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October 4, 2009

The quest for the paperless office: Scanning

by

Raleigh Criminal Lawyer

Author website

If you want to build a paperless law office, then avoid the practice of criminal law. While other parts of the legal system are slowly, but surely, moving into an electronic and paperless future, all important documents in a criminal practice need to be produced in hardcopy form.

And so I do have to maintain and secure client files.

Still I’m finding ways to minimize the paper flow. My discoveries may make sense to you in your real estate business, so I’ll share them here from time to time.

Today: The scanner.

I need something that is fast, produces good quality scans (but need not reproduce the Mona Lisa in all its glory), and is inexpensive. Right now my firm is me. But later I expect to add a support person and additional attorneys.

So I want something that can be networked so that colleagues can share the scanner.

I think I’ve found a solution: The Fujitsu ScanSnap S1500. I got the S1500M – the “M” is for Mac. It’s roughly $400 from Amazon, although I bought mine slightly cheaper. For the $400, Fujitsu throws in the latest version of Acrobat Professional, which itself runs more than $250 retail.

I haven’t fully exploited Acrobat Professional, but I’m sure it’s got some features I could incorporate into my workflow.

But I have worked with the ScanSnap for the past two months, and it’s been nearly flawless. It’s fast – Fujitsu claims 20 pages a minute – and handles a pile of documents of all sizes, automatically adjusting the scanner to accommodate different sizes.

Very rarely the multi-document feeder jams on a document that’s folded or wrinkled. But fixing the jam is painless. Most of the time the scanner powers through like a champ. Just put the documents into the feeder, and press the scan button. The scanner handles the rest.

This is a color scanner, but I have not used it to scan in photos so couldn’t say whether the scan quality is good enough for anything but the most basic color scanning.

Best of all, the scanner is only 12 inches by 6 inches, so Read more

October 3, 2009

The Self Correcting Loop: Another Loop Brought To You By GenuineChris

by

Instigator, anthill kicker.

Author website

When I was a mortgage guy, when I doubled my volume and income in 2007, I did it because I created systems and loops.

Systems: do the same thing every time.

Loops: have an end point that, on every job, fixes the system.

At the end of every transaction, no matter how routine, I would write down the points of friction, error and mistake. I’d write down EVERYTHING, try to get the # of phone calls down, focusing on delays and customer impacting changes.

I learned to have “Accurate Hud-1, Day 1” as a standard that I forced title companies to adhere to.
I sent DAILY updates to every party to the transaction: buyer, seller, listing agent, selling agent, title company. I stopped doing business with buyers that didn’t like this. That practice preserved good will on one transaction that had been put in a flood zone that requires flood insurance, to the benefit of all parties.
This was stuff that I learned because of operational flexibility. I had a survey for my customers, and myself. The one for myself I was more concerned with. “How many touches/phonecalls/passes…did this need,” and most importantly, “what can I do better next time.”

I Ignored My Own Advice When I Learned a New Business.

What Can I do better? That question, on every deal, no matter how routine, makes us better practitioners. When I went into the Web marketing thing, I avoided it for a while as I learned the topography and what I was good at. I was too focused on making ends meet. The teeth of the hydra–the nonsense that is the IRS–was upon me, so I was focused on right now selling.
When you’re burdened by time debt, you don’t have the operational flexibility to be proactive. When scarcity creeps in, you can’t be as proactive as you want. You feel scared. And your flailing and not doing the work that makes the most difference.
I had a mediocre business, that is now enjoying rapid improvement by having a self correcting loop.

What Is A Self Correcting Read more

October 2, 2009

Is it time for a second Vook at Brad Inman’s latest brain fart?

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Believe it or don’t, just yesterday I was telling Cathleen that I felt remiss in not having made fun of the Vook lately. The Vook, as you will recall, is Brad Inman’s latest attempt to prove that he stumbled onto half a billion bucks by accident. The trouble is, as he is discovering, pissing away that kind of dough isn’t easy, no matter how clueless you are — and Inman takes a back-seat to no one at cluelessness.

Even so, I need to issue a mea culpa of my own: The Vook has actually made it to the marketplace, a feat I would have bet against. Simon and Schuster — which has always made all of its profits from crossword puzzle books — turns out to be possessed of its own Inmaniacal cluelessness: The New York publisher is issuing Vook content, apparently because its printed books are not already selling badly enough.

But: Don’t despair. Even though there are very few people who are stupid enough to buy this stupid gadget, the Vook will still serve a purpose in the history of marketing: It will make the Zune look popular by contrast.

October 2, 2009

Screenflow Rocks: 30 Minutes End to End.

by

Instigator, anthill kicker.

Author website

Brian, Sean, into the breech I go.  I had wanted to stay out of Politics since the heartbreak of the campaign last year (organizational dysfunction at the highest level).  I wanted to steer clear, but I got sucked in.

It’s a bad idea to think about politics because then instead of pounding the damn phones, you get sucked into this stuff.

This took a half hour for me, end to end.  Screen flow rocks.  Call me sometime if you want one that tells Your story.  Given more time, they turn out better, but speed is what kills.  The fast DO eat the slow.

This video was made with 3 things:

Screenflow.

Garage Band (for the U2 Loop).

8.5 x 11″ sheet of paper to tell the story.

This was more of a proof of concept–telling a story in 30 minutes or so.  I downloaded and quickly edited youtube video supporting what story I was going to tell (namely that Sarah Palin could be president, and that Sarah Palin needn’t be in my crotch).

This was done rapidly–I’m aware that there are transition goofs and I don’t plan to fix them.  They are my fault, not Screenflow’s.  I was trying to do something in a timed fashion,

But, I used to have to splice Screenflow in with keynote, and I will still likely use keynote, but not as much with the new version of Screenflow.

Screenflow + live type does everything that you’d want from a NLE with the exception of chroma key.  I do wish that Keynote had some sort of output-to-alpha type function, or transparent backgrounds.

Speed is what matters.  If I was (and thank God I had the sense to quit) still a loan officer, you damn well better believe I’d do a screenflow talking head each and every day with rates and other stuff.  You could be end-to-end in 10 minutes, and your arrows would quickly block out the sun.

I’ll indulge myself over the weekend with another video, and demonstration of A/B testing with Google Website Optimizer at a new little thing Bawld Guy and I are doing.

October 1, 2009

BloodhoundBlog Radio: FHA/VA in 2010 (with Tony Gallegos)

by

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

Author website

Wondering about the future of VA home loans and FHA mortgages?  Listen to my interview with Bloodhound Blog contributor, Tony Gallegos.  We discuss:

  • San Diego County VA mortgage statistics (the market share number is going to astound you) 
  • Why VA loans have the lowest default rate among all four major loan types (including conventional prime).
  • Why FHA isn’t really going broke (contrary to my earlier statement, it’s doing quite well)
  • Why lenders are initiation stricter guidelines on FHA loans than HUD requires
  • Why I suggest that HUD is asking FHA-approved lenders to do the “heavy lifting” for them

The interview last about 40 minutes; the perfect treadmill companion. 

Listen to it here.

October 1, 2009

The Jobs Report – what’s it going to mean for mortgage rates?

by

Mortgage Officer

Author website

Okay, it’s hard to believe but tomorrow morning is the first Friday of the month again.    Where has the year gone?   In some ways it has flown by and in other ways it seems like it’s been about two or three years.   Know what I mean?

Any way, tomorrow morning is the jobs report that shows the statistics for the month of September.   I’ve had a lot of people asking me what I think it’s going to show and what I think it’s going to do to mortgage rates.    I’m going to lay out what I think are the four most likely outcomes and their potential impact on mortgage rates.  At the end of the piece, I’ll put my “projections” on which one is most likely to occur.

The Jobs Report Comes In Better Than Expected – Remember, it’s not so much the actual number as it is the difference between market expectations and the actual numbers.   But, if the jobs report comes in better than expected, here’s what I expect will happen:

  • People will feel better than they did about the prospects for a recovery in the economy.
  • People and institutional investors will move money (lots of it – how much depends on how much better) from the bond market and cash and put it into the stock market.
  • The stock market will have a very nice upward swing.
  • The bond market and mortgage backed securities will suffer from the movement of money.
  • Mortgage Rates will go up.

The Jobs Report Comes in about as expected – status quo, mediocre, we just sort of limp along.   If that’s the case, I expect we’d see a “non-reaction” in the markets.

The Jobs Report Comes in Worse Than Expected – a little bit worse, but not a huge amount worse.   If that’s what happens, here’s what I expect:

  • People will feel worse about the prospects for recovery in the economy and we’re Read more
October 1, 2009

DocuSign may be the best friend Realtors have ever had

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Okay, so all the Realtors know that short sales are like a jack-in-the-box: You crank and crank for weeks or months and nothing happens, then everything pops all at once.

Happened to me today, with the Sphinx-link bank suddenly lurching to life in order to issue two must-rush-now documents that reiterate terms my buyers have already agreed to.

That doesn’t matter. Must-rush-now! Must-have-today! Must return to hibernating state no later than 5 pm.

So Mom is at home and Dad’s at work — and both of them are 35 miles away from me.

We could trade faxes, but the originals are already barely readable.

But: No worries: We’ve got DocuSign on our side.

I set up the whole workflow: I sign, Mom signs, Dad signs — and then the whole package goes back to the lister, all untouched by human hands.

Note that I set everything up so that I could leave if I needed to, once I had signed, and the rest of the job would percolate through the ether on its own. I love this feature, since I no longer have to nurse documents.

But, as it works out, the whole job, Tinkers to Evers to Chance, was done in seven minutes flat.

I plan to write more about DocuSign when I have more time, but for now: If you don’t have DocuSign, get it. Your time is your money, and, in consequence, this is some of the best money you will ever spend.

And now the bank can roll over and go back to sleep…

 
P.S.: Just got confirmation that the lister has the documents. Twenty-two minutes total.

September 30, 2009

The Reading List: 8 “No BS” Books to Make You Better

by

Instigator, anthill kicker.

Author website

Get tactical.  Everyone wants some “grand strategy” or “new initiative.  But mastering tactics at the battlefield level is how 90% of us can earn money faster than the government steal it.  It’s all about Tactics, not Strategy.  Mastering tactics means that you are doing something towards a goal.  Something, anything that’s reasonable is better than fine tuning a meticulous plan.  I fell into the planning trap.   Loads of people have.  Doing something right now, fast, and done is the way to win.

Since making the switch from Stephen Covey to David Allen, I’ve paid off most of my IRS debt, I’ve built a business that works, and I’ve become better at living life on earth.   Stephen Covey principles work, no doubt, but rejiggering some life plan isn’t meaningful until you can make the pile of paperwork on your desk your bitch. That is practical, real and doable.

When Phil said “I hate coaching,” what I really hate is some notion of a program that isn’t held accountable to specific results.  Buying a marketing widget that “costs less than a closing?” Everything you do has to be held accountable to a result.  When Greg talked about A/B Testing, that was the expression of an idea: observe stuff with your own eyes.  Create an OODA loop.

Getting on the path to be an automatically improving being required that I go grab some knowledge.

1.) Getting Things Done, David Allen: The most important book on this list, by far.  Read, pracitce, understand fully GTD principles.  Make the papers and endles op

2.) On War: Von Clausewitz: Great book about going all in when you find yourself in conflict.  There are no half measures, if you don’t have passion behind the stuff you’re doing, simply don’t do it.

3.) Tested advertising methods: John Caples/etc.  This is about writing copy that works, that isn’t necessarily “clever” and that performs.  The book is solid and you can see that people don’t follow it much.  Copy that tells you what to expect and produces no “WTF” type responses is the goal.  And it’s easier to write than the nuanced cleverness that people go Read more

September 29, 2009

Save the world from home in your spare time!

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

I’ve known for more than a year that I want to write a book about what we’re getting wrong.

As a species, that is.

Through all of human history.

Surely that’s a man-sized ambition — and perhaps also a new high-water mark for the abstract concept denoted by the word “hubris.”

That’s as may be. In truth, this is an undertaking I would rather not undertake. For one thing, I’m busy and, in consequence, I’m physically tired much of the time. For another, this is less a thankless job than it is a task for which I can reasonably expect to be punished. Not officially punished, one may hope, but it seems likely that I will be derided, hectored or hounded, as I proceed with this project. I don’t shun that sort of thing, not ever, but it’s not something I actively court.

But none of that matters. The ideas I want to talk about drive me wild — in the best of all possible senses. I abhor every form of the claim of unchosen duty, and yet I feel that I must go through all this, that I cannot live in peace, much less die in peace, until I have transcribed every bit of everything that races through my brain.

But I can laugh at myself, too, so much am I alike, in my incipient dotage, to Dostoevsky’s Underground Man: “I am a sick man. I am a spiteful man.” Saving the world is a madman’s obsession, after all, a belfry awaiting its loyal complement of bats.

[Continue reading here, if you like. This project is way off topic even for a blog as topically-liberated as BloodhoundBlog, so if you want to follow along at home, the main action will be at SplendorQuest.com.]

September 29, 2009

Do Today’s home prices reflect their market value?

by

Realtor, Media Mogul

Author website

Can you really look at a buyer today and tell them that they are buying their home at a good price?  Sure, you can tell them how the price they are paying compares to what folks have been paying the last few months, or few years.  But that doesn’t mean that what you are seeing is the true market price!  The actual market price can’t be determined without a free market.  Right now, we have anything but a free and stable market in real estate.

Take the government’s free ice cream housing promotion, also known as the Homebuyer Tax Credit.  The issue I’m concerned about isn’t that it is going to cost taxpayers about 15 billion dollars if it is allowed to expire on November 30.  Nor is the issue that it has cost $43,500 that we, our children and grandchildren will somehow have to pay for each new buyer attracted into the program according to the NAR numbers.  The issue is it has artificially increased the value of homes in the market by $8000 and that will end on November 30th, or sometime.

So, that $250,000 home your client just bought and put a mortgage on is really only worth $242,000 when that market distortion is removed.  With an FHA loan, and a program to use the tax credit for a down payment, guess who is already upside down in their purchase?  Does this sound anything like the too recent past?

Our tax code is already heavily skewed towards home ownership.  With our government’s current spending spree and their desire to raise taxes, could the sacred mortgage interest tax deduction eventually be reduced?

While that is probably not the immediate threat, the current rulers prefer government solutions to allowing the private market to function.  Be it FHA or State Housing Programs for low income borrowers, a monetary policy of rock bottom interest rates and the mortgage interest deduction the programs and the proposals coming forth further distort the market.

This makes the biggest risk in a real estate investment strategy or even a home purchase predicting the future changes in artificial supports to the market Read more

September 29, 2009

BHB-style lawyer marketing – from the trenches

by

International Tax Lawyer

Author website

This is a long-delayed post. A thank you to BHB. A clue for others to see, use, follow. This post is about marketing techniques. A case study. A “you can do this, too.”

Apology in advance

Gregg, please pardon the backlinking to myself. I don’t like to pee in the pool by hyping myself, but the project I’m backlinking to is almost over, and will be worthless by the 15th of October, so I have no long term benefit from this. I’m deliberately not linking to my main website.

The world we live in

BHB is interesting to me. The philosophy (treat your customers like humans, get ’em smart, treat ’em right), the approach (use the tools that Teh Interwebs give ya), the people.

The real estate world is hidebound and burdened with useless historical debris. But the law world is worse. Lawyering is a closed shop industry and the State Bar is hellbent on protecting union members. Using ideas imported proudly from Elizabethan England.

BHB-style thinking and action to me is what the individual can do — constructively — to rage against the machine. (Hmmm. Good name for a band, I think.)

The opportunity

First, background. The IRS announced a voluntary disclosure program in late March, 2009 — people with money hidden offshore could Come to Jesus and avoid criminal prosecution for tax evasion.

I’m an international tax lawyer. Ding-ding-ding.

Seizing the opportunity

With help and coaching (ha! Chris hates that word!) from GenuineChris I launched www.foreignbankaccountamnesty.com. Simple WordPress install, various plug-ins, no biggie.

With me so far? Yep. All of you have launched blogs. Ain’t but a few of you who have made money on them. Listen up.

Get to work

Here’s what happened next. Chris Johnson harangued me. “Write!” he commanded. I wrote like an SOB. I remember one time when he said “It doesn’t matter what you write, just write.” As if content doesn’t matter. My “A” student overachiever feelings were hurt. But I wrote. Brute Force SEO. That’s what we Read more

September 29, 2009

World Health Organization lowers the safe breathing radon gas level: further complicating Real Estate transactions

by

Realtor, Guerilla Technologist

Author website

New standards released by the World Health Organization (WHO) on September 23, 2009 have taken a huge stance on the odorless cancer causing, radon gas.  The World Health Organization has taken the already safe4.0 pCi/L and reduced the safe breathing gas level down to 2.7 pCi/!  Who cares, right?  Well, I care especially living the Midwest where we have basements.  Basements are a wonderful source for radon gas leaking into the home through cracks in the basement floor.

You’re writing an offer to purchase with a customer and it’s determined for the safety of the family you’ll go ahead with a radon gas test.  Typically radon gas tests start out at $125 up till about $175 in the Wisconsin market.  The home inspector you’ve hired happens to also tests for radon gas so he kills two birds with one stone.  The home inspector hands over his findings; the report states the average level of radon gas in the basement is 3.2pCi/L.  Perfect were all set to go!  Actually we are not.  The buying side of the transaction states the NEW industry standard is now 2.7pCi/L according to the World Health Organization!  The Selling side states, the World Health Organization does not over-ride the Environmental Protection Agency’s safe operating level of 4.0pCi/L.

The Realtor now has a problem that needs to solved between buyer and seller in order to get a commission.  Who is correct is this matter; buyer or seller?  Remember…RADON kills…right?

The National Association of REALTORS has advised the EPA standard is still operative or law. The World Health Organization’s suggested standard has no legal or regulatory status as a binding authority.

READERS!  IT’S IMPORTANT TO UNDERSTAND —> As industry professionals we need to draft accurate contracts without complicating our transactions.  Simple and Effective are the two words that immediately come to mind.  Remember to specify in your contracts what level of radon is acceptable before mitigation is required.   Just because we know the EPA standards legally apply, does not mean the buyer uses the EPA standard even though its law.

Below I plagiarized a statistical graph from the EPA.gov website.

EPA estimates
that radon
causes
thousands
of cancer
deaths in
the Read more
September 29, 2009

Dave, Gary, Jim – Ready to Conquer Video and Double Global Market Share?

by

Retechulous...

Author website

Over at Agent Genius, Amy Chorew has a post up entitled “How One Company Conquered Video”. The post was obviously a nice plug for one of the principles of Coldwell Banker premier in Berlin Connecticut and a local video company, but it somehow set me off a bit.

Here was my comment on the post:

Conquered Video?

The local CB’s approach, while more progressive than most was likely a wasted effort. Fred’s right, these are lame. And Bob’s right. How is anyone gonna see these things?

What Coldwell Banker should do is this:

1. Work out a deal with Flip or Vado so that their agents can buy cameras at a discount.

2. Help each of their agents set up a Youtube account and understand how to upload videos from their cameras and do some very basic editing using Youtube’s built in features.

3. Assign each agent a theme to video around. Examples: Neighborhood Driving Videos, Interviews With Home Sellers, Interviews With Home Buyers, Featured Businesses, etc.

4. Give each company agent a Video Blog page (on a larger company Video Site) featuring a youtube gallery similar to the approach on display over at PropertunityKnocks.Com.

5. Make sure effective lead capture elements are built into these video blog pages.

6. Promote the overall video blog site to the public via a massive Facebook ads campaign.

The result?

Coldwell Banker does something that would accomplish a lot more for their agents (and the company as a whole) then working out some sleazy affiliate relationship with a vendor and taking a little something more from their agents.

Sorry for being skeptical here. But doesn’t it seem more like CB conquered their agents wallets here a little more effectively than they did video?

(I feel a little bad about that last part because I wrote it before my first cup of coffee. While it’s possible the local broker had an affiliate relationship with the local broker, it’s not fair to assume they did. Instead I wish I’d congradulated that broker for at least trying instead of being so grumpy. But oh well…)

The point is this. It’s now more possible for large Brokers to “conquer video” than Read more

September 28, 2009

FHA Broker Approval Delegated to Approved DE Lenders: Will This Squeeze Out Smaller Players?

by

Mortgage Technologist

Author website

Over the last eight days, calls from my clients and mortgage associates having been growing on a daily basis concerning the recent announcement by the FHA delegating mortgage broker approval to originate FHA loans to approved DE lenders. Quite frankly, many small lenders and mortgage brokers are concerned the mega-lenders will yield a big stick and force the smaller players out of the FHA playing field.

In this video, I provide an overview of the concerns, share background information and then present my thoughts.

FHA Delegates Broker Approval to DE Lenders

Note: This is my first video, so please excuse any rookie production mistakes.

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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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