BloodhoundBlog

[This is the introductory text to an eBook I have prepared discussing the idea of divorcing the real estate commissions, a topic I have discussed here at some length. You can find the eBook by clicking here. If you like, you can post a button linking to this book -- there is code at the end of this post. But my primary motive for putting this together is to appeal to the various consumer-facing personal finance weblogs. I don't foresee any meaningful reform in the real estate industry originating from the inside, so I am doing what I can to arm consumers against the pernicious evil that is the National Association of Realtors. --GSS]

 
Introduction

Here are three interesting real estate questions, two that came to me directly and one that was commended to me by Rudy Bachraty of Trulia.com.

Question #1: “Potential buyers for our home ($800K - California) have a realtor but he did not find our home for them. The buyers did and have visited both times without him. He has played no role whatever in bringing us these buyers. If we accept their offer why on earth should we give him 3% ($24K) of our home’s equity for contributing nothing whatsoever?”

Question #2: “When looking at homes on our own and calling the listing agents ourselves to set up appointments, does that obligate us to go with the listing agent if we decide to place an offer on the property?”

Question #3: “Since the amount of work involved doesn’t really differ according to the value of the house, financially, it seems like the percentage commission would make higher prices more favorable from a buyer’s agent’s perspective. If this is the case, why would the buyer’s agent be motivated to help negotiate the price down?”

Now, there are nice, long, complicated answers for each of those questions, and nice, long, complicated answers are the very essence of a certain type of salesmanship. It’s called Tap-Dancing, and it works — at least if you’re easily confused. But here are much shorter, much more truthful answers to those three questions:

Answer #1: If you want to hang onto the buyers, you’re probably stuck paying the do-nothing agent. Grin and bear it.

Answer #2: You are not obliged to have the listing agent represent you, but he will almost certainly not agree either to compensate a buyer’s agent for you, nor to waive the buyer’s agent’s commission.

Answer #3: Ethical buyer’s agents and whores-with-hearts-of-gold do exist, but paying a buyer’s agent a percentage of the sales price is a misalignment of incentives: The buyers would rather pay less, but the buyers’ agent earns more when the buyers pay more.

Even better, here is a very short answer to all three of these dilemmas, plus dozens of others: Divorce the commissions.

Each one of these problems is caused by the insane way we compensate buyer’s agents in the residential real estate market. From the beginnings of real estate brokerage, sellers have set the amount of compensation for the listing agent, and the listing agent has set the amount of compensation for the buyer’s agent. The buyer’s agent’s incentives are misaligned with the buyer’s interests because the seller, historically, was paying the buyer’s agent to get top dollar for the seller — a complete betrayal of the buyer.

Things are still done this way because nobody ever thought to change them, but the entire Rube Goldberg contraption is absurd: Sellers pay the listing agent to pay the buyer’s agent to betray the seller’s interest. Buyers believe they are getting real estate representation “for free,” when in fact “their” agent is being paid by the seller and the listing agent in the hope that the buyer’s agent will betray the buyer — often with secret bonus payments to the buyer’s agent to sweeten the pot. All of this is a massive conspiracy devised by real estate brokers to enrich themselves by defrauding consumers.

Over the course of the last two or three years, we’ve had a wonderful information explosion in the real estate industry. Venture capital-funded internet start-ups — I call them Realty.bots — have sprung up, providing scads of information to consumers — information that was previously more difficult to obtain. But the owners of the Realty.bots are much like consumers themselves: They understand real estate at the surface level of transactions, but they really don’t know very much about what’s going on at the level of real estate brokerage.

This is not a criticism. No one understands sex like a gynecologist, but when an OB/GYN’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love, you might wince and change the subject. So while a great deal of previously undisclosed information is suddenly being shared with consumers, the most important issues in residential real estate representation are still concealed.

What are these issues? The real estate licensing laws do not exist to provide you with consumer protection. They exist to “protect” you from cheaper competition. The IRS “safe harbor” income-reporting exclusion for real estate brokers virtually assures that 90% or more of all new agents will fail within their first two years in business — but not before they’ve had the chance to wreck the financial lives of innocent consumers with their “state-licensed” inexperience and ineptitude.

There’s more, but by far the most significant “secret” issue in residential real estate is the way that buyer’s agents are compensated. The current system virtually assures the betrayal of both the buyer’s and the seller’s interests, with this fate being avoided only by accident. Moreover, it occasions as a secondary consequence the citadel of secrets and lies known as the MLS system.

The residential real estate industry is not a true business in its present form. By means of legislative fiat and its own internal structures built on secrecy and deceit, it is a cartel — a vast conspiracy against the consumer. But of all the reforms I could name to correct this atrocious situation, the one that would make the most immediate, most consequential difference would be to divorce the real estate commissions — to restructure the way we account for funds at the closing table so that the seller pays only the listing agent and the buyer pays only the buyer’s agent.

How hard would it be to effect this change? It could happen just like that — just by a change of policy by loan underwriters.

How likely is this to happen? Hide and watch.

But this is a vitally important consumer issue. There are a few Realtors who understand why this is so important, even if it might result in our earning less per transaction. There are similarly enlightened lenders and title reps. But for the most part, the entire real estate industry is opposed to this idea — and they’re way ahead of consumers because they know the issue exists, and most consumers do not.

That’s why I’ve put this little e-book together. It’s based on a series of weblog posts I wrote in November of 2007. I’ve updated them here and there, but the main argument stands — and, to my knowledge, no one has been able to dispute it in even the smallest way. There is simply no way to argue that the present system of compensating Realtors is in the best interests of consumers. It serves — and is designed to serve — the real estate brokers and their agents at the expense of the interests of consumers.

What can be done? The best recent hope for divorcing the commissions was the Department of Justice/Federal Trade Commission lawsuit against the National Association of Realtors. Alas, that ended in an essentially-meaningless whitewash settlement. It seems plausible to me that, in due course, a judge in a real estate lawsuit will take notice that buyer’s agency as it is currently practiced is in fact simply sub-agency — every agent works for the seller — in camouflage. And there’s always a chance that both the NAR and the Mafia will wake up one day and forswear their criminal ways forevermore.

But don’t hold your breath.

What we can do for now is arm ourselves with information. The sad fact is that most consumers don’t even know this issue exists, and they blithely grope their way through real estate transactions, convinced to the core that their agents really are acting in their best interests. The good news is, this is often true. The bad news is, the commission structure we have right now rewards and sanctifies the persistent betrayal of Realtors’ fiduciary duties to their clients.

So even though we may not be able to change anything right now, on our own, nothing will ever change until consumers learn that they must look out for their own interests in their real estate transactions.

So this is a matter of “consciousness raising.” If buyers and sellers understand how their agents are compensated, they can at least negotiate payment terms that aligns their agents’ interests with their own. Simply raising the issue could provide important clues about the honesty and trustworthiness of particular agents.

If you would like to help pass this word along, you can use one of the buttons shown below to link back to this eBook. The more people who know about this issue, the greater our chances of achieving reform. To deploy one of these buttons, just copy the code you see below the button and paste it into the sidebar of your website or weblog.

Large button — 200 pixels

<p align="center"><a
href="http://www.bloodhoundrealty.com/DivorcedCommissions.pdf"
target="_blank"><img border="0"
src="http://www.bloodhoundrealty.com/DivorcedLg.png"></a></p>

Medium button — 150 pixels

<p align="center"><a
href="http://www.bloodhoundrealty.com/DivorcedCommissions.pdf"
target="_blank"><img border="0"
src="http://www.bloodhoundrealty.com/DivorcedMd.png"></a></p>

Small button — 125 pixels

<p align="center"><a
href="http://www.bloodhoundrealty.com/DivorcedCommissions.pdf"
target="_blank"><img border="0"
src="http://www.bloodhoundrealty.com/DivorcedSm.png"></a></p>

If you walked into court to defend yourself in a lawsuit, only to discover that “your” attorney was being compensated by your opponent in the dispute, you just might be able to smell a rat. As you will learn in this small book, residential real estate is a rat’s nest. With your help — and your completely justified outrage — we just might be able to clean it up.

Technorati Tags: compensation for buyer representation, real estate, real estate marketing

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

Dearly Beloved:

We gather here to commemorate the dearly departed who’s passing we mourn today. I’d like us to take a few moments to dwell on the lives that were lived, the good that was done, and the ways we can learn from their excesses.

Fannie lived a good long life. She came to this earth during the Depression and spent many many years doing good and helping many many people live the American Dream and buy a house of their own and benefit from long term fixed and affordable mortgages.

Later in life, Fannie’s younger brother came on the scene. Freddie, beset with a case of sibling rivalry, attempted to outdo his older sister. First Freddie attempted to do the same thing that Fannie did and all was well. Competition was good, it kept the siblings honest and many people benefited.

But as Fannie grew older, she began to resent her younger sibling. He was younger, less experienced, but kept up with his older sibling quite well. As the sibling rivalry grew, more risks were taken. In their attempts to outdo each other, greed and corruption took over. Risks were taken and increasingly risky behavior was considered acceptable.

Over the years, the markets responded very well to Fannie and Freddie’s increasingly competitive and risky behaviors. More and more people were able to live the American Dream until the American Dream became too expensive. Suddenly, the risky behaviors that Fannie and Freddie were engaging in weren’t paying off quite as well.

Initially, Fannie and Freddie seemed fine, but later it was determined that the risky behaviors had caused significant internal damage. Many efforts were made to revive them and bring them back to full health. The medical bills have been staggering and the efforts were heroic. But, alas, it was too late.

Rest in peace, dear brother and sister. Know that you’ve done well and helped many over the years. Know that the lessons that we’ve all learned from you will echo throughout the years: Know your limits, be responsible, don’t let greed run rampant.

In Memory of our Dearly Departed, I ask that you join me in singing the great old hymn, “He Has Never Failed Me Yet…..”

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

This is my column for this week from the Arizona Republic (permanent link).

 
August was a great month for real estate sales, but when 40% of buyers are pushed off the playing field, home prices could plummet

We won’t have reliable numbers for a few days,* but preliminary results leave no doubt that August was a huge month for real estate sales in the Valley of the Sun. Not for prices, alas, which continued to slide by around 1.5% last month. But, of the bread-and-butter suburban tract homes we track, around 200 will have sold, a two-year high.

September promises to be a banner month also, with nearly 280 homes currently under contract. Not all of those homes will make it through the escrow process, but most of them will.

What accounts for all this activity? The single greatest factor is seller-paid down-payment assistance programs like AmeriDream and Nehemiah. An FHA loan requires a 3% down-payment, and these grant programs permit the seller to fund the grant, along with up to 3% more for closing costs. The upshot is that buyers can take possession of the home for “nothing down.”

In recent months, down-payment assistance programs have accounted for as much as 40% of sales of resale homes, and as much as 90% of new-build sales.

Here’s the catch: Under the mortgage relief act recently signed into law, seller-paid down-payment assistance will be forbidden. The restriction takes effect on October 1st, but most lenders have already closed the window on new AmeriDream and Nehemiah loans.

It’s possible these programs will be reinstated by future legislation, but, even if they are not, it’s not the end of the world. It’s no great challenge to find a decent starter home for $100,000. And if buyers cannot manage to save up $3,000 for a down-payment ($3,500 after October 1st), acquiring a huge new debt may not be the best solution to their financial problems.

But the short-run prognosis seems pretty obvious: When 40% of resale buyers are forced onto the sidelines, the downward pressure on prices should accelerate.

The bottom line: If you’re prepared to buy a house in the Phoenix area, either as your residence or as an investment, prices could be very attractive.

 
*Final results for August 2008 are reported in the BloodhoundRealty.com Market Basket of Homes.

Technorati Tags: arizona, arizona real estate, investment, phoenix, phoenix real estate, real estate, real estate marketing

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

If any of you have enjoyed the “give and take” between Sean and I about the Fannie Freddie death watch, it appears, based on reports in the Wall Street Journal and others that the bailout is happening this weekend.   What shape is it taking?   Lots of rumors, very few facts.

Here’s what I feel safe saying I know for now:

1. If you own common shares in Fannie or Freddie, you can probably use them for wallpaper.

2. If you own “debt” from Fannie or Freddie, you’ll be fine.

3. I’m still going to be writing mortgages next week.   The purpose of the bailout is to make sure the housing market stays moving and doesn’t precipitate a total financial collapse.

If I know more, I’ll write more later.

Tom Vanderwell

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

There is so much pop-demographic-driven hype about Gen X, Gen Y and the “Millennials” (I saw that movie…cartoon family in red suits, right?) in the RE Blogosphere that it has become a bit of a cliché.

It makes sense: The industry is dominated by Boomers, and if you are a self-proclaimed RE Guru, there is no better way to scare a Boomer into downloading your eBook than to suggest that they are no longer “hip”, that the next generation is smarter about technology than they are, and that the alignment of these two trends threatens their very way of life.

Sort of like how their parents felt about the Beatles.

Then something comes along that syncs up with the hype, and it reminds me that there really is some substance behind the idea that generational demographics are at work, and that it matters.

On the Property Detail pages of our RE Search Engine, we encourage people to ask our agent a question. We have cleverly named this feature “Ask Our Agent” (AOA).  This recent question is my new favorite:

“Straight up: Does this neighborhood suck? Don’t lie, I will be there soon, and if you do, I’ll know.

You can tell me if it sucks without saying, “Hey Jay, It sucks out there.”  Be smart.

P.S. Don’t lie.”

This question reveals so much in so few words:

• Homebuyers really are getting younger.
• Younger Homebuyers approach home buying on the Web in the same “straight up” fashion they approach other interactions on the Web.
• Younger Homebuyers assume RE agents will lie to them.
• Younger Homebuyers assume RE agents are idiots. This one actually instructs the agent on how not to lie and admonishes the agent to “Be Smart”.

The property in question is a $105k, 3 Bdrm row house in Bridgeport, CT , so it is within reach of a younger buyer. The listing is not our client’s, so all we have on it is what came out of IDX - the base facts and the one picture (complete with garden hose and trash cans) that shows a house that looks to be in reasonably good shape, but tells us nothing else, including the name of the neighborhood let alone whether or not it sucks.

This is where the rubber meets the road for this industry right now: The Gen X and Gen Y buyers don’t have a lot of faith in us to start with, but they will engage, anyway. In this case because the agent who posted this listing has done such a poor job (confirming their suspicions about all RE Agents), that he didn’t have much choice.

How we respond to the Jays out there, when they grudgingly reach out,  will determine whether they work with us or work around us. Jay wants somebody to give him the straight up truth about this ‘hood, and he knows he isn’t going to get it on TruliaVoices. He is looking for an honest response, what the authors of The Cluetrain Manifesto called “the Human Voice”:

The real thing. We have knowledge of what we do and how we do it — our craft — and it drives our voices…

The Cluetrain also points out that we are pretty good at recognizing a true Voice, and I submit that Jay probably doesn’t care much about your Blog, because, while its your words, its not your Voice, and its not specific enough. A Bridgeport Real Estate agent could Blog all day long about what a beautiful town Bridgeport is, how it has lots of parks and a great zoo, but that’s not what Jay wants to know.

Jay wants to know two things: Is anyone selling crack next door to this place he is interested in,  and can he trust you to tell him, straight up (as in email me back and let me know), without you trying to get his pre-qualification letter first?

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

“I wonder who was your intended audience?”

A question from my inbox, and one I hear occasionally. I’m always pulled up short by questions like this, or this, because they tend to come unexpectedly and in this case, it greeted me first thing in the morning, and the writer, who shall remain nameless but knows who he is (and is, I’m sure, laughing right now) was by his own admission, a bit grumpy when he asked this question. So Good Morning to you too!

Actually, this question, or variations of it, has been on my mind lately because I forgot this intended audience for awhile, and the post to which this writer was referring was my way of going back to the beginning of my blogging days, when I was writing to the very same people to whom I wrote this post- local bloggers. How did I lose my way? Quite honestly, I think it was Twitter, but that’s another story for another time. Let’s return to my blogging roots.

Possibly the first piece of advice Greg gave me when I started blogging on The Brick Ranch was to find other local blogs and connect with them. Notice he didn’t say other real estate blogs, but local blogs. A Google search, and Google alerts, turned up only a handful of blogs back then- March 2007. Seriously, I think there were about five non-political blogs, and most had only been at it for a few months, which is a cool thing as I’ll explain shortly. At first I simply left comments on their blogs without a return blog url, because I wanted to be there as a participant, not as a spamming Realtor- there is an implied accusation when visiting local blogs, am I really there to sell them a house? Um, no. I’m really there because I like talking with people, throwing ideas back and forth, and I know that most bloggers like comments, so leaving a thoughtful comment, using my name, not “TimbuktuHomesForYou” in that tiny little blogiverse where everything was shiny and new, was an easy way to say “Hello! Nice to meet you.” It was about the conversation, not the conversion. Greg talked about this so eloquently here. David Gibbons and Jeff Brown talked about this at Bloodhound Unchained.

Warning: This is not the Get Rich Quick way of Blogging for Dollars. This is the slow and thoughtful way of connecting, networking, communicating. It doesn’t get you to the top of Google in 30 days, but it does get you as close to belly-to-belly as you can get online. It means you have to pay attention, think, share, discuss. It also means that we may not have anything in common, so I’m going to have to work to find a common ground. It means that I will find something interesting in your posts, and share it on my blog. In other words, it takes time to build relationships locally, which may not be the case with the echo chamber.

The echo chamber: I’m okay, you’re okay; I’m a Realtor, you’re a Realtor. Ah. A shared experience, a common ground. I may not have to pay too much attention because we have real estate in common. Unlike those local folks who may not want to talk to me at all because I’m a Realtor. You and I can fall into conversation faster, with more ease, talk shop- and it’s all good. Except it isn’t really. Ultimately it’s distracting to someone like me- focus, Lussier!

So I’m focused and on this particular day, my post it isn’t for the echo chamber to understand, or the out-of-town buyer, or the home seller. That particular post is a conversation with local bloggers. If you, my dear RE.net buddy, like my post, that’s nice, but it is ultimately unimportant to me- nothing personal.

The problem with all this is that we get warm fuzzies quickly from the echo chamber, but not so much, if at all, from the local blogiverse- it’s a tough crowd- why bother? If you can get to the top of Google quickly, get lots o’ leads without the time invested locally, get your ego stroked at the same time (who doesn’t like strokes?) then why go to all that trouble? Because the local folks with whom you’ve developed this relationship with, know folks who know folks, and while I’m only beginning to see some ROI for that particular audience, when the clients who are connected with local bloggers ask me for more business cards, that’s some mighty powerful ROI.

And I’ll take that any day of the week and twice on Sundays.

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

Has SellsiusRealEstate.com (”Just like Craigslist, only not free!”) hit the Dead Pool? The weblog rages on, but the main site doesn’t even 404. The “About” page for the weblog has been re-rendered as yet another those-who-can’t-teach pitch, and, of course, Sellsius was a pioneer in the suddenly-popular practice of making net.friends in order to sell them out to advertisers. Perhaps these business models are enough to keep the wolves at bay. Sic transit gloria mundi.

But despair not. Even today, there is something new under the sun. RealtyBaron.com is introducing an idea it calls “risk management for Realtors.” What it is is a hedging strategy — akin to an insurance bet in Blackjack — whereby listing agents pay a premium to insure that listings are profitable whether or not they sell.

Worth a thousand words:

Oh, wait. That is a thousand words.
 
This is not quite stoopid, although it shares some genes with stoopid. It’s a Realtor-milking scheme, beyond all doubt. It’s not quite as scurvy as some scams, but it does amount to you betting on your own failure, hardly the food of a good attitude.

I don’t completely hate the idea. But, assuming it takes off in sufficient numbers to matter, it seems to be misaligned to rational market incentives.

As I’ve discussed in the past, we charge a non-refundable retainer to sellers for similar reasons, to cover our front-loaded costs if the rug is pulled out from under us. But the primary reason for the retainer is to impose a meaningful cost on the seller for pulling the rug out from under us. We want for our sellers to have some skin in the game, to make cancellation an unattractive prospect — and to make sure they’re completely committed before we start working. The hedge bet does nothing to assure the commitment of the seller.

Moreover, as above, the entire plan is built around a bet on failure. If you as the lister know your ass is covered both ways, are you as likely to do the whatever-it-takes to get your listing sold? And if you are not, what direction should you expect the hedging premiums to take going forward?

Not my problem. During the beta period, RealtyBaron plans to play its hedging game with play money — which is itself probably a poor idea, since people take risks with play money they would never take with the true gelt. But as a bonus, if you play along in the beta, any “BaronBucks” you earn will convert to ownership in the company at the end of the beta. That’s a fun idea just by itself.

It’s not for me, but at least it’s something different.

Technorati Tags: real estate, real estate marketing

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

I was inspired to republish this post, which was first seen here almost 18 months ago, after reading the answer my son gave to a Brown & Brown client yesterday via email. I’ve spent four years mentoring him within an inch of his life. Pride bubbled up from nowhere as I read his response. At 27 he’s already where I was at 40. (I just turned 57.)

His journey to full ‘agentship’ is another post altogether.

Not being a hi-tech guy by even the most lenient definition, I try to bring to the fore, skills required to actually list or sell real estate. Until GeekWorld figures out how to interact with prospects and clients belly to belly, cats will continue to be skinned in every conceivable way — except hi-tech. Even Hal hasn’t figured that one out.

The ability, the art if the truth is told, to answer questions is almost always the difference between consistent success, and consistently being just ‘this close’. You’re reading that and know exactly what I’m talkin’ about.

It’s shameful the way I used to answer questions from prospects or clients. The excuse of age is available, as I was only about 25 or so. But even youth, or having just transitioned from homes to investments doesn’t wash as an excuse for my pitiful performance back then. It’s truly a blessing there were no hidden cameras or recorders in the office back then.

Clients would ask me if the rents in the area would tend to rise during the holding period. And I’d answer yes. The problem? Most folks asking questions want the answer, of course. But what they really want is the ‘why’ or ‘how’ behind your answer. Back then it irritated me no end that they wouldn’t just accept my answer as if I was quoting from the missing third tablet Moses forgot on the mountain. I knew the answer. Why couldn’t they just take my word for it? What a moron I was. I could have been more full of myself back then, I’m just not sure how.

That’s about the time I was blessed by the teachings and example of Chuck Chatham. As far as I’m concerned Mr. Chatham was absolutely the best teacher and practitioner of real estate counseling. As the title of his seminar promised, The Art of Real Estate Counseling, (also the title of his book) he was indeed a master, a true artist. One the subjects near and dear to his heart was how we, as professionals, dealt with questions from our clients, or those pondering becoming a client. He was especially sensitive to young upstarts like me and a few others in his seminar one day.

You first have to imagine a smallish older guy with what appears to be several centuries of experience. He literally oozed authority. I remember his face as having an eagle’s beak nose, and a patrician like stare, that when focused on you, was both chilling and assuring at the same time.

Figure that one out.

Anyway, he’d been talking with some of us whipper-snappers during breaks, and was not happy at either our attitude or demeanor. Don’t get me wrong, all of us had immeasurable respect for him. Heck, he was just about deity to most of us in the seminar. But he was concerned about the high opinion we held for our own skills and knowledge — which he felt was humorously over estimated.

Go figure.

His remedy was to teach by example. He took one of the students who was about to start looking for his first investment property, and asked him to participate in an impromptu role play. Mr. Chatham would be the professional and the student the prospect. The prospect began asking questions. And that’s when I begin to feel as if I knew zip, nada, nothin’ about how to really answer questions in a way that actually helped the person across the desk or on the phone. (add email to that today)
It was awesome. It was like watching the Mona Lisa being painted by da Vinci himself — in real time.

Here’s what I learned that day.

If possible, give the short answer at first.

Follow that up with an explanation for that answer.

Ensure that explanation is pure substance, with no guessing on your part.

Give an example if possible, illustrating your explanation.

Allow for chronological context if appropriate.

Finally, ask them if your answer was sufficient.

You’ll be surprised how many times that last one generates very solid follow-up questions. When this happens it’s often an indicator they now have more confidence in your expertise and real world knowledge and experience.

Why?

Because in the end, you can’t fake solid substantive answers to real questions. Especially when they’re from folks who are asking those questions in part to ascertain whether you actually know more than they do.

Short dismissive answers given with a false tone of authority just won’t cut it — not in the long run. You must in fact know what you’re talking about. Quick, somebody write that Black Pearl down.

When we as pros answer questions, we must give answers so complete, forthcoming, and informative that the questioner is somewhat taken aback — positively. If you begin putting this into practice you’ll never go back to the short, dismissive, “you’re questions are a pain in the rear end” answers.

Why?

The change in the way they look at you. You gave them a real answer with an impeccable explanation, and instead of getting served instant pudding, you gave them filet mignon. Talk about separating yourself from the crowd.

Of course, this requires that you actually know the answers. That’s always the challenge, isn’t it?

Here’s something I left out from that original post. When you’ve built of your ‘account’ with excellent answers, the occasional ‘I don’t know’ tends to add to your credibility. However, this only occurs when the client or prospect has already decided you indeed know what the hell you’re talkin’ about.

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

Chrome: Yawn. Firefox, OTOH, is coming along nicely. I now run it side-by-side with Safari on my Mac. Safari is still my fave, but I don’t rail at Firefox like I used to.

The user interface of the iPhone is actually a hugely subversive paradigm shift in computer design: Tapping, multi-touch, micro- and macro-spatial awareness — these are all new things under the sun. Cathleen has been hearing interesting rumors about this UI being the basis for a MacTablet computer. And Apple has an event scheduled for next week…

I mentioned a week or two ago that I’m having Cameron build a session-tracker for our web sites. What he’s working on will live at the top HTML level of our server, so that, if necessary, he can track activity from the same one IP address across multiple domains. In other words, if someone follows a link from here to BloodhoundRealty.com, then from there to one of our single-property web sites, we should be able to see every movement.

I find myself wanting something like Jott without the limitations. When I’m previewing a house, I’d like to be able to dictate my impressions on the spot. I’d also like to be able to dictate emails, weblog posts and miscellaneous memoranda. Is there anything out there like that, ideally phone-based like Jott?

Technorati Tags: real estate, real estate marketing, technology

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

The Pledge of Allegiance

Alright now - simmer down - relax - this is not a political post.

With the advent of a new school year here, I couldn’t help but be reminded of days gone by - in the classroom - Ms. Sukula, my second grade teacher - with Bewitched hair - stood proudly at the front of the classroom, hand over her left breast - slowly reciting the Pledge of Allegiance.   She told us to stand like soldiers - hand over our chests with pride - you’re an American!

Now if you didn’t recite it along with her - her eyes would focus on you with the deep intent of causing bodily harm - lips firmly and taughtly pulled back to bare her brilliant white teeth - still slowly reciting the words - almost melodically.

It was definitely not a smile -  believe me - her message did not lack clarity.

Ahh - memories …

Now - surprisingly, this draws parallels in my current day-to-day life as a real estate agent deeply embroiled in the pursuit of sorting out of all the new technology solutions in the Real Estate 2.0 cyber space.  You’ll notice from my last post - this is a taking some time.

Greg has shared with us the cool new Trulia app for the iPhone here on Bloodhound.  I recently saw on Twitter that Trulia has already surpassed over 10,000 downloads - this new functionality not only is cool, it clearly has legs.

But why am I not running to Trulia?

I am a member - I participate on TruliaVoices.  I’ve claimed all of my listings and have subscribed to Trulia Pro - but their latest feature has me frustrated - blogging.  While it is a great feature, I can’t help but ask myself, why do I want to put all of my eggs in the Trulia basket?

I have spent the last several idle months re-alphabetizing my CD collection, sorting through my closets and more importantly, really being focused on learning the new Web 2.0 tools and building my online presence.  I’ve invested in my own domain for my blog and have tried to make a concerted effort at creating, what I hope to be, valuable content.

Now - if I want to exploit the blogging features on Trulia - I have to start all over again.  Why?  The same is essentially true of ActiveRain.  While AR does allow me to point my domain to my AR blog, I can’t do the reverse.  HomeGain?  PropertyQube allows me to syndicate my content - and while they may not have the same level of traffic, I believe the key is I am able to control my content.

I get the fact that there are a number of new users and a great deal of agents who are just embarking on a Web 2.0 presence - these sites are providing a great suite of tools.  My problem is this - my future clients are all over the web.  They are looking at every site possible.  They have not established a defacto standard for RE Web 2.0 information - why should I be limited?

From my perspective, I don’t want to put my brand and content in the hands of the technology players - particularly when there will be some rationalization of the solutions at some point.

I want the technology solutions to help me leverage my content - truly be a portal to more than just data, but valuable content - which ultimately I control and source.  Help me best position myself as a valued resource to my potential client.

You know - looking back, I realize that it has been decades since I last recited the Pledge of Allegiance.  I think times have changed, however.  Therefore, I suggest a new version - here’ it is:

I pledge allegiance to the RE 2.0 solutions of the World Wide Web and to the consumers and real estate professionals for which they stand, one community under God, indivisible, with openness and syndication for all.

Ok - so it was alittle political - sorry for the biblical reference - but come on, it’s an election year - I gotta play to the base.

So - you NRA card carrying members - just shoot me.

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

I was installing a new Genie garage door opener one Friday evening on my very first house back in 1980-whatever. Basking in ‘pride of ownership’ and eager to….

Pause.

Deep breath.

Now, let’s be honest Mr Petro… (inner voice)

Okay. Let me begin again:

I was spending an entire weekend trying to replace an old Genie motor with a new one I had purchased, on a dump I never should have bought in the first place, with just a screwdriver, a hammer and some vice-grips; the Holy Trinity for those of us born without the dominant handyman gene. This was back in a time before Fixer-Upper actually meant Tear-Down but I was a young insurance salesman born with the recessive sucker gene so what did I know? Rookie sales guys are the biggest suckers. Everybody knows this. My Realtor certainly did.

And to this day I’m still not sure if she was actually my Realtor. She shanghaied me from her Open House I’d happened upon one Sunday, hustled me into the back of her 2-door Caddy (the passenger side front seat was stacked with MLS binders the size of phone books, briefcases, and boxes of direct mail envelopes. Piles of loose, legal length paperwork and blue carbon sheets rose from the floorboard to the glove box) and shot me over to another, much cheaper Cape Cod on the northeast side of Baltimore, blowing cigarette smoke in my face the rest of the afternoon and staring me down in silence until I signed the paperwork in her office and wrote an initial earnest money check to her brokerage firm. I was nowhere near my car or I would have run like Updike’s Rabbit but like I said earlier, I was shanghaied.

Truth is, had I hung on to the place (I shuffled it off to another sucker 24 months to the day later; old tax code) it would have been paid off a few years ago and worth about $350,000 today for the land value alone. I paid $65,000 and almost cried every month the $495 mortgage payment was due. Now, I do cry every month with a payment exactly ten times that amount. No one else to blame this time. I sold this one to myself. Sucker.

So it’s a Saturday morning in 1980-something and I’m resuming the project I started the prior evening (and finally abandoned a little after midnight). The original idea was to leave the insurance office early on Friday, stop at the hardware store to pick up a new Genie, run home, tear down the old one, stick up the new one, shower, and make it to the Orioles game at old Memorial Stadium in time for the 7:05pm first pitch against the Yankees. Eddie Murray was close to breaking one record that season, Cal Ripken, Jr was well on his way to another, and “Tippy” Martinez, bullpen southpaw scrub by those days (and neighbor down the street) had left two upper-deck nosebleeds in the mailbox which had been resting, unattached, on the front porch floorboards all summer; a different project for a different weekend. I listened to the game on the radio. Somebody won.

So I’m on the top rung of the step ladder looking up, sweat stinging my eyes, holding the wrong tool in the wrong hand when this little kid in a blue and gold football jersey walks up the driveway and asks me, “Wanna buy some candy, Mister? It’s $2.” I look down at him; at myself not that long ago at the time. Number 23. My number. Such a fleet journey from boy to Mister. From candy to insurance. From dependent to dependent upon. A cruel warp in Someone else’s cosmic nano formula…

“Sure.” I buy 5 boxes only because all I have is a ten and of course, the kid can’t break the bill. It was some kind of brittle. I go back to my project. The door was stuck open now and I had no choice but to finish. Unattached mailbox on the porch, garage door stuck open, grass overgrown, $495 a month mortgage, $210 a month car payment, $85 electricity, $65 Visa, $35 Britannica, $25 Electrolux, food, clothing, alcohol… I did a quick calculation. I just gave the kid 10% of my after tax monthly cash flow. Brittle, indeed. Recessive, for sure.

The next day I’m back on the ladder still looking up. It’s mid-afternoon and the radio is blaring. Yankees are winning. We all need to rally and come from behind if we hope to be victors this day. I can get the door to go down but not all the way. It’s stuck half open. I hear a small voice. I step down for fresh air and duck out to the driveway, soaked to my tee shirt with sweat. A little kid in an oversize football jersey is standing there. The large white number 88 makes him look even smaller beneath the shiny blue and gold material. “Wanna buy some candy, Mister?”

“Sorry son. I already bought some yesterday.” I look down at the end of the driveway and see Number 23 standing at the curb. “From him !” I point in the direction of the sidewalk. “I bought it from him!”

“Yeah. I know,” says the little bench warmer, clearly too small to play any position associated with that number; Defensive end? Hardly. Wide receiver? Doubtful. Probably the son of a coach or someone’s little brother. “He says you’re the only one buying anything around here.”

We reek of it, us salespeople. We can’t help ourselves. It’s recessive. I give the kid $2 in coins from my dusty golf bag leaning against a far corner of the gaping garage, mostly to punish myself for being such a sap. High handicap. Recessive. Salesman…

I checked my e-mails this morning after a real estate ‘Day of Silence’ on Sunday. I promised my wife I would not take the iPhone to the outlet malls in Wisconsin; our little end-of-summer day trip away from Chicago. An old Willie Loman type tried to sell me a pair of orange corduroys at Brooks Brothers. “60% off the lowest marked price. Takes a strong looking man like yourself to pull a pair of slacks like this off…” Pull a pair of slacks off. He looked at me, I looked back at myself 20 years from now.

“Get it? Pull a pair off…?” Loman asks. Squinting. Nudging. Low Man.

“Yes. I get it. Pretty funny. But no thank you. Orange isn’t my color. Makes me look fat.” Lessons learned. Still, there was an undercurrent; a mild urge to cave in and give the old fart $49 to help make his semi-retired floor time quota…

So I scroll through the 76 messages I received since Saturday. A third are from vendors who have no idea who I am; stabbing at URLs in cyberspace hoping to snare some hot cosmic particles but landing in my Inbox instead. ‘Dear Gene. Hi Gene. Geno! Dear Mr. Petro. Dear Mr Petroche’ (part of my blogspot adddress). Leads. SEO assistance. E-Pro workshops; Blogging Tips. Be A Better Blogger. In 30 Days. Guaranteed.

A third are from my own back-end administrator letting me know which current registrants have logged on and anyone else who is new to the website. Auto-replies are sent to Joe Blow at 555-555-5555 and Brett Favre also at 555-555-5555. Madonna, however, leaves a phone number that at least looks valid, although lacking a United Kingdom country code. Apparently, she lives in Indiana now (219). My phone pings every 15 minutes with these updates.

And finally, a third are from other Chicago Realtors. Many I know. Most I don’t. They are standing at the end of my driveway trying to snare my attention, pique my interest, hawk their own wares. One after another; Condos Along The Lake, Mc Mansions Near The Park; Short Sales On The Horizon. Won’t Last Long. (Not if one considers a year long.) Like I can’t find these overpriced Listings on my own. (Would they not be sold already if they weren’t? Overpriced? Answer Me…)

Like there aren’t already a dozen or so in the same building along the same stretch of lake with sellers who are just as eager to move on with their lives. As if a Starbuck’s card and catered Pizza Hut is ample motivation to drag me out of my $4950 per month house on Tuesdays, where I’ve been weathering my own fiscal storm since last winter as I electronically nudge along the likes Blow, Favre and the Material Girl. You see, I too, have a cyber-campaign in play; always a half dozen or so ready and willing Buyers just waiting for those last season orange corduroys to be slashed one more time, the necktie market to slacken just a little more around the throat, the short SALE to get even shorter. Or to Unsubscribe. Take a number…

Alterations Take

Two to Three

Price Reductions.

Should Be Ready

For Pick-Up

By Early Spring.

‘Pull a pair off…’

Get it?

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

Time is physics, the stately transit of the stars and planets. Time is space is mass is energy, four faces of the same one thing, elegant in its simplicity.

The passage of time — or, rather, the awareness of the passage of time — is a human artifact, a man-made thing. The Greeks or their forebears gave us seconds and minutes and hours — elegantly composed of factorials. Days, weeks, months, decades, centuries, millennia — time marches on, don’t it?

Here’s my thing, and it’s something I don’t think I’ve ever talked about with other people: I am constantly aware of the passage of time. It matters to me that I get things done, so I am always measuring my performance against the clock.

Even moreso if I have set aside time to complete a task.

Even moreso at the end of the workday.

Even moreso on Friday afternoons, when I look back to see what I accomplished for the week.

And much, much moreso at the start of a new month, when I not only look back at what got done in the month just past, but also look ahead to what the coming month promises.

If you’re in straight commission sales, you live out of a pipeline, that’s understood. It’s nice to watch those paychecks coming out of the pipeline, but the haunting question — always — is what am I doing right now to put future paychecks into the pipeline?

Like many people reading here, August was a great month for us. I won’t know until I see the final numbers, but it may have been our best month ever. Certainly it’s in the top five.

September shows real promise, both because lenders are getting back on their bicycles and because Phoenix is suddenly very appealing to all-cash buyers.

But still… I look at the calendar and I think about that pipeline…

I’d love to stay and chat, but I’ve got to go to work.

Technorati Tags: real estate, real estate marketing

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed

Ah yes, it’s an election year. How do I know for certain? As Jeff Brown, who’s married to a native Ohioan- smart guy- recently twittered to me: “Ohioans’re gonna be very popular in the next 9 weeks. As usual, you guys are the babe at the prom without a date.”

Every four years we are courted and kissed by those same folks who forget we are here the rest of the time. I don’t welcome or enjoy the attention. I wish the federal government would forget we are here completely. I don’t want to be trotted out as an example of what went wrong with this or that administration. Don’t use Dayton to push your agenda and don’t use Dayton to make yourself feel good. Don’t do me any favors.

Dayton native Emily Langer wrote an article, Excuse Me, But I’m From Ohio, in the Washington Post today, accurately describing the strange political position in which Ohio, and the Midwest, finds itself every four years. In part:

Presidential candidates, in their efforts to look like regular folks, are among the chief purveyors of one of the most destructive stereotypes of Midwesterners: the working stiff who can’t work, thanks to the Rust Belt hemorrhaging all those jobs. During a campaign stop in Youngstown, Ohio, 2004 Democratic nominee John F. Kerry set up shop outside a boarded-up building so that photos and television footage would show the city’s “ugly rump,” as the New York Times wrote, rather than the new office building across the street. No hard feelings, senator. The voters of Youngstown understood: It was easier for you to show that Ohioans needed your help if you pretended that they couldn’t help themselves.

Reporters do their part as well, stocking their dispatches from the Midwest with caricatures of down-at-the-heels factory workers and embittered waitresses. If you read enough of that prattle, you might start to wonder: Don’t these people have anything better to do than sit around carping about NAFTA? Don’t they know that McCain was just being honest when he said that some of Michigan’s vanished jobs won’t reappear? And by the way, don’t they realize that anybody who thinks Obama hates America is a fool? The answer to all those questions is, yes, of course they do.

Forbes.com would also have you believe that there is no hope for the heartland and recently put eight Midwestern places, including Dayton, on a list of America’s 10 fastest-dying cities. But they failed to factor into their questionable formulas and calculations the resilience of a population whose land used to be a frontier. Corn grown by Iowa farmers looks less quaint and more cutting-edge now that it’s helping run cars. Illinois businesses are making good money exporting computers and electronics to China. And somehow, the Indianapolis 500 keeps putting butts in the seats.

I can’t change the perception the rest of the country has of Dayton and Ohio. Nor do I really care to. As Larry Yatkowsky says: “there’s a lot wrong with lots of places but each of them are our homes and that makes them special.” We all have our reasons for living where we do. I’m in Dayton because the people I love more than anything else in the world are here, and that’s a damn good reason to be anywhere. I would argue it’s the only damn reason to be anywhere.

Ms. Langer writes:

My Midwestern parents are sophisticated enough to know that children have been venturing out on their own since the beginning of time, sometimes to look for someplace more exciting, other times because that’s just how life unfolds, hardly ever to turn their backs on their families and almost always to make them proud. I hit pay dirt the day I was born in Ohio, and if I ever move back, I’ll hit pay dirt again.

“I hit pay dirt the day I was born in Ohio” My god, that’s lovely.

I just started working with a native Daytonian who is moving back from a stint on the east coast. Why? To come “home”, to be close to family, to settle down and start their own family, right here in Dayton. I’ve been showing properties to a couple who are moving to Dayton so he can start a business. These people aren’t investors scooping up deals, these are “just folks” who are happily putting down roots, right here in Dayton.

While I can’t say I’m putting up yard signs all over this town, I can say that I’m still plugging along in this business, in this town, both of which should be belly up by now, according to news flashes all across the country. Boo hoo, poor poor pitiful me? Hell no! I won’t go! This is my home: I work here, I live here, I love here. And I’m happy to be helping other people find a home so perhaps they can experience the same sense of… I dunno- Daytonianism? Home? Ease? Contentment? Whatever it’s called, that intangible sense of ownership that we as Realtors help people achieve, is something I love to do, and whaddya know? That sense of owning a home is something that people in Dayton still desparately want to do. My guess is that people in your town feel the same way about owning a home.

Dear Mr. McCain, and Mr. Obama, while you are attentive now, I know how fickle politicians can be. I also know who I am, and unlike you, I know this place in which I live. I have a life to attend to, and believe it or not, it doesn’t have much to do with you. And now if you’ll excuse me, I prefer to dance with them that brung me.

Bookmark this to: del.icio.us • Digg it • StumbleUpon • Subscribe to RSS feed