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Since the beginning of last year, how long has it taken to sell your listings? I’m not talkin’ about those priced at half the median value in your market. I’m talkin’ about a traditional seller who simply wants you to sell his real estate. Why do a few listings in every market sell faster than the rest? Let’s set aside the obvious go-to answer, price. Let’s also agree that unless you’re pricing your listings below the market, there are other significant factors involved in market time.

But what are they?

My firm is now on its third generation, and to gain respect at the dinner table, you must be a listing agent. Doesn’t mean you eschew buyers, not even close. It also doesn’t mean we don’t hold buyers’ agents in the highest esteem, cuz we do. In fact, we adore ‘em. They’re the main reason we can leave town for extended periods, doin’ deals while applying the sunscreen. ‘Course, I gave up that luxury when I left my hometown market almost a decade ago.

It’s taken about six years, but San Diego’s real estate investors, especially the regular folk, are finally realizing there’s real estate life outside of Paradise. If I’m correct in this supposition though, how will I sell their properties quickly and for market value?

BawldJapan strikes again!

I have no false pride when it comes to doing what puts cat skins on the wall. Since I come up with precious few original ideas myself, to survive, I’ve learned to steal like a cat burglar. Sometimes I leave well enough alone, sometimes I tweak a little here and there. I’ve learned through experience that my clients are influenced more by one factor than all the others combined: Obtaining the results for which they hired me.

Funny how that works. It’s why most marketing folks keep their distance from guys like me. I’m constantly measuring their efforts with the ‘R’ word — RESULTS.

Serious minded sellers are obsessed with results when they choose an agent to list their property for sale. They universally like the marketing plan we employ. 98% of property owners (a number I picked outa the air just now) have never seen anything like what we show them. But, as much as I’d love to be able to claim credit for it, I can’t. I do claim the credit for at least being bright enough to have recognized brilliance when it was right in front of me — then putting it to use.

All of the credit goes to Greg Swan. His overall marketing plan for selling listings is maybe the most unsung, underrated stratagem for selling residential real estate I’ve seen in my nearly 43 years as a licensee.

Here’s a link to the plan in it’s entirety.

Though we don’t use all of it, the vast majority is adhered to almost slavishly. As I said earlier, I usually take others’ ideas and add my own tweaks. Gotta admit though, Greg’s plan was so completely thought through, there was only one thing I thought was missing.

An experienced interior designer familiar with the real world.

What do I mean by real world? I don’t in any way mean that interior designers aren’t real with what they do. I’m referring to what so very often makes the pivotal difference to buyers. If you’re in a market where a huge segment, maybe most of your personal practice, is made up of homes 10 years old or less, this additional listing ‘team member’ might be unnecessary. Floor plans are far friendlier than they were in 1965. Or 1985 for that matter.

But the professionally trained and experienced eye can almost immediately see where half a dozen simple ‘tweaks’ can combine to make a home literally pop! when buyers walk through. This is particularly true when they’ve already seen the nearby competition.

We’ve used our own designer not only in San Diego, but in a couple other states as well, and with solid results. We’ve even used her ‘long distance’ with clients selling their rental homes or 2-4 unit properties. Even then it’s worked like magic. Most of her design modifications don’t even need a permit, though a large minority do. A contractor, or sub-contractor is used if that level of expertise is required. Quality results is always the measuring stick.

I wrote about this listing long ago. But it still sticks out as the epitome of what’s possible. It was a rental home that had had the same large family as tenants for over eight years. Outside of the medium sized kitchen remodel, the client/seller had done nothing inside for those eight years. The property was about 35 years old, give or take.

Here’s what we had the seller do, based upon the interior designer’s inspection and recommendations. It probably helps to know the house itself was in a nice middle class area with prices at the time, about 10-12% or so above the county median. Basically a typical American neighborhood.

1. Added 3′ X 4′ alcove in the main hallway bathroom. Took that space from the entry way coat closet. Killer addition to the bathroom — no big loss in the entry way. They weren’t gonna be hangin’ their fur coats there, right?

2. Her female side came to the surface in the master bathroom. The unavoidable view from the shower (no tub) was the commode. Surveys have shown conclusively that’s not the preferred view of wives when enjoying their morning shower. She had the offending commode turned 90 degrees left. Then had a 4′ pony wall built behind it. Now his better half can only see his head.

3. The backyard patio and its cover was about 50-60% of the home’s width. It paralleled the entire living and dining rooms. The house side of the cover was attached at the level of the eaves. She hated that. She had it detached and repositioned it on the roof. The difference was more than a little surprising. It made everything look airier. It also allowed much more sunlight into the living and dining rooms, which had given the feel of being cave-like before the modification.

4. This was the most effective in my view. She had the last 18-20″ of the dividing wall between kitchen and living room removed, floor to ceiling. This opened up the floor plan such that you didn’t feel squeezed when coming from the entry way or the hallway. It gave the home more of an open feeling, instead of being segmented, almost like a prison. Made a very obvious difference.

5. Except for the kitchen, she had the rest of the house re-floored. It was an eye-opener for me. A very smart move.

6. She had the client’s handyman drywall the entire garage interior. Relatively cheap, and much mo betta appearance.

7. The entire interior, sans kitchen, was painted. Her colors, her guy. Fantastic improvement. Anyone would’ve painted, but it was the color choices and quality of the painter that made the difference.

No changes were made to any of the landscaping, as the client had kept it in excellent condition, using a professional a couple times monthly. We just ensured he had the guy come by weekly during the listing period, and while we were preparing the home for sale. The exterior paint was in good condition and tasteful. The curb appeal was pretty nice, especially compared to the competition listed at the time. It was inviting.

Again, this home was nothing special. We simply made it the best it could be without spending gobs of money. A real facelift woulda run over $30,000 easily. Our client’s outa pocket was around $15,000 or so. At the time, the market was as horrible as I’ve seen it in my career. It was 2009.

Sean Purcell was going to create a killer for sale sign for us, as per Greg’s plan. It wasn’t to be. The home hit the MLS on a Friday after lunch. It went into escrow the following Tuesday or Wednesday. It sold for more than any comparable in the neighborhood at the time. We had to adjust to the appraisal, as it was a brutal buyers’ market then. The adjustment was around 3-4% if memory serves.

Go to the linked list, and do what it says. Give the interior designer addition a whirl too, if you think it would be effective. This plan will easily cut your marketing time, while increasing your expected sales price. Would love to hear your thoughts.

This is in an article titled “The great realtor rip-off”.

The comparison to estate agents in the UK is especially interesting. They make half the commission and close 3 to 4x transactions.

The article mentions NAR by name and only refers to MLS in passing as ex-cartels:

The business used to operate like a series of local cartels. In a typical area, a handful of brokers controlled a shared database of available homes, and limited their cheaper rivals’ access to those listings. In 2008 in the United States and 2010 in Canada, regulators struck deals with realtors to open up these databases. Yet since then the average commission has actually risen, from 5.0% in 2005 to 5.4% in 2011, according to REAL Trends, a research firm.

“Used to”, huh?

A follow-up to an article on syndication I wrote just a short time ago.  Keep in mind that I’ve never even met Jim Abbott, and am not promoting his company.  But I’m listening harder now to him, and as he speaks his words continue to etch a path that I really believe warrants all of our attention.

At the end he does make a request.  In San Diego you can actually withhold syndication on a property by property basis.  On the MLS form simply check “No Syndication.”  Try it.  I discussed it yesterday with a client, and I’m listing her home without giving away all the info to you know who.  Oh, and I truly believe if buyers come to my site to learn about this property, even if they don’t want this particular home, it will greatly increase the likelihood of my working with them in the future.

Want to skin some cats, anyone?

My take: You cannot successfully push-market into that cacophony. You must pull, because there is already way too much push. I’m thinking Eric Blackwell’s archives warrant your attention.

In the world of Google upheaval that I have lived through in the past couple of months, I have consumed my share of Diet Mt. Dew and aspirin. So to cure my headache and to continue to contribute to all that is good in the real estate conversation, I offer you the first of hopefully many Jeff Foxworthy style best practices that I am seeing in the real estate industry.

I have entitled these posts, “You might be a Bloodhound if…” I think it is appropriate.

The first entry is from a friend in Manhattan Beach Ca who has what I think is one of the classiest videos to introduce himself ever. Try competing with the sincerity and the authenticity of this REALTOR:

Get to know ya video for Greg Geilman

Seriously. Go to the page…click the video and please share your thoughts.

I personally think that this type of video connects in all the right ways with a consumer. It would if I was the consumer.

Would love your feedback. (And NO I did not do the video. He sent it to me for my thoughts. grin

You might be a Bloodhound if…you create a video to connect with people like this. #justsayin for those of you twitterers..grin

Yesterday, I made a video discussing some of the ideas in Man Alive!. At one point, I mention Leonard Cohen’s line, “They’re gonna hear from me,” so I thought I would salute the song it comes from, Anthem.

Rick Danko, the third great voice in The Band, the too one easily overlooked. All three of these men are gone now, and the world is a poorer place.

From: Man Alive! A survival manual for the human mind.

Extract from Chapter 12. The love of Splendor is the life divine.

There is one more idea I want to take up with you, and I think it is the most demanding one I know. You had to wrap your mind around the self, after being told all your life to despise it, and then I sprung the notion of self-adoration on you. I undermined just about every dogma you have ever heard about, and then I made you eat anarchy-pie and like it – or at least not spit it out. And now I plan to make you stretch even farther, to go with me where no philosophy of reason has ever gone before.

Where might that be?

To heaven.

“Say WHAT?!?”

But, but, but… Heaven is for theologians. Heaven is for priests. Heaven, every smug academic will sneer, is for wishful thinkers who can’t handle the infinite hell that is human life on Earth.

I think you might be able to guess what I think about a claim like that. If theological pronouncements about ontology and teleology are intellectually useless, invalidities defended with insipidities, so, too, are the metaphysical opinions of modern philosophers, academics, artists, journalists and politicians. If you hate the self, in time you cannot fail to hate life as well – your own life and all of human life. You will not be able to stop yourself from sneering at joy, at hope, at ambition, at every value the fully-human life requires. You will look for nothing but evidences of failure and despair in the world around you, and your one, unique, irreplaceable human life will become the infinite hell you insist you see everywhere.

But what if you were to point your mind in the opposite direction?

…continue reading here…

“My biggest mistake was loving you too much — and letting you know.”

“Why do the best things always disappear?”

“Yeah, yeah, you know I sure wish I could yodel like Yoko!”

I was a teenage photo geek, and I used to spin up side two of “Before the Flood” and play it all night in the darkroom. The three voices of The Band — Levon Helm, Rick Danko and Richard Manuel — have been ringing through my head for most of my life.

“They should never have taken the very best.”

Further notice: The man behind the drums has left life’s stage.

From: Man Alive! A survival manual for the human mind.

Extract from Chapter 11. Indomitable you.

We all know that slavery is abominable, a vile and vicious practice, indefensible on any grounds. And yet we may not know – or may know but do not want to admit we know – that many, many slaves, throughout human history, have clung to their captivity and vehemently resisted manumission – freedom. And while you may want to insist that you would never prostate yourself like that – begging to be chained, begging to be abused, begging to be despoiled – precisely what is it you are doing when you sign your tax return? When you mail in your property tax check, paying, over and over again, so that the brute of the state will not confiscate the land you allegedly own? What are you doing when you show up, hat in hand, in one government office after the next, begging for permission to stay alive for one more day – so that today’s earnings can be expropriated just like those of the day before and the day before that, on and on for every day of your life?

There are a lot of different things I can say, when I meet people, to find out if they are still capable of thinking with the clarity of mind of any normal five-year-old, or if they have walled up their minds in some dank dungeon of mindlessness. This is one of my favorites, a truism that sorts the sheep from the shepherds from the living minds just like that:

Every time you lick a stamp, you’re kissing the master’s ass.

“Say WHAT?!?”

There is obviously no reason for mail delivery to be a state monopoly, no reason but mindless tradition and the inertia of thoughtless habits-of-mind. And there are obviously many good reasons for every sort of communications business to be handled by free-market enterprises. And yet you kiss the master’s ass with every piece of mail you send or receive, and the master rewards your obedience by piling vast hordes of unkempt, slowly-meandering union men on your shoulders, paying them at least five times what their skills and abilities are worth and conferring upon them million-dollar retirement plans – to be paid for by your hard work. You may have to subsist on oatmeal and ketchup when you come home for the last time from your working life, but every functionary of every branch of the state will be doing just fine – at your expense.

And you glance at me briefly and then you look away. You smile weakly and you shuffle your feet and you look this way and that and then you say, “Oh, well, you know…” I do know, alas. I live just as you do, half-free, half-slave, smiling and shuffling and trying not to notice too mindfully when I find myself begging – again – for the privilege of living my own life in my own way. I want to live, and so I volunteer to live as a slave. I want to have a nice home for my family, nice things for my wife, good food for us and for our pets. And so I kiss the master’s ass again and again – and so do you. I don’t care how much money you make or don’t make. I don’t even care if you yourself are a government functionary. If you are not living off the land – completely “off the grid” – as a feral human being, you are complicit in your own despoiling. You are a voluntary participant in your own enslavement.

And isn’t that a dainty dish? Just now, government functionaries at all levels of the state are desperate to figure out how much more wealth they can squeeze out of you – how many more sweetheart deals they can bilk you for, how many more lavishly-paid “jobs” they can give to their friends, how many more votes they can buy from grasping welfare slaves with your income. Here is the question they should be asking themselves: What will you do when you have had enough of being bilked and milked and pushed around?

…continue reading here…

I made a catalog of the means by which people gull you into betraying your own interests and values. Paul Kelly sings the soundtrack:

If this don’t make you dance, you need some Gin and Juice.

From: Man Alive! A survival manual for the human mind.

Extract from Chapter 10. A mindful catalog of mindlessness.

I like to play a philosophy game I call Backstory. I will look at someone – anyone I happen to see – and try to project backward in time to the past causes of that person’s present-day appearance. Toddlers and young children will have sweet faces, almost always, with no deeper meanings to be discerned. But older children and adults will have had many experiences in their lives, and those past events will have written an emotional history in the lines of their skin. Your mama told you, when you glared and grimaced at her, that your face would freeze like that, but neither one of you knew she was right: The facial expressions we wear most often – habituated Mothertongue emotional reactions – inscribe themselves into our skin. I can see those habitual expressions in the people I am watching. Their clothing and their manner will tell their stories, too, and it is interesting to me to try to suss out their histories, just by looking at people from a distance.

I stress that this is just a game. Every living organism, human or not, is in a certain sense a laboratory specimen to me. I am not cruel or intrusive in any way, but I watch everything I am blessed with the opportunity to see, and I learn everything I can from the behavior I observe. In consequence, I can tell you from having run repeated tests that a toddler at around eleven months of age is just about as clueless as dog, when it comes to finding a toy hidden under a shirt, but that same child at thirteen or fifteen months will be able to identify the toy by the distortion of the fabric of the shirt, where the dog will not be able to “see” it, even though the dog actually should “know” by its much better sense of smell that the toy really is there. That’s subjunctivity in its most basic form – the toddler “seeing” an entity that is not immediately obvious to his eyes, identifying it by its much more abstract geometrical shape – and this again is a bright-line distinction between the kind of epistemological method appropriate to a proto-human mind and the method “unthinkingly” deployed by a mere mammal.

I wish I could tell you that I see a lot of Splendor when I play Backstory, but I don’t. I see the basic ingredients of Splendor in the faces of toddlers and young children, but in older children and adults, mostly what I see are accretions of pain – not always full-blown Squalor but way too much of the squalid. But how could this not be the case, given that virtually all of the people I see are trying with all their will and all their mental might to live down to moral philosophies that no one can practice fully without committing suicide – without slaughtering the self of the body because they cannot ever manage successfully to slaughter the self of the mind? This is awful, outrageous, unbearably tragic. But in the long run, nature is just. If you damn your mind and your self completely enough, for a long enough span of time, you go to hell. You just don’t die to get there.

…continue reading here…

From: Man Alive! A survival manual for the human mind.

Extract from Chapter 9. The high cost of mindlessness.

Because you never trained your mind to think about the ontology of human nature – don’t fault yourself for that; no one else did, either – you thought they were just talking about you. You’ve known your whole life that you yourself have never been able to live down to the perverse ideas of “virtue” that evil philosophers and their mindless minions have never tired of preaching at you, but you thought the fault was yours alone. You thought that, since everyone incessantly repeats these inverted moral prescriptions, everyone other than you must be conforming to them, as well, and it must be you alone who is defective. You could not succeed in condemning – damning – your life and still living it, so you called yourself a “sinner” for committing the awful crime of continuing to live as a human being after insisting to yourself not just once but a thousand times that the self – the cardinal value in the uniquely-human life – is evil. How could you possibly claim to be good if you could not ever seem to do the things you insisted to yourself are good?

You didn’t know that nearly every other human being swims in that same steaming sewer of longing and shame, each one of them perpetually and persistently failing to uphold “virtues” that are – by diabolical plan and intention – impossible to practice. You didn’t know that no one can practice those perverse ideas of virtue – because no entity can both be and not-be itself. That is the essential statement of ontology, the law of identity, and we can characterize virtually all of moral philosophy, until now, as anti-ontological teleology: You should be only what you cannot be. But that proposition is inverted, too. What virtually all theologians and philosophers have insisted, for all of human history, is that you should not be the only thing you can be – a self, a being of rationally-conceptual volitionality, a free moral agent.

Why would they make such perverse arguments – not just false, but comically, ludicrously, insanely contrary to plainly obvious fact, now that we have fully disclosed the facts of human nature? Why would they do that?

In order to enslave you. And guess what? It worked.

They said the only good human is a mindless human, and – man alive! – did you deliver the goods!

…continue reading here…

From: Man Alive! A survival manual for the human mind.

Extract from Chapter 8. The integrity of art.

When I talk about Mothertongue and Fathertongue, I know that many people are straining to divide them up in their minds, to separate them and to regard them somehow as being opposites. This is understandable – it’s the way our minds like to work, in distinct categories – but it is incorrect. A genetic Homo sapiens becomes a human being when he masters Fathertongue, but none of us ever stops communicating in Mothertongue.

For one thing, since Mothertongue consists of bodily expressions of internal emotional states, we are “communicating” in Mothertongue all the time – even when we are all alone. For another, Mothertongue is necessary to many types of human social concourse – when we want to communicate love or hate, affection or indifference, trust or suspicion, admiration or contempt, reverence or ridicule, pride or shame, satisfaction, boredom, fascination, derision, impatience, joy, anger and countless other emotions. For still another, Mothertongue is essential to demagoguery and other forms of deception: I can say one thing – or a noisome nothing – in words and simultaneously communicate a different idea in facial expressions, verbal intonations or bodily posturing. And for still one more thing, Mothertongue is the essence of art.

…continue reading here…