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May 16, 2011

Illustrating a software paradigm shift in the simplest possible way. Or possibly I’m just simple-minded.

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

I have every intention of talking about the paradigm shift in software engineering that is being ushered in by the iPad. The iPhone pushed us half the way there with “apps” — dedicated client interfaces into server-based databases. The iPad pushes all that much further, with interesting implications for real estate marketing.

Meanwhile, I’d like to use a very simple example to illustrate how a small change in the way software operates can result in big changes in the way we live our lives.

Consider the alarm clock: Big, clunky and loud, a magnificently useless dust magnet. One alarm, one time a day, set it and regret it. The digital age brought us the snooze alarm, and micro-electronics gave us the his-‘n’-hers alarm clock with a weekend override. But still very dumb technology, guaranteed to fail — partially twice a year at daylight savings time and completely every time the electricity goes out.

Enter the iPhone:

What you are seeing are my early-morning alarms: I get up early to deal with my email and to work out, then I get back into bed with Cathleen to snuggle for fifteen minute before we both get up to walk the dogs and get our days started.

The point is, I can have as many alarms as I want. It’s useful for software engineers to replicate analog tools in digital form. End-users already understand the concept, and so the new software simply seems to replicate the familiar analog functionality.

But this is not true, all appearances to the side. By enabling you to set up — say the word: to program — as many alarm clocks as you might need, the iPhone’s implementation of the alarm clock idea permits you to shift the way you have always thought about that wretched noise that greets the dawning.

This is an extremely simple example, but a useful one, I think. Software, at a minimum, permits us to do a better job at the things we’ve always done. But if we stretch our minds and use the tool as it can be used, and not simply as we have always used it in the Read more

May 14, 2011

The bad news? The NAR’s #rppsi scam passed, despite overwhelming opposition. The good news? The NAR is now a labor union, complete with forced political speech. Let the Right-to-Work lawsuits begin!

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

The National Association of Realtors’ bloodsuckers’ survival initiative (#rppsi) passed this morning, even though only the bloodsucking Babbitts themselves are in favor if it.

Now the NAR will have even more money to “protect homeownership” with bloodsucking legislation like the Community Reinvestment Act, the Government Sponsored Entities laws, the first-time home-buyer tax credit, etc.

The NAR plans to “protect homeownership” until every last one of us is living in a cardboard box.

That’s a bad thing — bad for the people who voted for it, since crime is always self-destructive. But bad for us, too, since we now have that much more to apologize for.

Here’s the silver lining: The NAR is now arguably a labor union. Membership is forced for most Realtors to gain access to the MLS. And #rppsi is beyond all doubt forced political speech: You will have no control over the $40 a year that is to be extracted from you. If you don’t despise Barney Franks, there’s something wrong with you, but your money will be going to that petulant thug like it or don’t.

If you are lucky enough to live in one of the 22 Right-to-Work states, you may have recourse in the courts. Here are some apposite links from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation:

The NAR has been a vampire latched onto the neck of the American body politic since its founding. It does not exist to “protect homeownership.” Its sole reason for existence is to despoil American consumers to the benefit of real estate brokers: To steal money from the people who earned it, diverting it to a conspiracy of bloodsucking vampires. Today’s vote was the first step in the process of eliminating this pestilence from our lives forever.

May 14, 2011

The Power of Not Knowing… and Other Meaningful Ideas

by

Real Estate Renaissance Man

Author website

Over the past couple of articles from the POPs Program for Agents, the emphasis has been on the first, key step in creating a balanced, successful life as a real estate agent: staying in the present.  The article on Temporal Awareness showed us that the past (guilt) and the future (fear) don’t actually exist.  It also discussed the emotional response we have over words that don’t exist.  And in The Mirror Effect, one of the most powerful concepts for creating true and lasting happiness, we learn that even someone being hurtful, doesn’t exist.  Are you starting to recognize a pattern here?

Nothing Exists!
No, no, that’s not what I’m suggesting.  The pattern is this: We Don’t Know The Meaning… of Anything.  As a matter of fact, I will take it one step further: We Assign Meaning… to Everything.  This is especially prevalent in the Sales and Services professions, where interaction with others is so integral to what we do.  We think we know what we’re seeing; possibly a “hot” new client, for instance:

 

Only to discover later how child-like are their expectations and decisions:

 

Time to Celebrate
At first, this idea that we don’t know the meaning of anything may seem a bit scary, but I suggest to you quite the opposite; this is actually cause for celebration!  Two reasons:

  • Not Knowing the Meaning = Freedom
  • Assigning Meaning = Power

When we admit, especially to ourselves, that we don’t know the meaning of events in our world, we become free to stop labeling those events as “good” and “bad”.  There’s a terrific line in the poem IF, by Rudyard Kipling:

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster,
and treat those two Impostors just the same; 

Realizing we don’t know, means freedom from all kinds of pressure.  The pressure to be disappointed, fearful, regretful and yes, even happy.  Sometimes the greatest pressure we know, is to put a happy face on something labeled “good” when in our hearts, we’re not feeling it at all.

As great as the freedom of not knowing is, it pales in comparison to the power of assigning meaning.  Think about how often this power can affect your life, and how much more success you Read more

May 13, 2011

Senator Rand Paul: The claim of a “right” to health care implies a belief in slavery.

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Say what you will about the Tea Party, it’s a small victory just to have words like these enunciated on the floor of Congress:

This is Ayn Rand from Atlas Shrugged making the same argument:

“I quit when medicine was placed under State control some years ago,” said Dr. Hendricks. “Do you know what it takes to perform a brain operation? Do you know the kind of skill it demands, and the years of passionate, merciless, excruciating devotion that go to acquire that skill? That was what I could not place at the disposal of men whose sole qualification to rule me was their capacity to spout the fraudulent generalities that got them elected to the privilege of enforcing their wishes at the point of a gun. I would not let them dictate the purpose for which my years of study had been spent, or the conditions of my work, or my choice of patients, or the amount of my reward. I observed that in all the discussions that preceded the enslavement of medicine, men discussed everything — except the desires of the doctors. Men considered only the ‘welfare’ of the patients, with no thought for those who were to provide it. That a doctor should have any right, desire or choice in the matter, was regarded as irrelevant selfishness; his is not to choose, they said, but ‘to serve.’ That a man’s willing to work under compulsion is too dangerous a brute to entrust with a job in the stockyards — never occurred to those who proposed to help the sick by making life impossible for the healthy. I have often wondered at the smugness at which people assert their right to enslave me, to control my work, to force my will, to violate my conscience, to stifle my mind — yet what is it they expect to depend on, when they lie on an operating table under my hands? Their moral code has taught them to believe that it is safe to rely on the virtue of their victims. Well, that is the virtue I have withdrawn. Let them discover the Read more

May 12, 2011

Dispatch from the NAR IDX Rule committee Meeting

by

IDX Search Entrepreneur

Author website

I’m sitting in the room @ NAR Mid-Year listening to the IDX Rules Committee trying to get its collective head around the use of IDX data on franchisor web sites, social media, and whether or not price change and days on market can be shown on IDX sites.

Its kinda like watching fleas on a dog debating whether not the dog should go swimming as if they had a say in the matter. Don’t these people ever learn? It was precisely by trying to control listings on the Web that they created an environment that was conducive to the growth of Trulia and Zillow and thus realized what they ostensibly fear — loss of control over the distribution of listings on Web sites and and the creation of an incentive for consumers to look for information they want on third party sites.

The Internet was designed to route around obstacles much bigger than a rules committee — like the nuclear obliteration of a network hub. Take away the ability to use IDX to sling listings to Facebook or the ability of brokers to say how long a listing has been on the market and what the price changes were and another channel will open up to provide that very information. It is the nature of the network.

For the record, the committee decided not to decide anything w/r/t social media, unanimously voted to keep a rule that prevents DOM and price changes from appearing on IDX sites, and — saving the most interesting for last — voted to suspend the rule they adopted last fall that enabled franchisors to use IDX on franchise domains.

Now these recommendations go before the Directors for a vote on Saturday which, as we learned in the “scraping” controversy, does not necessarily mean they will be followed. It will be interesting to see if the Directors decide to listen to their own subject matter “experts” (and I use that term very, very loosely) or choose to carry the franchisors water on their own.

On a side note, it was a lot of fun to sit here and re-read Greg’s recent Read more

May 11, 2011

More thrilling real estate math from the National Association of Realtors: How much did first-time home-buyers benefit from their $8,000 tax-funded subsidy? Can you count to negative $15,000?

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

You read that right. On average, recipients of the $8,000 federal housing subsidy lost $15,000 on the homes they purchased using the subsidy as their incentive.

From SmartMoney.com:

The government’s recent $8,000 cash incentive for first-time home buyers has proved even more costly for recipients than for taxpayers, according to data released Monday. Typical buyers have lost twice as much to price declines as they received from the program.

The median home value fell to about $170,000 in March from $185,000 a year earlier, according to Zillow.com. That means a buyer who closed on a house just before the tax-credit program expired in April 2010 collected $8,000 but has since lost $15,000 in value. Those who bought earlier in the program have done worse; the median price is down $20,000 from March 2009.

This was all completely foreseeable, of course. The only person, seemingly, who cannot grasp simple economics is Barrack Obama, temporarily president of the United States. But don’t get the idea that Obama is done wrecking the housing market just yet. Even now, his minions are pushing for still more sub-prime mortgages to economically-unqualified home-buyers.

As the great Tom Waits said, “I don’t have a drinking problem — except when I can’t get a drink.” America doesn’t have a housing problem. The problem is that, despite the state’s (mis)education monopoly, there are still too many people who can suss out a hustle, if you give them enough time.

May 11, 2011

What’s the long term investment value of owning your own home? Would you believe… nothing?

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Business Insider has the goods.

Yes, I know you can tell me stories about killings made. We’ve done it, too. How are your results lately?

Meanwhile, do you want to have a long talk with all those folks who bought their homes believing in the wealth-producing miracle of the mortgage-interest tax deduction?

Does anyone want to chip in for some wood polish for the NAR’s nose?

May 10, 2011

How does the National Association of Realtors love me? They sent me an evaluation so I could count the ways.

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

I appeared by videoconference at the National Association of Realtors Association Executives convention in March. At the time, I made note of my remarks in a comment to Teri Lussier’s first post on the NAR’s latest anti-consumer money-grab:

I spoke by videoconference to the NAR Association Executives conclave on Monday. I held nothing back, patiently explaining to them that legislation is crime — using force to induce an outcome that would not have occurred without the imposition of force.

I explained that a legislature can do nothing in a free market except harm, and that the American economy is by now essentially a vast mutual-vampirism cult: Each one of is sucking the lifeblood out of his neighbor’s neck, and each one of us is being sucked dry by his next neighbor. Taking a death-grip on the obvious, I patiently explained that this cannot but result in pandemic disaster.

Instead, I said, if the National Association of Realtors were to come to be as zealous about private property rights as the National Rifle Association is about firearms ownership rights, I would be proud to call myself a member.

As you might expect, the reaction was subdued.

Bob Bemis, CEO of ARMLS, intimated to me that there is video of the presentation somewhere, but I have not seen this. But yesterday there came by snail-mail a three-page evaluation of the event.

I think it would be fair to say that I made an impression. I knew going in that I would be telling them exactly what they did not want to hear, so I have to commend the people who made comments for their forbearance of my effrontery.

Here’s my take: What they don’t want to hear is precisely what they need most to hear. It’s not reflected in the evaluation, but a very important idea I took up with them is this one:

What happens if someone comes along and resolves to do real estate brokerage for free?

I’ve pointed out many times that Zillow’s “make me move” feature is brokerage: The introduction of buyer to seller. This is not affected by the real estate regulation machine since the act of Read more

May 10, 2011

Any Chance You’re Holding A Fun-House Mirror?

by

Real Estate Renaissance Man

Author website

So what do you see when you look in the mirror?  No doubt as a real estate agent the way you present yourself is important, but is that all you see?  In a standard mirror, maybe it is.  “Let’s see: short sleeve, button down shirt with yellow plaid design: check.  Power red necktie, wide, hanging half way down my ample belly: check.  Name tag with alphabet soup of certifications, right side up and cleaned of (most of) last night’s pasta sauce: check.  Roger Rocket – real estate superman – reporting for duty.”  But seriously, there are other kinds of mirrors you know…

A Look Back…?
Last week, in my article on Temporal Awareness, I talked a little about how past and present do not actually exist.  I used the example of someone saying something about us behind our backs – the visceral reaction, the anger – only to discover they never said anything!  We cause ourselves stress over things that never exist.  We create realities and emotions over events that never happen.  These responses can, however, be turned into a wonderful tool.  And by “wonderful” I mean a gut-wrenching look at what’s inside of us that we are desperately trying to hide from both the outside world and ourselves.  That kind of wonderful.

The Mirror Effect
The Mirror Effect is a way to recognize what’s happening and take a peek at what’s causing our emotional response.  It also helps us stay in the present.  (Though, truth be told, you have to be present enough to engage The Mirror Effect in the first place.)  Suppose someone said something hurtful to you – an observation – that you knew in your heart to be inaccurate.  For example: “Sean, you were never the athlete you like to think you were.”  Our reaction to that would be pretty subdued; we might even chuckle a little.  Why?  In my example, because I know who I am in that realm; I know what I accomplished and even how I ranked.  I’ve accepted the changes that come with moving past one’s athletic prime, but that does not diminish the truth of my vision.  When we are secure in this regard, comment means little and garners little reaction.

Now, let’s Read more

May 9, 2011

Me and my iPad: Slouching toward a still-more-mobile style of mobile real estate representation.

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

I got an iPad 2 Friday, my spiff for hitting my earnings goal ($1,000 per day, if you’re keeping score at home) in April. The dogs have written a ton about the iPad since its introduction, and my plan is to write a ton more as I get used to this little box.

Here’s my deal: How can I make a grand a day every month? How can I push that up to five grand a day? I’m on the move all the time. And I’m tethered to my desk all the time. And I need a way of reconciling that contradiction.

My MacBook went a long way toward dealing with this problem — and may the lord rain his blessings down upon Ronald MacDonald and all the other providers of free WiFi linkage. But a laptop wants too many resources to be universally useful.

How so? If I’m away from free-WiFi-land, I need to plug in an air card and wait for it to initialize. Not only that, I need a flat surface, and I need to give the laptop itself time for house-keeping. Plus which, I always need to nurse the battery, which makes me reluctant to use it for blue-sky purposes, for fear I’ll be powerless to deal with mission-critical problems later on. Still worse, I have to schlep the damn thing around — which makes it much too easy to leave behind.

The iPad takes away all of those problems:

  • WiFi plus 3G means instant-on internet virtually everywhere.
  • I can actually use it in my lap in my car — without moving to the passenger seat.
  • Ten hours of in-use battery life leaves me at little risk of running out of power — and the two iPhone power cables I already have in my car will both fit the iPad, as well.
  • And the iPad is almost too easy to carry: The size and weight of a magazine.

All that’s great, but it’s not as if the iPad does not introduce complications of its own. I’ll be going through everything in detail as I integrate the new machine into my praxis, but I’ll touch on a Read more

May 9, 2011

Brett Arends from the Wall Street Journal on Zillow’s morning gloom report: “All this bearish news makes me bullish.”

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Our friends at Zillow.com have figured out the secret to getting news coverage: Bad news:

Home values in the United States fell faster in the first quarter of 2011 than they have in any quarter since 2008, when the housing market experienced its worst performance, according to Zillow’s first quarter Real Estate Market Reports(1). The Zillow Home Value Index(2) fell 3 percent from the fourth quarter of 2010 to the first quarter of 2011, and declined 8.2 percent year-over-year to $169,600. Home values have fallen 29.5 percent since they peaked in June 2006.

Negative equity reached a new high mark with 28.4 percent of single-family homeowners with mortgages underwater at the end of the first quarter, up from 27 percent in the fourth quarter of 2010. A homeowner is in negative equity when they owe more on their mortgage than their home is worth.

Meanwhile, foreclosures(3) rose throughout the first quarter as banks unfroze moratoriums and allowed foreclosures to resume. Foreclosures had fallen in late 2010 due to the slew of moratoriums brought about by the “robo-signing” controversy. In March, one out of every 1,000 homes in the country was lost to foreclosure.

With substantial home value declines, as well as increasing negative equity and foreclosures, Zillow forecasts show it is unlikely that home values will reach a bottom in 2011. First quarter data has prompted Zillow to revise its forecast, now predicting a bottom in 2012, at the earliest.

“Home value declines are currently equal to those we experienced during the darkest days of the housing recession. With accelerating declines during the first quarter, it is unreasonable to expect home values to return to stability by the end of 2011,” said Zillow Chief Economist Dr. Stan Humphries. “We did expect substantial payback from the homebuyer tax credits, which buoyed the housing market last year, but underlying demand post-tax credit, as well as rising foreclosures and high negative equity rates, make it almost certain that we won’t see a bottom in home values until 2012 or later.”

My own take is that we are at or near the knee in the curve: While supplies of fire-sale-priced homes Read more

May 6, 2011

Which home is the right one for you? Coldwell Banker says it’s the property for which Coldwell Banker will get paid double.

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Is this home the right one for you and your family?

No, sorry. That’s an exclusive listing. Your trusty, ever-faithful Coldwell Banker broker won’t get paid if you buy that house.

So is this the perfect home for you?

Oh, no! This home has serious systemic defects, the worst of which is… it’s a fizzbo… Not only will there be no doughnuts at the closing table, your trusty, ever-faithful Coldwell Banker broker won’t get paid if you buy that house.

But this — this is the ideal home for you and your family:

Why? Because your trusty, ever-faithful Coldwell Banker broker will not only get paid, she’ll get paid double, once for suckering the seller into listing with Coldwell Banker and once more for suckering you into a dual agency.

Here’s the full clip:

When you say “yeah” you are conceding my argument. When you say “but” you are contradicting yourself. If this commercial is not a sleazy hustle, what is it?

May 5, 2011

Has anyone else noticed…?

by

IDX Search Entrepreneur

Author website

…a certain theme in Century 21’s latest attempt to make consumers care about a real estate brand?

Considering that the average age of a real estate agent is like 73, the women in these ads should look like this:

Blanche is even wearing a gold jacket!

Memo to Bev Thorne, CMO of C21: If you are going to cougar route, go full cougar. Why beat around the bush? :

May 5, 2011

Repeal The PATRIOT Act. Bin-Laden’s Dead.

by

Commercial Real Estate Finance Expert
Structured Debt and Equity
Licensed Real Estate Broker in AL, CA, and FL

Author website

STARDATE:  22 February 2002

Borrower:  Why do you need my driver’s license to secure me a mortgage?

Brady:  I’m required to by the new law, the USA P.A.T.R.I.O.T. Act.  We mortgage originators have been enlisted in the GWOT, as the first line of defense.  I’m proud to do my part to help protect America and hunt down Osama bin-Laden.

Borrower:  That’s jacked up.  Did you know the PATRIOT Act also allows the FBI to execute it’s own warrants, tap your phone, read your email, intercept your written correspondence, and instruct your banks to not inform you that they are spying on you?

Brady:  You don’t have to be an agitator. I’m just doing my part.  In fact, the President said it not only is it our duty to protect the Homeland against marauding borrowers, he wants us to lend you more money… to get the economy moving, you see.

Borrower:  So..I can borrow ABOVE the value of my home?

Brady:  Absolutely.  It’s your patriotic duty.

Borrower:  Heil, baby.  Where do I sign up?

Geronimo is down.  Repeal the PATRIOT Act.  I know that freedom ain’t free but I now know tyranny can come disguised as tuxedo-clad theater goers.

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