BloodhoundBlog

There’s always something to howl about.

Month: August 2008 (page 4 of 6)

August 15, 2008

Mortgage Market Week in Review

by

Mortgage Officer

Author website

Well, it’s Friday again, and as one of the few remaining Fridays of the summer, I hope you can get out and enjoy the weekend (and hopefully the weather where you are will allow you to!)

So what’s been happening in the mortgage market this week? This week it’s been all about inflation and housing statistics…..

Inflation – the Consumer Price Index grew by a much faster than expected .8% during July. Normally, that would send the markets into “freakout” mode but the markets didn’t really react all that much. Why? A couple of things: 1) A huge amount of the increase was due to the rising costs of energy and that has dropped quite substantially since the first of August, thereby easing the risk of inflation. 2) There has been quite a bit of “noise” lately on how the slowing of the economy both here and internationally will become, eventually, anti inflationary. How does that work? In a nutshell, if there aren’t many people shopping at Best Buy, they can’t very well raise prices, can they?

Housing Statistics – I’m not going to get into the itty bitty details of the housing statistics that have been released lately but I’m going to give you a bit of an overview of the reports and try to focus on the bigger picture rather than get stuck on details:
1. Foreclosures are rising – the number of homes that have been foreclosed on in July vs. last year is a LOT higher. In some areas of the country, it’s a staggering percentage higher, in others, just higher. But it’s up. What does that mean? It means that the troubles in the housing and credit markets are still going on and are potentially getting worse.
2. REO – Real estate owned by a bank or financial institutions. According to one report issued this week, banks and financial institutions now own over 750,000 homes throughout the United States. What does that mean? Essentially this, if we had to relocate the entire city of Chicago, we could find a bank owned home for every resident of Chicago and there Read more

August 14, 2008

Is An Educational Session A Sales Pitch? Of Course It Is.

by

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

Author website

I’m a salesman and have been since I hawked peanuts on the Ocean City boardwalk.  I’m addicted to “the pitch”.  I love writing them, watching them, and critiquing them.  Many people get upset when a “trainer” comes on to give an educational talk and finishes with an offer to buy books, tapes, coaching, et al.  Not me; I love it.  It gives me an opportunity to study someone else so I can better perfect my “pitch”.

The best pitch is the one that isn’t noticeable  It builds value and ends with a call to action that has the audience swamping you.  Rather than “asking for the order” it is so compelling that the prospective customers beg to buy what you’re selling- I saw one of those yesterday.

Lender (and Unchained graduate) Scott Schang invaded San Diego yesterday and presented to the East County Board of Realtors about a niche loan product.  He gave starving REALTORs  a juicy cheeseburger.  Scott invited me to both attend and critique his presentation yesterday.  He kicked butt but I spotted a few things he might improve.

Scott runs a shop called Porchlight Mortgage. Scott lends statewide and offers buyer brokerage in Orange County.  He has traditionally marketed directly to the consumer so this was his first shot at marketing to the REALTOR channel.  He did an excellent job explaining how his firm is committed to working purchase business rather than refinance loans and that value was recognized by the audience.  One agent questioned about his ability to wear his “lender” hat, with her clients, since he practices real estate brokerage.  What measures would he take to insure that her clients weren’t turned over to one of his “in-house” agents?

That was a fair question and I think Scott addressed it well.  I was thinking of Greg Swann’s “shoot the elephant in the room before he breaks all the furniture” approach to salesmanship.  Simply put, you HIGHLIGHT the negative objection up front…then shoot it down so it doesn’t become an issue. I suggested that Scott open his presentation by serving up that elephant.  I think he should proclaim that he is Read more

August 14, 2008

BloodhoundBlog Unchained has a home in Orlando for a twelve-hour event — and the price for tickets just went up to $199

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

We have a place to howl in Orlando at last. We wanted something very sexy, very cool, but the constrictions on time and space were killing us. We finally settled on a hotel conference facility to get a room big enough to accommodate all the people who want to join us for BloodhoundBlog Unchained in Orlando. As a bonus, we get to go back to our original plan of a twelve-hour event. This will give us time to explore some mastermind ideas that we would have had to leave out of a shorter presentation.

The flip side of this is this: The Earlybird price is gone. If you go to BloodhoundBlogUnchained.com, the levy for tickets is $199 — full price.

But don’t take out a second mortgage — whatever that is. We’ve made arrangements with some good friends of the kinds of ideas we teach. If you keep your eyes open, you’ll spy opportunities on other web sites to snag Unchained tickets at a discount. If you want to pay us full price, feel free. But you will have plenty of chances to save yourself some money.

For example, lender Kevin Sandridge can get you into Unchained in Orlando for half-price. Be sure to thank him when you meet him in November.

There will be other offers out there — but don’t dilly-dally. We only have a limited number of seats available, and there will be 20,000 Realtors in Orlando for the NAR Convention. When the music stops, they won’t be seats available at any price.

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August 14, 2008

I fear the Geeks, especially when bearing gifts.

by

Free Market Cowgirl

Author website

I’m not sure if it was Greg’s post welcoming me to Bloodhound Blog or if it is last name “H” week for the Hi-Tech cold callers…but my phone has been ringing off the hook with people trying to sell (give) me stuff to enhance my web 2.0 career.

The pitch, has been very simplistic in nature: The vendor is willing to give me their product/service for free or at a drastically reduced rate. IF, I will recommend it to the agents in my office and the ones that read my blog.

The close, “Isn’t this a great deal! What do you have to lose?”

What do I have to lose? Let me shuffle my feet and look down at them with my hands in my pockets. Ummmmm. Geee. I don’t know. How about my reputation with the people that I work for and depend on me to make sound decisions? How about the respect of people who read me and trust me to make reputable endorsements? If those aren’t good enough reasons how about all the money that I could lose? Money lost when agents figure out that I’m willing to sell my soul for free products/services on their dime. Referrals that might not come in if I recommend based off personal gain instead of success.

Do you really want my business? Do you really want me to recommend you? Would you really like me to write about how your product/service is the greatest thing since IMAP on my iPhone? Do you really want to improve my web 2.0 career?

First, I’m not looking for a handout. Times are hard but I’m not offering to give away my services. You shouldn’t either. People pay me a lot of money to sell their homes. I’m good at what I do. Why should I expect any less from you?

Second, interact with me on BHB, Active Rain, My Space or any of the other online communities that I frequent. Comment on my posts. Ask questions. Disagree. Challenge the way that I think and do business. Show me something different. Something exciting! Knock my Read more

August 13, 2008

A Proposal to Improve Mortgage Lending….

by

Mortgage Officer

Author website

Since there are a variety of licensing, regulation, education, criminal background check proposals bouncing around in an effort to clean up the mortgage world, I thought I’d throw out my own proposal on how to improve mortgage lending.

I’m proposing that as part of the training for becoming a mortgage lender, all originators be required to spend a minimum of 6 weeks working with a Realtor full time.  They would be required to essentially job shadow the Realtor in every aspect of the business.   What would they learn during their time?

  1. They would learn that Realtors don’t get weekly paychecks, they only get paid when they sell a house.
  2. They would learn that Realtors have many people putting pressure on them to “get the house closed.”   The seller wants to close so they don’t have to make another payment on it.  The buyer wants to close so that they don’t have to move twice.   The Realtor’s wife wants them to close so she has the money to buy groceries.   The Realtor’s daughter wants them to close so that Dad can buy her the stuff that she needs to “look good” going back to school.    The Realtor’s bank wants them to close so that he can make the payments that need to be made on the _______ (fill in the blank – car loan, lease, house payment, home equity payment).
  3. They would learn that there is a lot more to marketing a house that is for sale than a sign in the yard and a listing in the MLS.
  4. They would learn the intricacies of negotiating a purchase agreement and have a much better handle on the dynamics of the relationship between buyer and seller and the ways that a lender can avoid disturbing those relationships.
  5. They would realize that many Realtors care deeply that their buyers and sellers make wise decisions when they are buying or selling and aren’t just focusing on “how much can I make.”  Unfortunately, not all of them are focused that way.
  6. They would realize that there is a lot more that goes into determining what price to list a house at than the Read more
August 13, 2008

In Need of Migration Assistance – Please!

by

Realtor, Rabble-Rouser

Author website

Hi All – I am in need of assistance with the migration of my blog – currently hosted on blogger to my own domain using WordPress.

I have referenced Tom Vanderwell’s post on July 2 asking for help/clarifications.  I’ve attempted to follow everyone’s previous advice and dagnabbit, it still don’t werk.

I currently have a domain setup and hosted on godaddy.  I have successfully installed WordPress on my new host.  I have tried the import function via WordPress to import my blog from Blogger.  When I grant access to Blogger, I get a blank webbrowser – it says done, but it ain’t.

Secondly, I’ve gone into Blogger and directed my blog to my custom domain www.itaintallbighairandcadillacs.com – again, ain’t nuthin’.

I know I’m missing something, but I can’t figure this out.

Any thoughts?  Thanks!

August 13, 2008

Give me your money, Part I: Sell locally, market nationally and build a real estate brand that actually means something to consumers

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

I’ve been interested to watch Sean Purcell, Mike Farmer and Rob Hahn talk about alternative brokerage structures, but the only structure that actually matters to me is our own. It’s possible that BloodhoundRealty.com will grow bigger in due course — all but certain given the work we’re doing this year — but I am never, ever interested in growing so large that I cannot directly control the quality of experience we deliver to each of our clients.

Cathleen Collins and I both work constantly to come up with newer ways of doing our work better, more ways of knocking the socks completely off of our buyers and sellers. This is a process I want never to stop, much less see reversed by the three-headed monster that passes for “management” in most businesses: haphazard philosophy, hamhanded preparation and tightfisted execution.

That is to say, we are a brand, no matter how small we are. We approached our business that way from the very beginning, to have the iconic idea of a Bloodhound speak for us in every possible way. We have never pursued personal promotion, preferring instead to promote the idea of this brand — not just the images but the underlying ideas.

Our market penetration is very slight so far, as must be the case for a boot-strapped brokerage. But there is no one we have worked with, either our clients or their warm networks or neighbors, who does not remember us or the ideas we stand for. We don’t hit 1.000 — although we have not missed on a listing in 2008, knock wood — but we hit the ball so hard that everyone remembers us in the neighborhoods where work.

They remember not us as people, but the brand. One of my favorite clients came to us when, frustrated that his house wasn’t selling, he turned to his wife and said, “What we need is the Bloodhounds.” He didn’t remember us, he remembered our marketing efforts and our results. Iconic ideas Google well, so he found us in one quick search.

This is the kind of branding that I think can make all the Read more

August 12, 2008

The “MLS 5.0” Manifesto: Everyone working in hi-tech real estate must oppose this vicious plan with every fiber in your being

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

“Oh that the Roman people had but one neck, that I might cut it off at a blow!” –Caligula

Here is the naked essence of Saul Klein’s so-called “MLS 5.0” proposal:

The MLS of the future will bring a marketing service and benefit to the industry by being the single point of entry for listing data and then, based upon the election of the broker, distribute that information to web portals, newspapers, even radio and television, handheld devices and applications.

The emphasis was in the original, which is a nice illustration of how much Klein trusts you not to see what he’s up to.

What does that sentence actually say?

It says that Klein’s idealized “MLS of the Future” will be a national monopoly system controlled by real estate brokers and the NAR — to the immediate and permanent detriment of independent MLS systems and vendors, Web 2.0 listings aggregators and — most especially — individual real estate agents.

What Klein is proposing, ignoring the presumed benefits to accrue to his own ventures, is to give the real estate industry one chokepoint, one bottleneck, so that the NAR can put a choke-chain around it.

Who will control that “single point of entry for listing data”? The NAR.

Who will control who can and cannot have access to listing data? The NAR.

Who will have the entire real estate industry in a chokehold? The NAR.

This is so diabolical, it makes me wonder if the fix is already in — if this evil plan is going to be rammed down our collective throats in November in Orlando.

Let’s assume it is not. Klein’s proposal is an undiluted evil, and it is incumbent upon everyone working in hi-tech real estate to oppose this vicious plan with every fiber in your being.

To say more is to gild the lily. I think Klein’s actual objective is to pull off another Realtor.com heist, to get the NAR to sell him a national MLS monopoly. But the benefit to the NAR is obvious: With a national monopoly MLS system, brokers will once again have the power to bring their agents to heel. If you understand what it means Read more

August 12, 2008

Introducing Jessica Wynn Horton, a once and future mega-producer

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

What do you do when you’re selling a thick slice of a billion dollars’ worth of real estate every year, when you’ve built your own RE/Max franchise from scratch, when you’ve hit the “30 Under 30” target at Realtor magazine?

Start over in another town, of course, and do it all again.

Today we add once and future mega-producer Jessica Wynn Horton to our roster of contributors.

In addition to her duties as broker, Jessica is hoping to replicate her earlier successes, this time with a decidedly Web 2.0 approach.

We’ll teach her what we can, but I think we’ll reap a good deal more from her experiences.

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August 11, 2008

Unchained lullabies: Splendor, squalor and war…

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Teri Lussier sent me this clip as a celebration of Unchained in Orlando:

That’s sweet, but I always think of this when I think of lullabies:

And that’s so brutal that it’s almost unimaginably brutal — until you look at this:

That’s the real face of war. Not well-turned-out soldiers with their bootlaces smartly tied, not bombers or aircraft carriers. War is your grandmother wailing because everything she has ever known has been burned to a cinder.

Julie Gold is a great songwriter. She wrote From a Distance, and Bette Midler couldn’t quite ruin it as a massively over-produced anthem. But Nancy Griffith, on her best days, can sing a simple song simply. This is a lullaby for the people who are not sleeping in Tbilisi.

August 11, 2008

Unchained Speakers, Ribak and Brady, on HomeGain “Ask The Experts”

by

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

Author website

Mitch Ribak spoke to the Barrys on Real Estate Radio USA last Friday.  Mitch started as an agent in 2001, opened Tropical Realty in 2005, and has grown his business to close 180 transactions, during the first six months of 2008,  in a down real estate market.

Mitch looks for newer real estate agents, who are personable, with a strong work ethic for his team.  He plugs them into his 100mphmarketing software after driving prospective buyers to his website from various pay-per-click campaigns. 100% of his buyer leads come from the internet (his referrals come from original internet leads).

Mitch will be opening membership in the E-Homes Realty Network later this week. What is the eHomes Realty Network?

Very simply, it’s a membership that gives independent Real Estate Brokerages the ability to have the same tools and training that the Big Franchises have for one very low monthly membership fee.  It’s your Franchise without a Franchise!

We started eHomes Realty Network after realizing that most Independent Brokers don’t have the resources, the knowledge or the time to test and determine which products will work best for their companies. It has also become clear that most Independents don’t have any formal training programs for their Agents.

If this sounds like an “Unchained” idea, it is. Mitch is offering the national exposure, training, and masterminding, to independent agents (and brokers) for forty bucks a month.  He has plans for an updated e-designation for network members.  This is what Sean Purcell calls “disbrokeration” at its finest.

Tomorrow (Tuesday), Mitch and I will be hosted by Home Gain on their first “Ask the Experts” segment at 10:00 AM (PDT).  There will be over 250 real estate professionals attending the webinar.  There is no charge for the webinar and you can register here.  I’ll be talking about mortgage financing but Mitch will talk about how to drive traffic to your website.

PS:  If you’re wondering why Mitch calls his software 100mphmarketing, you gotta hear him talk.  Listening to Mitch talk about internet marketing is like trying to take a sip from a fire hydrant; he gives THAT much good information.  Bring a pen Read more

August 11, 2008

May You Live In Interesting Times

by

Realtor, Rabble-Rouser

Author website

I am reminded again this year of just how much I love the Olympics.  In my opinion, there are few events that can be defined as uniquely human experiences.  National pride aside, I continue to learn from each and every athlete how unbridled commitment, sheer determination and raw tenacity can produce unimaginable results.

I can’t explain exactly why I get choked up when I watch the medal ceremonies – I just do.  Maybe it’s because, as a father, I think it is just an instinctual reaction.  How can you not be reminded of the times when overwhelming pride swells into your chest when your own child accomplishes something magnificent.  It’s a feeling you can’t necessarily describe in words – but it is a warm rush of emotion that sometimes spills over into tears.

I was truly awestruck by the visually stunning opening ceremonies at the opening of the 2008 games in Beijing – not just in appreciation of the magnitude of effort to coordinate such a moving spectacle, but I was touched by the deep metaphors which emanated from the vignettes that took place on the floor of the “bird’s nest”.   The messages were gracefully and beautifully communicated but profoundly powerful.  The sleeping dragon has been aroused – and it roared.

I was left with a deep appreciation for the Chinese people, their heritage and the clear intertwining influences of their culture – its affect on daily life – how they view the world and their role within it.  As the dancers danced across the floor creating the images of nature, it was profoundly clear that in Chinese culture, there is little distinction between the art and the artist – they are not mutually exclusive, a concept which defines the psyche of the average Chinese citizen.

Upon longer reflection, I became uncomfortable with the bigger picture I was left to interpret.  I can’t help thinking – just look at what our interest payments have accomplished.  This world event is full of metaphors.  Have we passed the torch to the Chinese economically?

To think that this event was masterfully orchestrated in seven years.  In that same period, Read more

August 11, 2008

Is It Harder to Get a Mortgage?

by

Mortgage Officer

Author website

If you’ve been reading this for a while, you’d know that it’s been getting harder to get a mortgage.   Well, today we have proof of it for all to see.   This chart is courtesy of the Federal Reserve (by way of the Big Picture). Some commentary after the chart:

Now for some thoughts:

1. See the line that represents prime mortgages?   Yep, it’s gone continuously up since this started a year ago.

2. See the line for “non traditional?”   Remember back late winter where things sort of “eased off” in terms of credit?  Yep, that’s when those loosened up again.   Well, that’s changed again.

3. Subprime – well, let’s just say that subprime is going the way it should – up so that only those with large downpayments can get them and they end up paying more for them.

So what should you take away from a chart like this?   A couple of suggestions:

1. If you are planning on buying a house or building a house, you better plan on being able to document your income and your assets completely.

2. If you have something “marginal” about your financial profile (income isn’t quite enough, documentation is challenging, credit is spotty) you can expect to have to come up with more of a downpayment and work through more details.   You also might want to consider moving your timeline up and trying to do it now rather than next spring – it’s looking like it’s going to be harder then…..

3. If you are looking to buy a house for the first time, you might have to rent a little longer and save up a little more of a downpayment than you would have.

All is not lost, the mortgage world is not dead, just a bit harder than it used to be.   Call me if you’d like to chat about it.

Tom Vanderwell (616) 292-7559

August 10, 2008

Dogs in Disneyville: The BloodhoundBlog Unchained curriculum in Orlando and how it will differ from next Spring in Phoenix

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

We have a venue in Orlando, very comfortable with lots of hi-tech support, but I don’t want to announce it yet. Whether or not by malicious intent, the NAR has dominated every available meeting space near the Orange County Convention Center, so we had to think way outside the doghouse to find what we needed. Suffice it to say for now that it’s within easy walking distance of the Convention Center, it has ample parking, and it’s probably closer to your hotel room than the NAR Convention itself.

We’ve also decided on a curriculum for Orlando. Of the 20,000 Realtors who will be going to the NAR Convention, almost none of them are already working in our world. Many of them are not even in the wired world at all, but there’s not a lot we can do about that. What we can do is go through everything that is a part of our world in detail, building a repeatable, duplicable Web 2.0 real estate practice.

In other words, we’re going to do eight solid hours on what to do and how to do it: How to use your net.presence to attract prospects, harvest leads, manage them through time and convert them, one-by-one, into real-world real estate transactions — producing real, spendable income. If you already live in our world, some of this will be pretty basic for you. But we’ll have plenty of brand new practical ideas to make Unchained Orlando worth your time.

At BloodhoundBlog Unchained in Phoenix, Geno Petro, Teri Lussier and others asked for something like this. From the inside, all of this stuff seems obvious to me, even though Brian and I approach it from somewhat different directions. But in discussions we’ve had since then, both here and in email, we’ve come to see the benefit of building a whole program of ideas, step-by-step. Think of it as Social Media Marketing meets The Millionaire Real Estate Agent. We have room for 500 students, and I would love to send 500 very dangerous real estate agents back to their home markets.

By contrast, the curriculum for Unchained in Phoenix next Spring Read more

August 9, 2008

Redemption is egoism in action: In support of Mike Farmer, even if other people are criminal, I am not — but I will not cause them to become good by becoming a criminal myself

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Not completely off topic, but well above the normal fray. I wrote this ten or twelve years ago:

 
What I want to discuss is Socrates’ question about whether it is better to inflict an injury or to have an injury inflicted upon you. It’s a favorite of sophists and sophomores, I know, but I think it strikes at the very core of justice. The justice I seek and seek to defend is not “out there”, apart from myself. Justice (or injustice) is not what others do to me, it’s what I do to myself and to others. Where I find myself availing myself of the fallacies tu quoque or two wrongs make a right, I am rationalizing injustice, and the worst havoc I am wreaking is upon my own ego.

The Nazarene’s answer to Socrates was this: It is better to have an injury inflicted upon you, because redemption is still possible to one who has not inflicted injury upon another. I don’t believe in an afterlife and I don’t believe redemption hinges upon any one event. But I do believe that a “justice” that is itself unjust is vain at best and evil at worst.

We can make a joke by saying, “Political philosophy is the means by which ethical systems betray themselves.” There are actually a host of reasons for this, and all of them are amusing to me. For one, a political system has a meta-goal apart from the ethical system in which it is rooted: It must function in the real world.

Moreover, the political system itself has a meta-ethical or even extra-ethical goal in that its proponents will tend to imbue it with what they view are essential survival characteristics even if these betray the ethical system in which the political philosophy is putatively based. Any form of argument that the polity can or should or must do what it would be immoral or criminal for any individual to do is a form of this error. The counter is, but if we don’t inflict this injury, the polity won’t survive. And the counter to that is that a dispute resolution Read more

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Inventing Real Estate 2.0

Welcome to BloodhoundBlog, the national real estate industry marketing and technology weblog written by, for and about real estate professionals. Better yet, welcome to the wired world of real estate. We are busily inventing Real Estate 2.0 – technology, marketing, service and salesmanship. Like all Bloodhounds, we are smart, frisky and fiercely independent. We've built a spot on the earth – beloved over all – where each one of us can be who we are, no matter who that might be. We are committed to an idea of excellence that will flush the bums, the con-men and the crybabies out of the real estate industry. If you yearn to have your failures excused, your moral lapses absolved or your boo-boos kissed, seek elsewhere. But if you are sick to death of mediocrity – welcome home. Read all about us, subscribe to our feed and steel yourself for the hunt. We work hard, we play hard, we learn everything we can – and we bow to no one.

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