In addition to generating one million new home sales that would not have happened otherwise, the tax credit also pushed home prices up in 20 of the largest cities (the biggest boosts were in cities hurt most during the downturn). The increase represents 3.8 percent growth year-over-year, the biggest rise since 2006.  But the news was overshadowed by reports that foreclosures accounted for 31 percent of all home sales in the first quarter of 2010. To put that in perspective, in a “normal” market, foreclosures account for less that 2 percent of sales.  The silver lining is this represents a 14 percent decrease from the prior quarter.

A sign that another government based assistance program is helping, borrowers with home loans modified under the federal government’s foreclosure prevention effort are less likely to miss a payment. In other mortgage news, the multi-decade low rates are encouraging more people to refinance rather than encouraging people to buy homes. I’m glad to hear people are taking steps to make their homes more affordable, now it is a matter of encouraging potential buyers to take advantage.

In a bit of sobering news, an estimated quarter of all residences with mortgages owe more than their home is worth.  According to CoreLogic, borrowers in the hardest hit areas may not be able to break even in a home sale until at least 2020.   I think I speak for most people in real estate when I say I hope that is a very conservative estimate.

If the season’s green grass is inspiring you (or your consumers) to green-ify your home, check out these tips!

Have a safe Fourth of July!  Check here to see if there are any celebrations happening in your area.

NAR estimates that as many of 180,000 buyers along with the thousands of agents who worked with them may not see the keys to their new home or a commission check. These buyers had an accepted offer in place prior to the April 30th deadline of the HomeBuyer Tax Credit but may not be able to close that transaction by the June 30th deadline. Despite the efforts of many people, lawmakers failed last week to vote for the bill that would extend the closing from June 30th to Sept 30th.

This combined with the discouraging economic news on new construction and mortgage applications have been a frank reminder that although the first part 2010 gave us hope, we still have a long road ahead. There is still a slim chance that an extension on the closing date for the tax credit may happen. We’ll know more as this week plays out.

My first broker used to tell all his agents “Don’t spend your commission checks until you have them in hand.” This latest turn of events has certainly reinforced that advice.

I participated with several agents from my office and upon arrival we were met by the local builder who provided each of us with a carpenter’s apron, a hammer, nails, a tape measure and our assignments.  Mine was to hammer floor boards.  The builder barked out instructions, demonstrated with a few swings of his hammer and left me to my work which I took on with feverish excitement.

I tapped the first nail with the hammer and it quickly slid from my fingers onto the board then rolled to the ground.  I should know how to do this, I told myself.  I hang pictures all the time.  I tapped harder on the next nail and the next.  That worked better, but it seemed I tapped forever until the nails head finally rested in the wood. My excitement waned as I quickly realized how unprepared I was for the job.  The harder I tried, the more frustrated I became. By the end of the day, I wasn’t any more experienced in carpentry than I was at 8 AM, and while I was equipped with the tools and I participated, and contributed, I was not at all productive.

I’ve observed similarities with real estate agents. When an agent comes to the real estate business, he/she has a tool box.  It includes two things: their license and enthusiasm.  When they join a company, the tool box grows. Company tools are added, marketing materials, presentation books and/or programs, scripts and in many cases, training.  I challenge you that training alone is not enough.  We train dogs.  They learn to follow commands – sit, lay, heel, come.  People are different.

Preparing agents to succeed is three fold. I call it the ETC approach:

Educate – Teach agents the fundamental rules of prospecting, working with buyers and sellers, understanding motivations, uncovering needs, asking powerful questions, marketing. Without fundamentals, agents will follow commands. Agents need to have a thorough understanding of contracts and representation.

Train – Role play, scripts, case studies, assignments, practice, repeat, practice, repeat to learn and internalize information.

Coach – Follow up with agents for at least 90 – 120 days following the program to achieve at least one listing and one buyer.

Whether an agent comes to us fresh out of licensing school or with years in the business, it is our responsibility to assure they know how to use all the tools in their tool box.

My thought:  It doesn’t matter – Keep Selling.

It is important that we know what is happening in our industry and to remain aware of what others are saying to our potential customers – so continuing to read and educate oneself is always good.  But, don’t allow external forces determine your success.  I’ve know many sales professionals who have done well in down times and I’ve known many more sales people who have done poorly in good times.  The difference is always in the person and their attitude.

Long ago, I had a sales and training manager who broke my sales development into three areas: knowledge, techniques and attitude.  Knowledge included market conditions, competitors value props, trends, and products.  Techniques included communication skills, presentation skills, negotiation skills, and conflict resolution skills.  Both knowledge and techniques were tangible and easy to translate/teach/track. But attitude? How do you know if you have a good attitude or a bad attitude and who is to judge?

What I have witnessed in myself and others is that attitude, in sales, is simply the reflection of your work habits and work ethic.  Strong work habits and a productive work ethic is the reflection of a good attitude.  Poor habits and a lazy work ethic reflect a bad attitude.

My old manager use to say “your attitude will determine your altitude.”  Don’t worry about what the others say and just keep working hard – the results will show for themselves.

That advice seems as good to me today as it did then.

To make it easier for you to grow your network in Twitter and potentially secure new friends and followers, the social network is testing a new “You Both Follow” feature. Great way to make new connections! In other social media news, numbers out this week suggest that 34 percent of adults who use social media do so, in part, to rant or rave about a company. An important lesson for all of us is to maintain quality customer service online just as much as off and to address any complaints and issues consumers raise online immediately.

It may seem surprising that only one in five small business owners are integrating social media into their business (although, this number has doubled in the past year), but those that are often see impressive results. A salon in Seattle gets 75 percent of its business from Facebook, Twitter and its blog. Wow! Take some time this summer to build and execute a social media strategy. And, for those of you already with a blog on WordPress, this week the site introduced new features to become more social: quick reblogging and the ability to “like” posts. Good stuff!

Looking for ways to make your office seem more high tech and connected? Take a bite of an organic burger restaurant in New York, which will be constantly streaming Foursquare check-ins, tweets from Twitter and restaurant information on a large monitor, among other things. Pretty cool.

Now on to the infamous Apple versus Microsoft debate… Recently, Apple officially passed its rival as the world’s most valuable technology company. It should not be surprising then that Steve Jobs is predicting his company’s iPads will replace PCs in the years to come. What do you think will happen? Will one of these technologies trump the other or will a new technology emerge to topple them both? We should keep in mind, though, how third parties will affect the future of both technologies. In a move that could make potential iPad owners not as anxious to purchase, AT&T this week announced it will drop its $30 unlimited data plan. If you’re not considering an iPad yet, will this change your mind?

But, as we have learned by now, it’s never all good news these days. Even Warren Buffett underestimated the severity of the housing bubble. The Mortgage Bankers Association reported applications tied to home purchases are at the lowest level since April 1997. Other estimates out show real estate owned, or foreclosure, properties are on the rise, proving at least banks still have a long way to go. The two groups expected to be hurt the most long-term by the bubble burst are young first-time buyers and the so-called active-adult purchasers who downsize. How can we keep these two groups optimistic?

Dealing with any consumers trying to decide whether to rent or buy? This map may be helpful. Speaking of rentals, as the long-awaited summer vacation is upon us, Realogy launched HomeAwayRealEstate.com, a searchable database of vacation-home listings available to rent. This may even be useful for your family!

There was plenty of good news regionally this week. In Maine, home sales jumped a whopping 63 percent last month. Sales of existing homes in Boston rose 41.8 percent, in Pittsburgh 42.2 percent, in Portland 49.2 percent, and in New York and its surrounding suburbs 39.6 percent. Wow! Also, in California house prices rose 21 percent in April from a year earlier as forecloses fell. Folks in the Midwest and South, are you seeing similar trends?

A report from Zillow found that foreclosed homes typically sell for an average 20 to 30 percent discount. It’s no wonder, then, that auctions have increased by about 10 percent a year since the early 2000s.

On another note, the FHA guaranteed 1.9 million loans last year, beating out competitors Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. They’ve been working overtime!

Finally, just a little reminder of what our job is all about: finding people a home. Enjoy the holiday!

In other good news, although it is not directly tied to real estate, manufacturing showed signs of a rebound. The strength in this industry highlights a larger sign of economic recovery and increased consumer confidence. Great news!

This week was not without sobering news, though, as Freddie Mac requested an additional $10.6 billion in Treasury Department aid after reporting a first quarter loss of $6.7 billion. Both Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, however, are looking to ease lending restrictions in the Sunshine State, which should help many Floridians and their communities who’ve felt the effects of the downturn.

To end the week on some good news, home inventory in 27 major metropolitan cities across the country rose 2.6 percent in April. This increase is a definite sign that demand is starting to shift.

Finally, for all of you mothers, Happy Mothers Day!

To me, it just doesn’t matter.  Having seen and lived through various markets (in various industries,) I have always found that there are those sales professionals who do well and those who do not.  Those who do well are always focused on what they have at their disposal to provide value to their current or potential clients.  Those sales associates who don’t do as well, are always focused on what used to be or what others have, that they do not.

So to help jump start some ‘value’ thinking, I have listed a few items that we currently have at our disposal, to benefit our customers today:

1) Mortgage rates are fantastic!  Mortgage rates continue to remain very low, and while there is always talk of volatility in the mortgage backed securities market and the impact that volatility will have on consumer rates, even 5.5% or the dreaded 6% rate threshold for a 30 year fixed is a really good rate.

2) Declining prices are an exciting opportunity for first time and move-up buyers.  Take for example, a family who lives in a market where prices have dropped 15% or more over the past year or two.  While their $285,000 home may now be worth $242,250, the home that was $400,000 is now down to $340,000 – or about a $17,000 savings above their perceived ‘lost equity’ (you can do your own math for your area.)

3) FHA Mortgages remain a very large portion of our entire lending landscape.  While the House Financial Services Committee defeated a proposal to increase the minimum down payment requirements (it’s remaining at 3.5%), the committee did agree to raise the FHA mortgage insurance premiums from its current level of 0.55 percent gradually to an annual premium of 1.5%.  Speak with your local preferred lender and have she or he notify you to find out when this will happen – but the cost will rise….soon.

4) Home prices in many markets are beginning to stabilize and, in fact, there are a few markets where home prices are beginning to increase from their lows (S&P/Case Shiller Home Price Indices www.homeprice.standardandpoors.com).  So, even with all the talk of ‘shadow inventory’ from forthcoming foreclosures (which I believe to be true), we may look back and see it as a time when inflation/price increases began to show again.  So, now is the time for a great deal!

When you combine these macro-level economics with the very real value that each and every one of our sales associates has at their disposal using our Better Homes & Gardens Real Estate tools in the Better Homes & Gardens Real Estate Greenhouse (www.mybhggreenhouse.com), we have more to offer today than ever before.

So, if you or one of your fellow sales associates is ever thinking about something you don’t have, read our blogs and re-review our web site – we are constantly adding and working hard to help you grow and have what others do not.

As many of you know it is important to distinguish between your personal and company Twitter accounts. For those of you with company accounts, here are some easy-to-follow tips on how to effectively align your tweets with what your followers (i.e. consumers) are expecting.

In other news, if you feel like everything is centered on your community these days, you’re not alone. In addition to some recent localized advertising and marketing offerings, which we’ve mentioned in previous blogs, a new partnership between CNN and Outside.in, an aggregator of local blogs, is providing hyper-local news and weather information on the media giant’s website. We should expect to see other partnerships arise with Outside.in in the near future. Just think of what a service like this could do to your own website or blog!

Looking for a way to keep folks engaged? Encourage the adoption of iPhones. Although the percentage of users may be small as compared to smart phones in general, iPhone users tend to be much more engaged on mobile platforms, including news outlets. What a great way to ensure your agents are “in the know.”

Speaking of engagement, a reporter from AdWeek recently noticed a sharp decrease in the use of taglines from major brands, which he thinks is a disgrace to the industry because consumers become less engaged in brands. We agree it’s important to define a brand with specific words and communicate these with your consumers, whether that means a tagline or not. You should think about what those words are for your brand and how consumers can know what you stand for.

We have talked a lot about greening the home over the past weeks, but what about greening the things you already have in your home by creatively recycling them? Mashable offers eight ways to repurpose technologies. My personal favorite: turning an old computer into an aquarium. These tips could also work in the office!

Lastly, for all of those who doubted the success of the iPad, Apple this week announced it has sold 1 million devices so far. Not bad for just a month on the market!