmanship. Like all Bloodhounds, we are smart, frisky and fiercely independent. We've built a spot on the earth – beloved over all – where each one of us can be who we are, no matter who that might be. We are committed to an idea of excellence that will flush the bums, the con-men and the crybabies out of the real estate industry. If you yearn to have your failures excused, your moral lapses absolved or your boo-boos kissed, seek elsewhere. But if you are sick to death of mediocrity – welcome home. Read all about us, subscribe to our feed and steel yourself for the hunt. We work hard, we play hard, we learn everything we can – and we bow to no one.

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