Category: Realty Reality (page 7 of 16)

May 12, 2008

#1 Myth In Real Estate: Agents Don’t Know Why They’re Failing

by Jeff Brown

Real Estate Investments Broker

BHB is about excellence. Excellence in service, products we need and/or use, various marketing methods, and how we conduct ourselves during what I’ll laughingly refer to as ‘business hours’. I’ve suspected Greg’s goal of reaching the million agents is gonna be a tall order, ‘cuz 80% of the agents out there would have to move up the ‘I get it’ ladder to have a clue. More simply put, they don’t come here, and probably never will. That said, I also believe there is a relatively large grouping of agents who’ve not learned yet what it takes to become a consistently successful high volume producer. They do business, but realize they could, and should be doing much more.

High volume? Look, you don’t have to close 100 escrows, ok? But an agent who wants to, can make six figures, $100-250,000 or more in nearly any market. This morning I discovered Russ also addressed this topic, but in his own way.

Agents just don’t know what they should be doing with their time.

Or so they would have you believe.

Let’s conduct a short experiment. Think of any past endeavor for which you had more than a passing interest in succeeding. Let’s take a simple one with which most of us can identify — losing weight and/or improving our overall health. How’d ya do?

If you were successful, it’s my guess you know why. Duh. Can’t we then infer if you had failed, 99% of folks would also know exactly why? Am I being too subtle here? When I was the ‘Chubby Little Blonde Guy’ (That oughta date it for you.) I knew exactly what road I’d used to arrive at Chubsville. No self discipline when it came to diet and exercise. Go ahead, write down that Black Pearl. I’ll wait for you.

It takes an IQ of at least 150-180 minimum to understand the dynamics of calories in vs. calories out, plus the added factor of consistent exercise, both aerobic, and anaerobic. Get the right math goin’ for 120 days or so, and pretty soon you’re shoppin’ for clothes that aren’t X-rated. I Read more

May 11, 2008

Number1Expert Re-Launches as Number2Expert

by Eric Bramlett

Real Estate

In a surprise move, website template provider Number1Expert has announced plans to rebrand as Number2Expert. This decision came following their inclusion of Trulia widgets on the myhomes.asp pages of all of their client sites. Here’s an example.

When asked about the decision, a spokesman said, “To date, our clients are providing Trulia with over 11,000 links. We live in a web 2.0 World, and transparency is very important. Since we’re effectively promoting Trulia as the #1 real estate expert, we felt it important to re-brand ourselves to more consistently mesh with this strategy.” He then added, “We’re very excited about the new opportunities that will arise with our market position as the Number 2 Experts.

The widgets that Number2Experts places on their template sites have been a hot topic in the RE.net as of late. Demonized by real estate SEO’s, and heralded as powerful, free online tools by others, the real estate world cannot seem to come to a consensus.

Be sure to keep an ear open, and an RSS reader ready for more news to come regarding this intriguing topic.

May 9, 2008

Thinking myself out of business: a lone real estate agent faces the future

by Mike Farmer

Real Estate Broker

Agents get leads from different marketing strategies, both offline and online, but where will most of the leads come from in five years? Looking ahead I’d have to say leads will come mainly from one source — Google.

Unless something changes, Google has the lion’s share of searchers. As more and more home buyers use Google to search for area information and sites where real estate listings can be found, it becomes obvious for listing agents and buyer agents that search placement is, and will be even moreso in the future, vital to success in the real estate business.

Before I go any further, I’ll address opposition to this statement by saying that some agents will continue to be successful using marketing methods outside Google search, but I’m talking about the majority of agents working in the real estate business full time. I’m excluding the mega-agents who attract buyers and sellers through their star status and obviously superior abilities of attraction and promotion — the majority of agents will not be stars. Plus, even the offline efforts that give an agent exposure might be eclipsed after someone gets online to begin searching — an agent’s name might appear in a magazine, or a billboard, or through the mail, or a flyer in a store, or on a “for sale” sign on the street, but when the buyer goes back to their computer to search, another agent who has mastered the art of placement will pop up and lead the buyer in a different direction. I predict the online presence will become more valid in the buyer’s mind than offline presence as consumers learn to trust and depend on the net more and more.

I don’t believe Zillow and Trulia will be major factors in lead generation. If they survive, they will be a draw for those curious about real estate in general, but searchers will be more sophisticated and agents will be smarter about SEO.

It’s my opinion that the majority of agents will need to get good placement on Google in order to be successful. Google placement won’t be the ONLY way to market, just the most effective way Read more

May 8, 2008

I’m in Business to Make Money

by Sean Purcell

Real Estate Renaissance Man

One of the best parts of BHB for me, is taking the ideas and the round tablediscussions that happen here and bringing them to the street. (I must admit an occasional guilty pleasure taken, when I use the knowledge I glean from BHB to steer and even dominate these discussions. I am shamelessly looking forward to Unchained, that I might return a 600lb gorilla in gorilla marketing.) There has been some very interesting debate recently, both here and on other blogs, over the valuation of real estate services. It is a tough dialogue because large amounts of money are involved and strong feelings abound.

But asking the agents I work with what they think of the NAR, their sense on the moral obligation of a contract and how they value their services opens up new view points and sheds more light on these issues. Recently I was talking to a Realtor I know and respect about how to answer the question of commission and agent value. Now, there may be many right answers to this question; but I have yet to hear one that cannot be debated and diminished. Not due so much to anyone’s superior skills as a wordsmith but rather the multi-faceted nature of the topic. This agent and I, however, after deciding that the premise of the question itself was suspect, eventually decided that there is one answer that is inarguable, morally justified and epistemologically sound. The very simple answer to the question of how one justifies their commission is this:

I am a real estate agent and, by definition, an entrepreneur. I am in business to make a profit. I charge what the market will bear.

May 5, 2008

Do You Have Faith? — Belief? — Or Do You KNOW?

by Jeff Brown

Real Estate Investments Broker

Take it from someone who for years did what he thought would produce, but in reality experienced haphazard results. There’s a huge difference in the quality of results (read: success/failure) when the actions taken to produce said results were proceeded by an easily defined thought — followed by a slamdunk belief in said thought — which generates behaviors, followed closely by expectations of successful results. It really comes down to this: We know what we know, and we tend to act on what we know. Not what we hope. Not what we theorize. What we know. If you say you believe something to be true, and you can honestly substitute the word ‘know’ for believe, you’ll succeed.

Make sense?

I understand for most readers, it’s certainly not a new concept. Most of us have heard various versions of this since somewhere in our childhood. Years ago, I experienced a spontaneous breakthrough of clarity. I was talking one day with someone who knew me too well. She compared the difference between my behavior when I strongly believed something to when she felt I knew something to be true. I demurred with much volume and histrionics until she smiled and gave me a few recent and inarguably concrete examples. I hung my head in shame.

She then asked me one of the most important questions I’ve ever had to answer. What methods of acquiring new business was I using knowing it would produce results?

Substitute the word ‘know’ for ‘believe’ and tell me what you think about your goals for this year, if you have them. Do you believe the methods you’re employing to attain them will work, or do you know? And for the record? This isn’t some Kumbaya, rah-rah, ‘ya gotta believe’ crappola for the soft headed out there who need to feel good for an hour or so.

The Point?

What we think of most of the time is what we become. (Paraphrased — hat tip to King Solomon)

If we’re consistently wondering if what we’re doing will produce the results we’re pursuing, we’re on the doubt train headed to who knows where. It’s Read more

April 29, 2008

A disturbing Reality – desperate builders doing immoral things

by Eric Blackwell

The Real Estate Group, Virginia Beach and Chesapeake VA

I was having a chat with Mike Taylor, a real estate broker and friend from Indianapolis the other day. He was unusually incensed about a builder allegedly doing something I find unconscionable. Selling homes as free and clear that are actually in the process of or about to get hit with Mechanic’s liens. Nice. “Aren’t you glad we bought this new home, honey?”–followed quickly by– “Hey what’s this mechanic’s lien on our new house?”.

How? Well, most of the details are here on Mike’s blog. He is a sensible guy and not prone to overstatement and from what he has documented with courthouse records, he certainly has a reason to be miffed about this kind of treatment of people.

FORGET THE LEGAL IMPLICATIONS, WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE GOLDEN RULE?

I am not talking about the “He who has the gold, makes the rules” one. I am referring to the original one of do unto others. These morons KNOW that these bills are going to come due and they KNOW that they cannot pay them and they KNOW that the buyer is going to wake up with in some cases, up to $10,000 of encumbrance on their home and a royal pain in the rear to clear.

Would they want this on a home THEY bought? Would they want to have to explain this to THEIR wife?

Yes, this market has been tough and YES it will grind some people out of the business. However, tough times only reveal the true character of the person below and if what Mike alleges is true (and I have ZERO reason to doubt it), the true character of these folks is morally bankrupt.

And financially broke you can recover from FAR more easily (in my opinion) than being morally bankrupt.

Kudos to Mike for having the courage to stand up and say a) this is immoral and b) I am not going to sit quietly by and watch it happen. (NOTE: He didn’t just post it on his blog. He is taking it to the local press as well.)

April 27, 2008

The smarter agent emerging: standards out of experimentation

by Mike Farmer

Real Estate Broker

Choice is becoming more critical as options increasingly expand. I have read about this potential problem for years and now we seem to be well along the road to increasing abundance of options. As real esate agents, we’re inundated with options regarding web sites, social networking avenues, blogs to read, models to consider, marketing techniques to employ and advertising venues to use. It’s the flip side of the blessing, the curse of too many options and the problem of choice.

One of the benefits of sites like Bloodhound is that people are giving consideration to these problems and openly writing about what has been found to be the best practices. Awhile back I talked about an article written years ago predicting how the internet would intially be chaos, then experimentation and selection and winnowing, then a standardization period. I want to give credit to the writer, but I can’t find the source. Perhaps someone will remember.

It seems we are still in the experimentation stage, but as we quickly change and learn, choices will hopefully become easier. There is still a dearth of statistics showing the effectiveness of blogging, social networking and online marketing through website providers, RE sites and social sites but anectdotal evidence and personal experience based on analysis are beginning to give us an indication that these new forms of doing business have much potential for those who are adopting the right methods and utilizing them in a committed way.

I do have evidence in my own company that online business has increased by at least 20-30% each year for the last three years, I just haven’t pinpointed which methods produce what part of that business — perhaps it’s a holistic effect of it all.

Making choices is based on knowledge gained through experimentation, our results and the results of others, developing certain guidelines I can use to measure new offerings. In other words, I’m getting to a point where I don’t have to experiment with every new online offering, wasting money on useless gimmicks — it’s easier to tell now which ones have merit and which ones are just a snazzy remake of something I’ve tried that didn’t work.

I suspect many real Read more

April 24, 2008

Another Happy Customer

by Russell Shaw

Mega-Producing Realtor

Below is an email I just received that I thought I would pass along.

Prey - listings

After talking with your agent this afternoon, I NOW UNDERSTAND how you can advertise that most of your propertys sell in 30 days !!!!!!

YOU PREY on the unfortunate home owners who’s property and there situation are in distress !!!!!! YOUR agent had the GALL to tell me Id have to list my home for under $ 150,000 !!! You know SHE DID NOT EVEN SEE MY PROPERTY !!!!! All her talk about bad times etc, and wanting to know why I wanted to sell was her attempt to , I GUESS , scare me into listing a property worth alot more than that BUT you people DONT want to work for your money as a true real estate person does by seeking buyers for homes priced properly. YOU JUST WANT the distressed propertys so as you can scare the home owner with your talk , get him to list with you at a drastically reduced price so as it will sell in your advertised 30 days with you people doing little to NO work and making your money !!!

Answer this IF YOU CAN !!!! How can your agent MAGICALLY put a value on my property WITHOUT even seeing it, re, condition etc BUT she can magically compare it to another property priced lower WHICH she hasnt even seen neither. How do you people MAGICALLY be able to EVEN compare the two without even seeing EITHER ONE !!! The comparison one could be a piece of #%^# !!!! Mine is not !!!!!!

How do you people even call your self realtors in what you are doing !!!!

April 22, 2008

Is It A Great Time To Buy, Or Just A Great Time To Be A Buyer?

by Dave Phillips

CEO, PA Association of Realtors

I’ve said it my self hundreds of times in the last 12 months – it’s a great time to buy. How could it not be a great time to buy – tons of inventory, prices have come down, interest rates are still low – of course it is a great time to buy. Or is it? Whenever I shout “it’s a great time house to buy” in a particularly loud fashion (generally quoted in the local newspaper), I get an e-mail from some intelligent sounding person saying, “no it isn’t.” Here let me give you the latest example that was spurred by a front page story on a local promotion to promote first time home buying:

(unedited)

Let me see if I have this correct:· House prices are falling;· Houses are not selling at a rate which will supportrealtors, because no one wants to buy a depreciating asset;· So, realtors want to sell more houses;· Therefore, they target first time buyers, whopresumably know the least about the pitfalls of homeownership and are the most likely to try to ‘catch a falling knife.’ · The lines they use in their propaganda are the sameused nationally in every newspaper article on housing which publishes a realtor quote, to-wit “now is a great time to buy,” or “it’s a perfect storm.”Why do I find this reprehensible?

In case you did not read the story I linked, just suffice it to say that we are doing a major local promotion to educate new home buyers on the new issues with financing and promoting them to purchase a home from the massive inventory. Self-serving, yes, but there are also great benefits for sellers, mortgage bankers, others in the real estate business, and for the general economy. Locally, people look to us to lead and that’s what we are doing. Fortunately, our local economy is insulated from the national issues that are present in other areas.

The real issue in this rant is the claim that it is NOT a good time to buy because “no one wants a depreciating asset.” Of course every market is different and prices have fallen here in Read more

April 20, 2008

Don’t Listen To The Arrogant Attention Whores — Just Skin Your Cat

by Jeff Brown

Real Estate Investments Broker

As happens with blogging sometimes, certain topics inspire many to register their take. That’s what we do. Whether it’s real estate, loan, or tech oriented, it’s amazing how quickly certain subjects can morph into almost a spiritual debate.

Watching all the back and forth the last month or so has been, uh, enlightening — not.

I’m here to tell you, Bloodhound is all about making agents better at what they do. I adhere to that as my Bloodhound mission statement with whatever I write here, just as I do in my own house. Writing here is such an honor. The first thing readers realize is that most of us understand it’s not about us, but about you. This is a critical distinction when passing on expertise.

For example, as a youth baseball coach, (five all-star teams 🙂 ) I never told a kid he was stupid ‘cuz he hit a line drive other than how I’d taught him. On the contrary, I praised him for gettin’ the job done. There are so many ways to hit a baseball hard. But if you freeze frame the hitter at the point where ball meets bat? They pretty much look identical.

The same goes for real estate agents. Their success depends on one thing: How many prospects were they able to get themselves in front of on a consistent basis? In baseball parlance, how many at-bats do they get every week, month, year?

Wow, you made seven figures?! Yep. How’d you do it? The answer isn’t relevant. The target of the question did it — that’s what’s relevant. He skinned the cat. Now that you’ve discovered that fact, you can sit down with them and find out how. The next agent who impresses you with their income will have done it an entirely different way. Go figure.

We human types are funny. We figure out what works for us, then become evangelical about it. Billy Graham was never more passionate than those on either side of the discussions on SEO methods, what to call a lead (Are you serious?), cold calling/door knocking vs the internet, Read more

April 13, 2008

Integrity — It’s more than just a word…

by Cathleen Collins

Realtor, Staging Consultant

We were just assigned our seventh Team Lead since Catholic Healthcare West had outsourced me to PerotSystems. I’d been part of Perot’s Business Applications team for about sixteen months, and this seventh Team Lead was the first to come to Phoenix to look her team members into our eyes. She was brand new to the account and now had to give us our annual reviews, without the benefit of ever having viewed us. Like so many other corporations, Perot has the employee review herself, then during the annual review the employee and her direct supervisor compare reviews to come to an agreement. I’m often my own worst critic, so I was modest in ranking most of the achievements I was being measured on. But when I got to Client Satisfaction and Integrity, I gave myself the highest possible scores. Nina (pronounced Nine-ah), had seen a few of the accolades given me by clients who I supported, so she conceded the penultimate score on Client Satisfaction. But she had no way to assess my integrity. So she apologized, explained she was handling everyone on her new team the same, and gave me the average score, what would be a “C” on Cameron’s report card, for my Integrity. My reaction? This was the most honest evaluation that Nina could have given, given the circumstances. How can anyone judge another person’s integrity without evidence?

First of all, just what is integrity? I like Wikipedia’s definition:

Integrity is the basing of one’s actions on an internally consistent framework of principles. Depth of principles and adherence of each level to the next are key determining factors. One is said to have integrity to the extent that everything one does on the same core set of values. While those values may change, it is their consistency with each other and with the person’s actions that determine the person’s integrity.
(Emphasis mine.)

Words have precise meanings, and it’s the imprecise use of words that causes so many problems.

(My Mom and I had this debate yesterday: She — “I heard it on TV today… we’re definitely in a recession.” Me — “Definitely, as Read more

April 13, 2008

Doom and Gloom Win Again: Real Estate Is Dead

by Mike Farmer

Real Estate Broker

It is now pervasive, whether fact, fiction, miscalculation or a misunderstanding of economic adjustments — doom and gloom has colored our lexicon and everyone’s on board. The “realists” are merely pointing out facts, the politicians are merely offering a big hand to help all the little people in this troubling time, the agents are merely accepting fate, the lenders are merely going broke, the pundits are merely predicting a dour future — it’s over, real estate is dead.

If you don’t believe it you are an idiot, a Koolaid drinker, a liar, a naive babe in denial or an unscrupulous player preying on the unsuspecting. When someone asks you about the real estate market, tell them it’s dead and getting worse. Tell them there is nothing positive in sight, that it might go for years, decades, a century, who knows, just tell them it’s dead.

We’re doomed, and gloom is our tomorrow and the next day and many after that. Close your doors, lock up shop, sell the Mercedes, real estate is dead. Foreclosures will climb, and after the sub-prime, the leveraged will crumble and then the middle will fold and the highest of the high will fall like tin men one and all. No one will be spared, real estate is dead.

The builders will watch their half-built McMansions sit like bones in a graveyard; realtors will be playing guitars in the park for nickels and dimes; a huge swooshing sound will be heard as the last of the ill winds blow over the rubble that was once a great industry and renters will rule the world and lord over those who once were lords of land. Real estate is dead.

Brokers and lenders will flip burgers or work as city clerks while builders cut grass and investors shine shoes and players of all stripes sing the blues — real estate is dead.

Obama will help the least fortunate, but the ones who rode high will meet their just rewards, for, afterall, it was greed that brought us low. In the wasteland of RE web 2.0 there will be blogs written by the depressed and dispossessed, mashups showing a combination of sorrow, charts showing Read more

April 11, 2008

A deeply philosophical discussion of the flame war that will not be happening at BloodhoundBlog

by Greg Swann

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Oh, good grief…

I can credit both sides of the rancorous dispute that is not going to happen.

I agree with Russell Shaw that Barry Cunningham can run roughshod over opponents in debate, and I knew without having to be told that Russ was steaming over this.

I agree with Barry on the factual prognosis for real estate. I watched it happen in the graphic arts, and I’m watching it happen in dozens of other industries.

I was laughing with Brian Brady on the phone last night that I have inadvertently introduced a second standard on ad hominem comments: Zero tolerance for everything else, but a wider latitude on Barry’s threads. I’ve stepped in when things seemed to be trending a little too flamey, but, for the most part I haven’t had huge objections.

Gentlemen, I want for you both — and for everyone reading this — to understand something that, like the oceans of air I am immersed in, is too obvious to me even to notice most of the time:

Weblogging is theater of the mind.

What we do is entertainment. It should be interesting, fact-based, persuasive — all that serious stuff. But we are competing for attention with radio and television, not Oxford University. I certainly want to talk about things that matter to me, and I have huge goals for real estate and for the world at large that I would like to see effected. But none of those things is going to happen overnight — and none of them in response to a blog post.

If Barry Cunningham paints the world with a broad brush and that makes you hot under the collar, the most interesting question is this one: Are you angry because he’s outrageously wrong — or because he might be right? When an argument is absurdly off the mark, we ignore it. Ha, ha. Who cares? It’s when things are too irritatingly right that we get irritated. Your emotional reactions tell you almost nothing about the world outside your mind — and almost everything about the world inside your mind.

But more importantly, all you need to do to defeat an erroneous Read more

April 9, 2008

What Is a Good Free Gift To Give Them?

by Russell Shaw

Mega-Producing Realtor

A follow up email with a question:

You have mentioned to me a couple of months ago on the phone to give 150 people that I know something that would make me go “thanks, that is a cool gift”, and right before I leave turn around and say “oh by the way I am in real estate if you know of any one who wants to buy or sell property, give me a call” (Something around that format). This I idea that I came up with would be giving the a TEN dollar gift card from TIM HORTONS. ( Big Coffee Province loves this coffee) because almost every person in Ontario goes to Tim Horton’s Coffee shop at one time or another.

Do you think that this gift would work for what you are talking about? How do you feel about the amount being spent on the gift or is there a certain amount you should spend?

Do I think it is a good thing to drop off to a hundred people you hardly know? No, not really. Here’s why, first you would – at $10 each – be paying about $1,500 Free Gift Inside and a prepaid coffee card would have a very short shelf life.
The list I am talking about is anyone who would recognize you on sight. Not a list of people who have sent you business in the past. For a short list like that, do I think a prepaid coffee card could be a nice thing to give them? Yes, absolutely.

What you are looking for is something that might wind up on their refrigerator or bulletin board. Something that a person might want to keep – someplace they can see it, so they could easily find and and refer to it. Some kind of list. Restaurants, movie theaters, sports events, anything that you would be happy to get. Surveys are the key to stats (what do they really really want?) so normally I would want to find out the answer to that question first. But the person I am “doing the survey” on, in this case, is you. The reason? I want you Read more

April 7, 2008

I Want To Be A Lister – The Listing Presentation – The Objections

by Russell Shaw

Mega-Producing Realtor

An expert is a person who has made all the mistakes that can be made in a very narrow field.

– Niels Bohr, Danish physicist and Nobel Prize winner

About a year ago I wrote what was really part 1 of The Listing Presentation. Anyone wanting to increase their listing skills will likely find time spent on this post Money Down The Drain and
that first post time well spent. I have mentioned the short list of different things a seller might say (or objections they might have to listing) to you. All good listers know these objections and are not startled or thrown off by the seller bringing them up. In fact, great listers know the objections so well that they want the seller to bring them up and if the seller does not bring them up the agent will bring them up. That’s correct. If you already know what they are thinking, why not just address it before they even mention it? It is usually fun to hit a softball when it is a slow underhand pitch.

As the nature of the objections has never really changed it is really sort of silly for any agent wanting to take a lot of listings to not know – in advance – that these are the concerns of the seller. I know that the internet and these new-brand-new-all-new-discount-really-really-low-maybe-even-no-commission companies have changed the very nature of life on earth, as we know it – but I am pretty sure the main objections that you could hear from a home seller back in 1968 were still the same in 1978. They are still the same in 2008. I am thinking they may be still quite similar in 2048. Just a guess, but if you are planning on sticking around in this business for a while, perhaps it might be a good idea to know how you are going to respond when they bring these up.

As a really humorous aside, there were also discount companies in 1978 that would list and sell homes for practically nothing. Those companies too were going to change the very nature of how real estate was done. Read more

Category: Realty Reality (page 7 of 16)

#1 Myth In Real Estate: Agents Don’t Know Why They’re Failing

by Jeff Brown

Number1Expert Re-Launches as Number2Expert

by Eric Bramlett

Thinking myself out of business: a lone real estate agent faces the future

by Mike Farmer

I’m in Business to Make Money

by Sean Purcell

Do You Have Faith? — Belief? — Or Do You KNOW?

by Jeff Brown

A disturbing Reality – desperate builders doing immoral things

by Eric Blackwell

The smarter agent emerging: standards out of experimentation

by Mike Farmer

Another Happy Customer

by Russell Shaw

Is It A Great Time To Buy, Or Just A Great Time To Be A Buyer?

by Dave Phillips

Don’t Listen To The Arrogant Attention Whores — Just Skin Your Cat

by Jeff Brown

Integrity — It’s more than just a word…

by Cathleen Collins

Doom and Gloom Win Again: Real Estate Is Dead

by Mike Farmer

A deeply philosophical discussion of the flame war that will not be happening at BloodhoundBlog

by Greg Swann

What Is a Good Free Gift To Give Them?

by Russell Shaw

I Want To Be A Lister – The Listing Presentation – The Objections

by Russell Shaw

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