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December 26, 2008

The Case Against Paid Reviews: Why Agents & Vendors Should Never Use Them.

by

Instigator, anthill kicker.

Author website

First a disclaimer:  I’ve done fine on the web.  Made great money connecting with clients that don’t know, used to know, and kinda know me.  A lot on LiveJournal till I left, and even more on Facebook.  I’ll make more money in 2009.   A second disclaimer:  I hope that this post makes me tens of thousands of dollars by attracting to me the type of person I wanna do business with.  So this post is written for perfectly selfish reasons, but we all have that on the table now…and can move forward.   I guess with that said, every single post I write here or elsewhere…I write with the intent of connecting with someone cool.

When I first joined BHB, no less than 3  ‘vendors’ that currently advertise elsewhere on the RE.NET looked at me and assumed that I’d be the type to shill their products.  I wasn’t ever offered cash, but I was offered to use the product and see if I like it.   I was too busy at the time, and didn’t give a shit about those particular products. I don’t know if I would have taken cash, I wasn’t asked, so I can’t answer that question.   What I do know is that I blew it off because the products didn’t seem interesting.  Who cares about some new CRM that manages your showings or whatever…

Vendors invariably harm themselves with paid reviews.   When you coopt a voice like Agent Genuis with ad money and reviews, you short circuit your ability go gain feedback.    If you’re trying to make anything better and different, you must be able to rely on places like AG to give you honest feeback on your product.  You either want to advertise it–which is what Todd at Lenderama does transparently and honestly…or you want to improve it.   Co-opting the people that have influence is not the way to get actionable feedback. It’s also an insult to them: it basically says hey, we like your readers, but we will give you money instead of listening to your ideas.

The RE.NET is packed with bright people.   More valuable than the Read more

December 26, 2008

Do You Know How to Iron?

by

Real Estate Renaissance Man

Author website

I attended a Christmas dinner party earlier this week.  It followed the script of most such dinner parties, which is to say: it was remarkable – the same way almost all social gatherings turn out to be remarkable.  They start slow: a few people in various corners of the living room, their conversations hushed and directed at the same person who accompanied them through the door not ten minutes earlier.  Then the wine is opened, some appetizers are laid out and enough people show up that a tipping point occurs.  As if by design the conversation hubs begin to move, some groups grow in size while others diminish, strangers are pulled in and couples become less dependent upon each other.  Eventually, the dinner is served and new friends engage in cross conversations around the table.  It is a predictable, if not awkward transformation leading to a unique treasure each and every time.

This party was no different.  I sat down on the couch and was soon engaged in a wonderful conversation.  Forced to guess her age I would say sixty, but she could have been seventy and she could have been fifty.  She was well traveled and she was observant.  It was easy to sense a certain wisdom in her person and I was fascinated.  She had recently returned from a trip to Europe and exuded a confident happiness that intrigued me.  “What’s the secret?” I asked.  She looked at me for a moment, trying to gauge whether I would understand her answer I supposed, then replied, “I iron my clothes now.”  She could see in my face that I was confused and I could see in hers that she had gauged correctly.  “Over in Europe, people still care,”  and she went on to explain how Europeans were more considered in the clothes they wore and how they looked.  This appealed to her in comparison with the casualness prevalent in America.  So… now she irons her clothes every morning.  It requires a little extra time and a little extra effort but it makes her day special.

I thought about that conversation all the Read more

December 24, 2008

Holiday Greetings from the left coast

by

Commercial Real Estate Broker

Author website

A classic Holiday (er, winter solstice) Greeting from a friend in Lodi (hat tip to Rolff):

Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit my best wishes 
for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, 
non-addictive, gender neutral celebration of the winter solstice 
holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the 
religious persuasion or secular practices of your choice, with 
respect for the religious/secular persuasions and/or traditions of 
others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all;

PLUS

A fiscally successful, personally fulfilling, and medically 
uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted 
calendar year, but not without due respect for the calendars of 
choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped 
make America great, (not to imply that America is necessarily greater 
than any other country or is the only “AMERICA” in the western 
hemisphere), and without regard to race, creed, color, age, physical 
ability, religious faith, or choice of computer platform.

(Disclaimer: By accepting this greeting, you are accepting these 
terms. This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is 
freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It 
implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the 
wishes for her/himself or others, and is void where prohibited by 
law, and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish 
is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of 
good tidings for a period of one year, or until the issuance of a 
subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is 
limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the 
sole discretion of the wisher who assumes no responsibility for any 
unintended emotional stress these greetings may bring to those not 
caught up in the holiday spirit.)

And you wonder why they can’t balance the budget in California.. Merry Christmas..

December 24, 2008

My own little gift on Christmas Eve: I’ve discovered a way that a contributor to BloodhoundBlog can get fired…

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

I would ask, is this sick-making to me alone? — but I heard about it from a nauseated reader before I had seen it myself.

We don’t take any money out of this site at all, not even Amazon affiliate fees. I don’t want for anyone reading BloodhoundBlog ever to doubt our integrity.

I am repelled by advertising on real estate weblogs, but taking in-kind bribes for pimping vendors and their dubious wares is simply corrupt.

Until today, there were no rules for BloodhoundBlog contributors — if for no other reason than because it had never occurred to me that anyone could do something this disgusting, much less celebrate it. Today we inaugurate our first rule:

If you write for us and if you have taken bribes in the form of cash or merchandise from a vendor, please send me your resignation. If I find out that any BloodhoundBlog contributor has taken bribes from a vendor, I will fire you on the spot. I love having our contributors here, but we each one of us have to be above reproach, now and always. This is the way I built this place, and thus it will remain, even if I have to go back to writing alone.

The one bright spot in this, for me, is that not one of these jackals made their bribe offers to me.

Un-frolicking-believable…

I have two more posts scheduled for the day, but I’m so angry I could spit. I’m going to mix myself a drink and toast, one by one, the people I know for sure I can trust.

December 24, 2008

By publishing enough of the right information, Mom and Pop teams can triumph over Redfin, VOWs, Realty.bots or big-name brokers

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

I’d like to introduce you to some really nice folks. Take a look:

The couple on the left are the Anybodys, Jeff and Janice. Jeff is a middle-manager for GE. Unless he owns a Pizza Hut. Unless he’s a Civil Engineer for the county health department. Janice is a schoolteacher — or a stay-at-home mom — or the assistant manager of the parts department at the Saturn dealership.

On the right is their real estate agent — real live real estate agent Allie Howard.

This is good real estate marketing, profoundly effective in all kinds of ways. Virtually anybody can see themselves as the Anybodys. They are exceptional examples of everything that is unexceptional in American middle-class life. And Allie is just geeky enough, just semi-hip enough, just po-mo enough and just down-to-business enough to connect with the Anybodys in the intense but decisively temporary marriage that is a home search.

Everything in this photo is perfect. The clothing is casual but expensive — in just the right colors. That hand-written type face is an homage to the “Hello!” of the original Macintosh. Everything about this image is devised to make you feel comfortable about proceeding with a real estate transaction with Allie.

So who is responsible for this inspired piece of marketing?

Redfin.com, that’s who.

That’s right, the home of the geeks is working very hard to become the just-geeky-enough place for Janice — not Jeff — to shop for a home.

Just two weeks ago, Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman was wondering among the Bloodhounds if hi-tech companies like his would crush all the Mom and Pop brokerages. But here we see that self-same Kelman working very hard to compete with Mom and Pop on their own turf.

Let me make two interstitial points, if I might.

First, do not underestimate Glenn Kelman. We’ve beat up on a lot of people in the last 30 months, but, as far as I can tell, Glenn Kelman is the only one among them who is actively trying to figure out what he’s getting wrong. That doesn’t mean we have been right, necessarily. But Kelman is going to keep testing and revising his Read more

December 23, 2008

The Frog and Scorpion (Millenium Edition)

by

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

Author website

Rod Blagojevich tried to sell the Illinois Senate seat, recently vacated by President-Elect Obama.  Blago is to public service what Bernard Madoff is to investment advisory; a modern day pirate, raping and plundering.  Their sociopathic behavior is exacerbated by their belief that position implies entitlement.  If you’re a believer, there is a special place in hell for them. You’ll hear Blago take the stand and offer this defense, in a classic Midwestern dialect,

“I didn’t do nuttin’ wrong. Daat’s how things get done in Chi-caago. ”

He’ll walk and that will be that.  How do I know this?    He wants to fight the charges:

“I’m not going to quit my job. I’m not going to do what my accusers and political enemies have done and that is talk about this case in 30 second sound bites. I am dying to show you how innocent I am. I intend to answer every allegation that comes my way.”

I think Blago’s DYING to speak out because he’s got the dirt on the whole Illinois political machine.  It’s a festering wound, oozing pus from a century of infection and I believe it’s reach extends from the freshest of aldermen to the highest office in our land. You shouldn’t care about this because “Daat’s the Chi-caago Way”.  Illinois voters price corruption into the market when they vote because they have no choice.

Here’s why you should be pissed off; Banks are refusing to disclose the uses of TARP funds:

Goldman:  When pressed for what the TARP money was being used for, Goldman Sachs replied that it is spent to “facilitate client activity in the capital markets.”

Morgan:  Of the 16 banks that were contacted by ABC News and asked how they were spending the hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars, only one bank pointed to a specific loan that it made with the cash. That was a $17 billion loan that Morgan Stanley made to Verizon Wireless.

Keep in mind that both Goldman and Morgan relinquished their status as securities firms and applied for Federal bank charters.  The brokers became bankers; members of the 3-6-3 club.    Did you expect this to Read more

December 23, 2008

Learning to Appreciate the Arts

by

Real Estate Renaissance Man

Author website

Not everyone appreciates the entertainment value of watching the body politic.  But I do.  I stand hands on hips, amazed by the intricate movements each player contributes to their tap dance around the truth.  I listen to their spin, enthralled by the rhythm and stunned by their ability to stand upon the dais and look us in the eyes.  For all its pleasures though, most dedicated fans recognize the elements of tragedy that underlie every production.  There may be action and there will most certainly be humor; but the end is always the same: hubris and self-importance combine to bring about tragedy.  In the audience we may see it coming, but our recognition is too late to avert the inevitable.

Residents of California have been blessed with a double header as of late; two shows for the price of one.  True aficionados of this delicate art form will not only revel in the production value both shows offer, but the clever juxtaposition between them – the contrasting views of power they represent.

On the main stage we find the Federal Players and their prime-time rendition of The King and I.  The legislative branch of democracy writes a blank check and hands it to King Henry (Paulson) and his trusty side-kick President Bush.  They spend it on assorted items, many never contemplated when the check was written.  The legislature must be commended, however, for its heartfelt portrayal of the country bumpkins who did not see any of this coming.  In the final act, a chagrined upper house – the Senate – reasserts itself.  They choose not to spend money they don’t have on an industry that does not deserve it.  (This decision aligns with the wishes of the audience, but we assume the relationship to be coincidental more than causal.)  At the last moment: a twist!  We see the King spending the money anyway!  He usurps the Legislature’s constitutional and historical role as the means of appropriation.  It is a dramatic twist, shocking in its brazen contempt for law.  As the curtain comes down the audience is too dazzled by it all to recognize Read more

December 22, 2008

Peace on Earth, Goodwill to men…

by

The Real Estate Group, Virginia Beach and Chesapeake VA

Author website

One of the things you may not know about me is that I have two passions that most of my online friends do not see. I love to cook. I also love to sing (in a choir, where my mediocrity has a hiding place-grin). I particularly get a thrill out of Christmas carols. They are important markers of time and immovable objects for me in a life that changes at a frenetic pace.

My favorite Christmas carol? I heard the bells on Christmas day. Yet it was only yesterday that I took the time to learn the backstory behind Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, it’s lyricist. Here’s a version of it from The Carpenters on YouTube.

I recommend a quick overview of his life here. I admire the man.

Much of the best writing in life comes from the dark place that is tragedy. What was going on in Longfellow’s life as penned the words “For hate is strong and mocks the song, of peace on earth, goodwill to men.”? The war between the states. His own son was severely injured in the war and would be maimed for the rest of his life. What else was going on? He was grieving the loss of his beloved wife in a tragic fire that took her life and, (in his efforts to save her), burned him severely. The beard that Longfellow is known for reportedly came from the fact that he could no longer shave due to those burns. This happened in 1861.

The loneliness and darkness of the death of his wife along with the despair of the war were the backdrop for the poem that later became the carol. From those dark Civil War days of sadness and loss, came the beautiful words: “Til ringing, singing on it’s way the world revolved from night to day.” “The wrong shall fail, the right prevail…with peace on earth, goodwill to men.”

Since we are REALLY good at procrastinating sending cards… From the real TeamEric to each of you:

We wish you “Peace on Earth, Goodwill to Men.” Merry Christmas. And here’s to a successful 2009 for Read more

December 21, 2008

John Kalinowski’s custom real estate signs — and his custom-made approach to everything at his new Cleveland real estate brokerage

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Totally stunning email this morning from John Kalinowski of LiquidBlueRealty.com. John is a profile in courage, to my way of looking at things. He’s just launched a brand new brokerage. In this real estate market. In Cleveland. He’s being very sweet to the Bloodhounds in this note, but this is an amazing amount of work he has undertaken:

I finally had a minute to sit down and send you a note, to thank you for all the help you’ve provided me, even though you weren’t aware you were helping! I’ve been following your site for quite some time now, absorbing every little tidbit possible, and in the last two weeks left RE/MAX to start my own brokerage in the Cleveland Market, Liquid Blue Realty. I’m building the entire company around the custom sign idea, and so far the response has been incredible, to say the least!

I am eternally grateful to the Bloodhounds (and to Russell Shaw) for all the inspiration that has pushed me to make this move. I even built my own website, using WordPress and the Thesis template, even though I’ve never had a blog or built a site before. I probably wouldn’t know what WordPress was if I hadn’t started following your site.

Our signs are 24″x36″, just like yours, but are actually printed directly onto a sign material that is made of some sort of hard plastic with aluminum bonded to each side. Our printer owns what amounts to a giant inkjet printer that can basically print on anything that will fit inside (I’ve seen them print on a bedroom door!), and uses waterproof ink. They use the same process to print conventional signs for other agents, and the panels are about 1/8″ thick and weigh about 5 lbs, so these are serious signs.

Believe it or not, I create my sign files on a PC! I start with MS Publisher with a full-size 24×36 image, then print to a PDF using Acrobat Distiller at 300 DPI. I then jump between Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop to fix the CMYK values on the blue color, and to create the huge 350mb Read more

December 21, 2008

The Way of the Farmer, a video podcast from BloodhoundBlog Unchained in Phoenix, 2008: Using the internet, social media and direct marketing to farm for listings

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Here is both the best and the worst of BloodhoundBlog Unchained so far.

It’s the best, or a piece of the best, because it covers a great deal of hard-nosed, hard-boiled, hard-headed nuts and bolts real estate sales technology in rapid-fire fashion.

It’s the worst, or of a piece with the worst, because it’s me delivering a lecture, rather than us doing the work I’m talking about.

There won’t be any lecturing at BloodhoundBlog Unchained in Phoenix, but there will be a whole lot of the doing of hard-nosed, hard-boiled, hard-headed nuts and bolts real estate sales technology.

This video represents just a slice of the content on the DVDs from BloodhoundBlog Unchained in Phoenix, 2008. We’ve learned a lot since then, and we’ve learned a lot about how to share what we know, so what we really want is for you to come to BloodhoundBlog Unchained in Phoenix this year. But if you can’t do that, there’s a whole lot of great information covered on those DVDs. If you can’t be with us in April — or even if you can — the DVD set could be a great Christmas gift for your career.

We’re marketers, and because of that we know that sales increase when the barriers to commitment are low. So let’s commit, shall we?

Enroll now for BloodhoundBlog Unchained in Phoenix

If you’re ready to rock, all you have to do from here is click a PayPal button to reserve your place at BloodhoundBlog Unchained in Phoenix. The event runs from April 28th to May 1st, 2009. Many more details can be found at the BloodhoundBlog Unchained in Phoenix weblog.

Fair warning: This won’t be cheap. If you’re looking for the best possible deal, and if you qualify, joining the CyberProfessionals might be your best bet. And if you’ve entrusted us with your money before, either last May in Phoenix or in November in Orlando, we want to express our gratitude with a special Unchained Alumnus price. But whatever you end up paying, we’re going to make it worth your while and then some.

Here’s how the prices break out. Just click on the appropriate button Read more

December 20, 2008

Joe Strummer: My thoughts on the looming crisis

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

“Joe Strummer” is the pseudonym of a frequent commenter on BloodhoundBlog. He runs a weblog of his own — under a different pseudonym — and leads a life of joy, contemplation and undisturbed privacy under his real name. But no matter how he is denominated, Strummer is an expert in the Austrian School of Economics, a colloquium of great minds who are, alas, the eternally unheeded Cassandras of the decline of Western Capitalism. In this essay, penned yesterday, Strummer shares with us his reflections upon the burgeoning economic crisis:

 
My thoughts on the looming crisis

by Joe Strummer

This is a graph of the nominal value of the assets that the Fed has “owned” over time. Notice the fairly flat, slightly rising line until September/October of 2008.

Two points about this graph. First, the Fed did not get value for the $1.2 trillion it has purchased in “assets” since October. The $1.2 trillion in nominal value is actually nearly worthless. That’s because these “assets” are the mortgage backed securities backed by now- or soon-to-be-broken promises to pay by individual homeowners.

Second, the Fed has merely pumped about 1.2 trillion of dollars into the market place free. In other words, it has taken nothing out of the economy of value. When the government adds currency – what Jim Cramer calls, dropping wads of cash from helicopters – without getting anything in return, it’s called inflation.

Now, $1.2 trillion in new currency is bad, but not nearly as bad as when the Fed loans money to banks at a .5 interest rate. The Fed simply is printing money for any bank that wants to borrow it at .5 percent. Consequently, banks are now borrowing to 1) cover the losses they incurred to make themselves solvent, and 2) to have cash reserves that they can then use when the economy picks up to lend at future, higher interest rates.

All of this inflation hasn’t hit the real economy because banks are hoarding that money to wait for better borrowers or because borrowers simply are hunkered down right now trying to wait out the storm.

When the economy starts Read more

December 20, 2008

Mariana Wagner’s custom real estate signs are slicker than a Colorado Springs sidewalk in December

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Look at these custom yard signs from Mariana Wagner’s iTeam real estate brokerage in Colorado Springs, Colorado:

Mariana reflects: “Not exactly how yours is set up, as our wind and freezing temps make the hanging sign a disaster, but these rock. (We have installed a 1-800# on the bottom of each sign, as well.)”

I like the white space, especially, a vital design element I too often leave out. And I really like the way that Mariana and her team play with the Keller Williams color scheme without being imprisoned by it.

I’m dying to hear how they sell — the houses and the brokerage.

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December 20, 2008

Pictures Still Sell

by

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

Author website

From Constant Contact:

ConnectUp!SM Poll

Do you have an online profile that you keep current on networking sites?
I have one that I don’t actively use 6.54%
I primarily use Facebook 38.69%
I primarily use LinkedIn 38.32%
I primarily use something other than LinkedIn or Facebook 3.74%
I don’t have any 12.71%

Less than 4% of the Constant Contact community polled (a tech-savvy group of entrepreneurs), claimed to use anything other than Facebook or LinkedIn (not limited to but including Twitter).  Twitter’s been around for over three years and while it’s an awesome service, the hoi polloi just ain’t using it.  This means that potential homebuyers aren’t using, what Greg Swann once called “modern-day CB radio”.

I caught hell from my buddy Todd Carpenter for my defection from Twitter to the glamorous world of Facebook.

Nota Bene:  Neither Todd nor I sell houses to the public.

I recognized that while 140 characters is beautiful in its simplicity, all the world loves a winner.  In my opinion, Facebook is, without a doubt, the best social network to brand yourself today.  That’s where alll the customers are….and that’s where soccer moms are headed en masse.

Why is Facebook growing in popularity? I call it Twitter with pictures.  Take note of that last word; pictures.

From my question on LinkedIn:

Which is the most useful tool, on social media, to engage your audience and create offline conversations?  I’m most interested in how you engage the community with an intent to start an offline conversation. (ie- Answers on LinkedIN, Twitter, Status bar on Facebook).   Have conversations, started online, resulted in offline sales/deals.contracts, etc. ? I would consider a weblog a social medium

When asked how many transactions were generated, directly from Twitter or from relationships forged on Twitter, there was silence.  There was talk about the POTENTIAL of Twitter conversations and the wonderful relationships from Tweet-Ups but no transactions (from REALTORs).  Okayfine.

Let’s see what IS working, from the pros who answered the question.  Here’s Teresa Boardman, who says she loves Twitter… BUT… watch what results in money for her:

However I’ll mention Flickr because it isn’t on your list and it has been a great tool for meeting people off line. Conversations start online 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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