{"id":2118,"date":"2007-10-29T18:07:59","date_gmt":"2007-10-30T01:07:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/?p=2118"},"modified":"2007-10-29T18:21:15","modified_gmt":"2007-10-30T01:21:15","slug":"my-hybrid-is-a-gas-guzzler","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/2118\/my-hybrid-is-a-gas-guzzler\/","title":{"rendered":"My Hybrid is a Gas Guzzler"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"hybrid.jpg\"<\/p>\n

The business of real estate sales is a business unlike any other. The Real Estate Hybrid is neither energy nor cost efficient. Ours does not fit neatly\u00a0under the Service Provider\u00a0heading nor do we have a product to sell in the traditional sense. What we do have, however, is\u00a0the goal universal to all commercial\u00a0business ventures – profitability.<\/p>\n

Why, then,\u00a0is it so fashionable these days to portray the real estate agent as overpaid, and the profession in the broadest terms as engorged with greed? Several factors contribute: The consumer’s lack of understanding or their misconceptions\u00a0of our business model, our inability to effectively communicate and demonstrate our value, and our tendency to carry on a public charade suggesting that our job is one big public service announcement. The latter, of course, is compensation for the former, with the real answer lying somewhere in the middle.<\/p>\n

When\u00a0did profit<\/em> become a dirty word?<\/p>\n

Just Take a Little Off the Top<\/strong><\/p>\n

A business consulting firm, Virtual Advisor Interactive<\/a>, wrote this about the pure consulting or service-oriented business:<\/p>\n

You may tend to think that pricing is not as complicated as product pricing, since what you are offering is less tangible, but appearances can be deceiving… Say you are a hair stylist, for example. Your raw costs will probably include the following: rent and utilities, equipment (including chairs, hair dryers, combs and brushes, sinks, mirrors, towels, washers and dryers, etc.), products (assorted shampoos, conditioners, hair spray and hair color), insurance, and staff salaries and benefits. Also, what about insurance, should a customer slip and fall? So while your service may be hair styling, you must carefully examine everything you will need… to perform that service. You must carefully and continuously list every expense. Once you have determined your raw costs, you can then set up an effective pricing model and figure how much you will need to charge for your service or time in order to break even and\/or make a profit.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So, we aren’t hair stylists, but a very large component of our business is delivering service. I won’t offend the reader by listing the costs associated with fueling our<\/em> business; if you are Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The business of real estate sales is a business unlike any other. The Real Estate Hybrid is neither energy nor cost efficient. Ours does not fit neatly\u00a0under the Service Provider\u00a0heading nor do we have a product to sell in the traditional sense. What we do have, however, is\u00a0the goal universal to all commercial\u00a0business ventures – […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,10],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2118","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-real-estate","7":"category-realty-reality","9":"no-featured-image"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2511,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/2511\/real-estate-weblogging-101-wringing-actual-commerce-out-of-your-commercial-weblog\/","url_meta":{"origin":2118,"position":0},"title":"Real Estate Weblogging 101: Wringing actual commerce out of your commercial weblog","author":"Greg Swann","date":"January 18, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm engaged in a debate with Dustin Luther at his place, but the issues are important enough that I want to highlight some of my remarks here. The meta-issue: Is linking back and forth among real estate weblogs an effective marketing strategy for a consumer-focused, client-seeking real estate weblog, or\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":530,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/530\/goodbye-mls-hello-craigslistcom\/","url_meta":{"origin":2118,"position":1},"title":"Goodbye, MLS. Hello, CraigsList.com . . .","author":"Greg Swann","date":"October 12, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"We had three listings close this week, a new listing going into the MLS, we're both showing quite a bit, and we had our usual meta-projects -- plus The Carnival of Real Estate. It's been a busy week... On top of all that, we took one of Cathy's listings \"private\".\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Disintermediation"","block_context":{"text":"Disintermediation","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/disintermediation\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6860,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/6860\/swanepoels-top-10-real-estate-trends-matter-to-me-and-to-real-estate-quite-a-bit-less-than-my-own-list-of-burning-issues\/","url_meta":{"origin":2118,"position":2},"title":"Swanepoel’s Top 10 Real Estate Trends matter to me — and to real estate — quite a bit less than my own list of burning issues","author":"Greg Swann","date":"February 10, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Stefan Swanepoel sent me a copy of his Top 10 Real Estate Trends Report, which was gracious of him, considering that neither me nor any of the Bloodhounds nor BloodhoundBlog itself are mentioned anywhere in the book -- at least as far as I could detect on a cursory examination.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Big Mother"","block_context":{"text":"Big Mother","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/big-mother\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":164,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/164\/the-long-tail-in-real-estate-photography\/","url_meta":{"origin":2118,"position":3},"title":"The Long Tail in real estate photography . . .","author":"Greg Swann","date":"August 2, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Chris Anderson at the Long Tail weblog on how switching from film to digital media changes movie acting and directing:\"I think shooting in digital changes acting as much as film changed stage acting, or as sound changed film,\" said Bill. Why? Because film costs a lot and must be used\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":499,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/499\/where-the-babies-are-and-where-they-arent\/","url_meta":{"origin":2118,"position":4},"title":"Where the babies are — and where they aren’t . . .","author":"Greg Swann","date":"October 3, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"There's a decently if not very deftly balanced comparison of Gilbert, Arizona, to Portland, Oregon, in the Christian Science Monitor today. The star of the piece is urbanologist Joel Kotkin, so Gilbert doesn't suffer the usual big-city-dweller's I-just-don't-get-it sliming. The issue of fecundity is touched upon without any mention of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Marketing"","block_context":{"text":"Marketing","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/marketing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7726,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/7726\/if-for-the-real-estate-crowd\/","url_meta":{"origin":2118,"position":5},"title":"IF (…for the real estate crowd)","author":"Sean Purcell","date":"April 8, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"A little Hump-Day fun.\u00a0 (Apologies to Rudyard Kipling.) If you can keep your deal when all about you Are losing theirs and talking of failure to you; If you can trust your client when all clients doubt you, And understand their doubting too; If you can wait and not be\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Flourishing"","block_context":{"text":"Flourishing","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/flourishing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2118","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2118"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2118\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2118"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2118"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2118"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}