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February 6, 2008

Avoiding McCain — in traffic, that is

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

We live in the last affordable ghetto in North Central Phoenix, a little pocket of reasonably-priced homes surrounded on three sides by unreasonably-priced homes.

John and Cindy (nee Hensley) McCain used to live about a mile and a half south of us, in the Hensley family compound on Central Avenue. We bought our house knowing there was a risk that McCain could become president and screw up the traffic on Central for everyone.

Lucky us, about a year-and-a-half ago, after ten months on market and a million dollars in price reductions, the McCains sold the Hensley estate and moved into a pair of hi-rise condos at Camelback and 24th Street — the Biltmore Shopping District.

After last night, I have to rate McCain’s chances of taking first place in the Grand Prix of Megalomania as being pretty good. But if we can manage to steer clear of the Biltmore when Captain Queeg is in town, it could be that Phoenicians won’t suffer much more than everyone else.

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February 5, 2008

Q: How many razors does one guy need? A: How many free blades come in the package? Or: Why we now have two color laser printers

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

We have a Konica Minolta 2450 color laser printer. Rock-solid performer, a good citizen on the network, true PostScript, excellent color reproduction.

And, as of today, we also have a Konica Minolta 2550 color laser printer — which is essentially the same model.

Why on earth do we have two color laser printers?

Because we needed a new drum cartridge, and we were running low on al four colors of toner. Big deal, right? It’s just consumables.

Here’s the thing: Four high-capacity toner cartridges plus a new drum cartridge would have run $471 at the best on-line price I could find.

The brand new 2550 printer, which uses the same consumables as the 2450 — and comes with them pre-installed — was $435, shipped.

I saved $36 and got a free printer in the deal. I would have bought two, except the next time I do this the spread between consumables and the full package will be even greater.

In the mean time, I have to decide if I want to try to sell the new printer new-in-box without the consumables or sell the old printer as a parts solution to someone who already has one or more of the discontinued 2450 model.

Is this insane? The idea was that you would give the razor away and make your money on the blades. But if the razor plus the blades is cheaper than the blades by themselves, we’d be fools not to buy more razors.

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February 5, 2008

Introducing Mike Farmer: Thinker, writer, buyer’s advocate

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

We’re adding a new contributor today, real estate broker and weblogger without equal, Mike Farmer:

The mythic city of Savannah is home to Mike Farmer, a commercial and residential real estate broker. Mike puts an emphasis on buyer agency, but there is a part of the man that lives simply to write.

Jay Thompson tipped me to Mike’s appreciable talents. I read his work, nominated him for The Odysseus Medal, then invited him to join us.

That’s twenty-five, but I’m not done yet. When will I be finished? When there’s nothing left to be said. It could take a while…

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February 4, 2008

The Odysseus Medal competition — Voting for the People’s Choice Award is open

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Sorry to be late. I’ve worked with dozens of Macs, mine and other people’s, since 1985, and Iridium is the first one I’ve ever had fail to start up. I cleaned my desk today — idle hands — and fired up 96 Tears, a ten-year-old G3, for the first time in months, the second time in more than two years. No problem. Cameron had a IIci running on his desk for more than twelve years.

Anyway, there are 20 entries on the short list this week, out of a long list of 113 posts. News, yes, but some truly thoughtful think pieces, too.

Vote for the People’s Choice Award here. You can use the voting interface to see each nominated post, so comparison is easy.

Ahem: Please don’t spam all your friends to come and vote for you. First, what we’re interested in is what is popular among people who would have been voting anyway. And second, I’ll eliminate you for cheating. Don’t say you weren’t warned.

Voting runs through to 12 Noon MST Wednesday this week. I’ll announce the winners of this week’s awards soon thereafter.

Here is this week’s short-list of Odysseus Medal nominees:

< ?PHP $AltEntries = array ( "Brendan King -- Change Your State of Mind Change Your State of Mind”,
“Dan Green — Another Rate Cut With Another Rate Cut, The Federal Reserve May Be The Proverbial \”Fool In The Shower\”“,
“Dan Green — Database Marketing In The Business Of Personal Relationships, Database Marketing Is More Effective Than SEO Marketing“,
“Dustin Luther — dothomes DotHomes Launches US Home Search Tool“,
“Geno Petro — A Mastermind of Hucksters A Mastermind of Hucksters“,
“Jeff Brown — Getting Off the Ground Principles of Flight and Real Estate — Getting Off the Ground“,
“Jillayne Schlicke — Walk Away If You Walk Away, I’ll Walk Away“,
“Jim Duncan — I hear rumors all the time I hear rumors all the time“,
“Joel Burslem — dothomes International Real Estate Search Site Makes a Move into US“,
“Joel Burslem — The New MicroHoo Real Estate The New MicroHoo Real Estate“,
“Kevin Boer — dothomes Do We Really Need Yet Another Real Estate Search Site?“,
“Kris Berg — Going Green Going Green – finally!“,
“Kris Berg — Joe and Marge Joe and Marge“,
“Marc Grayson — Are Read more

February 4, 2008

Back among the living…

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

I’m even caught up on my email, if only because I was dealing with mission-critical stuff in Squirrel Mail, a Eunuchs server-side mail client written in 1474. Motto: It’s Pre-Colombian!

Now: 327 unread posts in my feed-reader.

The Odysseus Medal will issue forth with dispatch, honest.

How much to repair the Mac: $0.

Priceless…

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February 3, 2008

Fair assessment of risk or Redlining?

by

Realtor, Real Estate Ethicist

Author website

Last week on my blog I noted what would happen if my local real estate market were to become a “declining market.”

This week brings a perspective from the Washington Post and the Consumerist that “declining markets” equate “redlining.”

Redlining:

Redlining refers to the illegal practice of refusing to make residential loans or imposing more onerous terms on any loans made because of the predominant race, national origin, etc., of the residents of the neighborhood in which the property is located.  Redlining violates both the FH Act and the ECOA.

Does the determination that a particular neighborhood or area has declining values really equate racial redlining, or are the lenders using good judgement (something they seemed to have been lacking over the past few years)?

Race is a tricky and always delicate topic, but I just don’t see the parallel between declining values and race.

One of the folks at FortiusOne sent me a link to this map showing the counties listed by Countrywide as declining.

Declining-Markets-From-Geocommons

February 3, 2008

No joy in Bloodville…

by

Big, Beautiful Bloodhound

Author website

The power supply on my Mac has bee acting flaky for weeks. Last night it finally died the true death, so I have to take it to the Apple Store to get it swapped out.

So there are three special prizes in my CrackerJack box:

  • No Mac
  • Windows instead
  • A delay in the judging of The Odysseus Medal competition

I’m guessing that enough people will be in the thrall of the Super Bowl that I won’t be missed. (For my own part, I think football could only be improved if the games were played in national forests. With Redfin agents as the referees.)

In any case, like the Phoenix herself, I’ll be back to normal shortly.

 
Amending this: Monday afternoon, he sobbed. I’ll do the Odysseus Medal tomorrow night, using Noon today as the cut-off for this week’s nominees. My apologies. In the mean time, it’s like I’m in Vegas — limited connectivity — but without the views or the liquour.

February 2, 2008

Understanding the Laffer Curve — Reality & Myth — What’s Next?

by

Real Estate Investments Broker

Author website

Being just slightly to the right of Attila the Hun, taxes are of great import to me. I believe in principles long established. One of them is small government works better for its citizens than large government. Lower taxes are better than higher taxes as long as the bills are being paid, our military is strong enough to deter aggressors, and basic constitutional government functions are adequately funded.

One of the breakthrough economic theories to be proven in the red hot fire of real life application has been the Laffer Curve. Arthur Laffer’s theory was adopted as fundamental to economic recovery by Ronald Reagan during his 1980 presidential campaign.

I’ll let the video below speak for itself, but will allow myself a few pithy observations.

The first time the Laffer Curve Theory was applied tax revenues skyrocketed. The U.S. Treasury’s own records show revenues generated from the early 1980’s tax cuts went up an aggregate 95%. The period measured was the time Reagan took office until he left office — just short of double in eight years. I expect this will be shown in Parts II and III when they’re released.

Actually, the first time the theory was applied was before anyone, including Laffer himself had even thought of the Laffer Curve. It was John Kennedy who cut the top marginal rate from (I’m not making this up.) about 90.5% (!) down to a paltry 70%. The reason Kennedy used was that it would spur the economy, and increase the actual tax dollars collected. Go figure. History shows he was dead on right. That top rate remained until Reagan cut it to 28% over two decades later.

Opinion — If we ever get income taxes, capital gains taxes, and corporate taxes where they belong, and combine them with cuts (elimination?) in the fat of government spending — we’ll see an economic surge that will make the Reagan boom look like a blip on the screen. But alas, I daydream. Cockroaches as a species will die before pork barrel spending does.

Opinion — Together with the significant liquidity increases in both the U.S. and European Read more

February 2, 2008

If Suddenly Your Phone Is Ringing Off The Hook…

by

Associate Broker

Author website

Then You Must Live In A Super-Duper Tuesday State

With the advent of the “Do Not Call” lists and associated laws, most of us have enjoyed some level of peace from the cacophony of telemarketers.

That is, until recently.

There were loopholes left in the “Do Not Call” bill. Particularly noticeable is the loophole for political candidates and political parties – as well as other so-called “non-profit” organizations.

Isn’t it funny how once again, those who “rule” over the dumb-masses are exempt from the laws they pass on the rest of us? How many of us, as Realtors, have wanted to call a FSBO – only to realize that they are on the Do Not Call list?

Is our livelihood less important than theirs?

And now, in this Presidential election year, we have before us a set of choices that do not inspire me at all. Oh sure, we have the first woman or African-American that has a chance of winning… but neither in my estimation is qualified for the job. I just don’t view a few years in the U.S. Senate – with no substantial legislative accomplishments – as a qualification.

On the other side of the aisle, I don’t see any great choices, either. We’ve got one guy who has helped pass laws that are outright unconstitutional – and positions that are at odds with what I feel are in the best interests of the country… and another who lifts his political finger in the air to decide what his core values are – and picks up his checkbook to bludgeon his opponents.

On top of everything else, our system is set up in such a way that most of the field has been eliminated before most of us get to cast our first ballot. Think about it – only three million ballots have been cast, yet we’re down to four or five candidates.

So for most of us – we won’t be casting a vote FOR anyone… because many of us have watched our first choice get eliminated in the first few rounds. Instead, we’ll be choosing between the lesser of two evils. Or at least Read more

February 2, 2008

A new way to howl: Announcing “The Long List of Odysseus Medal Nominees” — the weblog

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Apart from the normal crush of business, I’ve been hammering away for the past few weeks on a huge project — which I’ll be announcing shortly. In the mean time, I’ve wanted to make a further elaboration on the Long List lister I made a few weeks ago. That tool will echo The Long List of Odysseus Medal Nominees as they come in, but I wanted something that could be subscribed to by feed reader, as well.

It occurred to me to push the data out as a feed on my own, but instead I decided to build a link blog. I did that tonight. You can see it by clicking here.

This is a pure link blog — no commentary and no comments. I’m just drawing attention to the 75-100 posts that are making The Long List every week. You can see what’s new by visiting the weblog, but the ideal way to use this tool is simply to subscribe to the feed.

The Long List is updated several times a day, so you’ll always be abreast of the very best writing in the RE.net.

The other end of the pipeline commands your attention, as well: If you see something you think is truly great, and if it’s not already on The Long List — nominate it.

Here’s a trick, if you’re interested. Go to this nomination form, then drag it into your browser’s tool bar or save it in your bookmarks. The when you see a post you like, open the form in a new tab, so you can swap back and forth to paste in the title and URL.

On my end, the nomination process is by now almost completely automated. I moderate for porn and spam, of course, but I can normally update both the The Long List list box and The Long List of Odysseus Medal Nominees weblog with one click.

One of the things that I like best about this new weblog is that, from today going forward, The Long List will endure, instead of evaporating every Monday.

Anyway, the new weblog is open for business. Visit the blog, subscribe to the feed Read more

February 1, 2008

Up Your Marketing Game

by

Real Estate Rainmaker

Author website

What tips do you have to share with us to help everyone brush up on their marketing game?

February 1, 2008

The upside of exclusives

by

Mapping Technology Entrepreneur

Author website

What if sellers could list with anyone and everyone and what if only the party that brought the buyer got paid? Online listing search paralysis: no agent will disclose the address to a buyer unless they can show it.   

Sounds like the ideal place to go direct-to-sellers to list their house on the web; they’re already distributing their listing all over the place. 

It also sounds like agents really provide no service to help consumers get more for their listing there; no staging, pricing advice, etc. They’re just trying to find buyers and get it sold. Note to Spanish agents: the internet eats information withholding middlemen for lunch. Provide valuable services or die.

February 1, 2008

M-soft bids for Yahoo! What does it mean for search?

by

The Real Estate Group, Virginia Beach and Chesapeake VA

Author website

According to Yahoo News linked here Microsoft has tendered an unsolicited bid for Yahoo that would make it (in theory) a realistic competitor to Google in the search engine world. They are not even in the same league at the moment.

I had posted a couple of weeks ago about Yahoo laying off hundreds and the power of focus. Seems that Bill G. thinks he can bring some focus to them…it will be interesting to see. What will be even more interesting to see is (IF this bid is accepted and I would think it would since it is a large percentage over current stock values…) how they attempt to take on big G.

I will be posting some more in depth thought on how this MAY impact search marketing and search engine optimization efforts in the real estate space as the story develops. I think they will have a difficult time in getting their search results more relevant than Google’s are right now.

There could be some interesting implications to many REALTORS who currently derive much exposure from the search engines.

Stay tuned.

February 1, 2008

If you’ve finally found your dream home — don’t dawdle

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

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

 
If you’ve finally found your dream home — don’t dawdle

Here’s a paradox for the ages: It’s been a strong buyers market for more than two years — and yet buyers still can’t afford to be lax about the houses they love.

How’s that? In our recent seller’s market, sellers were completely indifferent to home-buyers — as a matter of studied strategy. “We might consider your offer,” they seemed to say, “but not today. We’re letting the offers pile up until Monday or Tuesday, then we’ll take a look at them all at the same time.”

Why can’t buyers in this market approach sellers with the same bland indifference?

They can — provided they’re willing to buy just any home.

In a seller’s market, qualified buyers are essentially a fungible quantity. Each one is simply a pile of money in the seller’s eyes — some larger, some smaller, some sooner, some later. Allowing for risks and opportunities, one is as good as another.

Not so for buyers. Houses are inherently non-fungible — each one is unique in location, appearance, construction, condition, amenities and lifestyle factors. Even with so many homes for sale right now, it can be a challenge for buyers to find even one house they are completely committed to buying.

My take: If you want to get the best possible deal, pick three homes, not one, and pit the sellers against each other.

But buyers don’t do this. Instead, they look at dozens of sub-standard offerings, and then focus all of their attention on the one house they can find that is priced right, repaired and staged right, marketed right.

And guess what? Of all the houses these buyers will have seen, this is the one for which there is competition. The factors that appeal to them also appeal to the other folks out there looking for homes right now. The dirty or neglected or over-priced houses attract no offers, where the few that are truly market-ready can draw multiple contracts within a few days of being listed.

The lesson to take away: If you really love Read more

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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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