Industry Commentary

(This is one of my longest posts ever! Good for a weekend read…)

When you are building a brand from the ground up, you can’t do it without receiving feedback. What better place to get feedback than at the annual NAR conference where you have a captive audience of some 20,000+ REALTORS® to talk to?

I have been attending this conference for at least the past 15 years.  I still remember my very first one. I just couldn’t get enough of it… the amount of information was staggering to me, the number of participants amazed me. I planned each and every session I would attend in advance, circled all of the trade show booths that were of interest, and visited them all. In later years, I began to speak at sessions rather than attend them and, for a few years, did not even make it through the tradeshow doors. Priorities change, and people get busy being busy.

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I’ve attended more industry conferences than I can readily count.  With my destination-shopper mentality, I tend to grumble a bit under my breath about the less-than-perfect efficiency of these events when I can’t just get what I want and move on.  While I believe they are necessary, I also see them as a microcosm for what is both great and frustrating about this industry so many of us call our own.

Last week in Orlando I attended both the REALTORS® Conference & Expo and a session from BloodhoundBlog Unchained.  There was no escaping the tremendous amount of excitement, enthusiasm, cooperation, collaboration, and innovation, yet I still flew home daydreaming about what I would do differently.  So here are the seven things you would find in this young curmudgeon’s perfect conference:

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Today we released the results of our “Living Green” consumer survey. The survey has been nine months in the making as we had it done in conjunction with the Better Homes and Gardens “Living Green” 15-city home show tour. At each stop along the way, we had pollsters interview visitors to the exhibit. As you can see in the video above, there were some pretty savvy people hosting the exhibit. Steven Whittle did an outstanding job “representing” green and all that the exhibit had to offer people in the way of raising their awareness regarding this important issue.

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“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
-The Declaration of Independence (1776)

“A little revolution now and then is a good thing.”
-Thomas Jefferson (1787)

“Values have shrunk to fantastic levels; taxes have risen; our ability to pay has fallen; government of all kinds is faced by serious curtailment of income; the means of exchange are frozen in the currents of trade; the withered leaves of industrial enterprise lie on every side; farmers find no markets for their produce; and the savings of many years in thousands of families are gone.  More important, a host of unemployed citizens face the grim problem of existence, and an equally great number toil with little return.  Only a foolish optimist can deny the dark realities of the moment.

And yet our distress comes from no failure of substance.  We are stricken by no plague of locusts.  Compared with the perils which our forefathers conquered, because they believed and were not afraid, we have still much to be thankful for.”
-Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1933)

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This is Part II in a Series on Short Sales. See Part I, Buying Short Sales.

Due to certain conditions pursuant to the Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act of 2007, the I.R.S. could consider debt forgiveness as income to the seller/borrower, and there is no guarantee that a lender who accepts a short sale will not legally pursue a seller for the difference between the amount owed and the amount paid. This amount is known as a deficiency. Whether you are a buyer or seller, always obtain legal and accounting advice from competent professionals.

General Principles for Sellers:

Not an easy alternative to foreclosure - The deficiency will be accounted for in some fashion. It can be 100% loaned to the seller in the form of a promissory note, which they then must repay. If any portion of the deficiency is “written off” meaning that the bank absorbs it, it will likely be reported it as 1099 income to the seller or even as a judgment which will show on the sellers credit for years. Read the rest of this entry »

A couple weeks ago, my colleague Jason Steele wrote an article describing the odyssey he and his wife had survived in selling their home.  For me, that article began a series of misunderstandings that could only happen in our socially-networked age as a number of friends (and some family) falsely believed that I had suddenly been forced to sell my house due to the difficult economy.  Since my parents and two of my three brothers live in various corners of Europe, this seemed entirely plausible; as serious as things are for many, they seem to somehow be getting an over dramatized version of the news.  For all they’ve heard and read, our entire economy has screeched to a complete and utter standstill.

How did this misunderstanding happen?

As part of a conscious effort to “spread the word”, many of us at BH&G RE link our social networking sites to this blog.  For example, when a new blog article posts it is automatically populated onto our “News Feeds” on Facebook.  This is one way to reach a broader audience.  The update only shows the title of the post (without indicating who the actual author is).  If someone wants to read more, they simply click on the hyperlink and follow the story.

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As an industry, we are all suffering right now in large part because too many people over a long period of time checked their ethical compasses at the door.  Whether we like it or not, we are all caught up in this mess and few people are differentiating the players - since we are part of the system, we are perceived by many as therefore being part of the problem.

At this point in time, confidence and trust in all aspects of our business are challenged.  Simultaneously, the financial environment for many brokers and agents has never been more difficult and the temptation to compromise company and personal values has never been higher.  As brokers and agents, this is the time to stand up in defense of your ethical principles.

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Photo by JOE M500/Flickr.com

Posted by Nicolai Kolding

I’m an insomniac.  That hardly makes me unique around here - it’s a bit of a running joke in our halls as we see each other in the morning:  “So, how many times did you wake up last night?!”  On many nights there are just too many ideas spinning around in our heads to allow for a peaceful sleep so we’re up like a flash at 3 a.m., reaching for pen and paper to write them down before trying to doze off again.

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Posted by Nicolai Kolding

Yesterday, Jim Cramer of CNBC’s Mad Money “called” the housing bottom as coming in July of 2009.  Whether or not you agree with his analysis and prediction, I’m sure there are many (including some who see him as no friend of housing) who will embrace this as welcome news to an industry that so badly needs it.

I view this with muted optimism.  On the one hand (whether I like it or not), people like him wield some influence on the market and I can’t help but smell a self-fulfilling prophecy taking shape if more predictions like this make news.  On the other hand (and here’s where I’m focused specifically on professionals in the industry), headlines like this can have a way of getting people to lose focus on the pain that could still lie ahead.

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Posted by Jason Steele

Over the past month I have been searching for the first addition to my staff. We posted the position internally and on all of the major job boards, monster, craigslist, Yahoo!, etc.. The position requires about 3-5 years experience and would most likely attract someone in their 20s. I had a hypothesis going into the process and it was to see how well my application of social media would shape each candidates interview process.

Before joining BH&G Real Estate I would go into an interview blind as Googling the company and prospective Executive leadership could only get you so far. When I was interviewing for the VP of Interactive Marketing position here it was a whole different story. I was on our Industry blog, read press releases on Realogy’s web site, investigated Sherry, Nicolai & Wendy’sbackgrounds on Linkedin, searched for any viral video on YouTube and lastly took a shot in the dark that they maintained Facebook pages (which they all do). I got to know each and every one of them personally and professionally via those sources before I even walked in the door. I was able to evaluate whether or not my vision for the brand and professional goals were shared amongst my prospective boss and peers. I assume you know what the answer was as you are reading my post on the brand’s blog right now.

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