As a student of philosophy I often found value in considering the extremes of an issue before trying to understand the balance. An article published this week in The New York Times gave an extreme example of an International real estate market that provides valuable consideration of where we are today in our real estate market. In Havana, Cuba, 100% of the real property is owned by the socialist state.  Hence, in theory, there is no real estate economic market, right?  Seriously, if you need a house, the government provides you one.  Simple. Add the human element and then what [...]

ClarisResources.com - Valuable tools for providing real estate market logic to consumers During the California Association of REALTORS meetings this week, Real Estate Business Services, Inc. (REBS) announced a partnership with Terradatum to offer two terrific new services for agents to help them better serve the information needs of their clients. “Consumers are exposed to constant housing market chatter, and these tools provide meaningful information, specific and relevant to the consumer’s situation,” said REBS Chairman of the Board Gary Thomas. “Clarus REsourceTM enhances the position of REALTORS® as trusted, skilled advisors by providing them with tools to easily interpret raw [...]

One Simple Method for Improving MLS Listing Data Accuracy For many MLSs around the country, missing photos consistently rank as one of the most prevalent problems with MLS listings. Not only does it create the potential for a subscriber to receive a fine, it significantly limits the ability to market a property. Now that digital cameras are included in just about every cell phone and digital cameras cost as little as $29.95, it does seem like the time has come for all MLSs to require a photo before the listing can go live. In a soon to be released study [...]

Smartphones in Real Estate Off The Charts Smartphones are becoming extremely popular, especially now that AT&T, the largest mobile phone service provider in the United States is heavily promoting $99 smartphones.  Growth of the smartphone market is being driven by adoption of BlackBerry and other brands, but NOT by phones with the Palm operating system. The market is projected to have 30% compounded annual growth for the next five years. According to In-Stat, a leading technology company identified the following: All Smartphone OSs (other than the Palm OS) will grow at double digits over the next five years. A smartphone [...]

One of my favorite jokes goes something like this. What happens when you play a country music song backwards? Your wife moves back in, your dog is revived, you get a new truck.. I had a very interesting conversation last night with Bill French, one of the brightest minds in the world of Blogging.  We discussed what happens when someone turns off a blog that they have had for a year or two with weekly posting. His answer was shocking One customer who recently truned off thier blog and replaced it with nothing removed 93% of the content from thier [...]

Lather, Rinse, Repeat - the secret to clean hair and real estate success I attended the Inman Connect conference in New York last week. I attended several of the sessions and spoke on a panel about productivity tools. Throughout the couple of days, I got the distinct impression that many of the agents were there to get "the secret" about how to survive and thrive in a down market.  In my session on productivity tools, for example, I was asked the question, "What are the three tools that you would recommend to help me grow my business?" While there were [...]