I had a blast last week at the California Association of Realtors® Expo and annual conference. By the way, if you are a California Realtor® and you are not taking advantage of the opportunity to attend this free conference, then you are really missing out. I was honored with the opportunity to address a pretty large audience on the topic of Finding Listings in Any Market. Given the fact that we are in a “flat” ... Continue Reading
In light of the tragic news regarding Realtor® Beverly Carter, I’ve decided to dedicate this week’s post to Realtor® safety. As children, we are told to never talk to strangers, yet our job as real estate professionals often involves interacting with those who we have never met before. While there is no telling when something awful may occur, the good news is that smartphone apps and smart jewelry are modern-day ... Continue Reading
Remember when you were in school? Remember back in the day when they had Show and Tell? We’d bring in little things that we had—perhaps something from an exotic vacation, a pet hamster, or a puppy. Well, the goal of that activity back in school was to get us comfortable with speaking to others—speaking in front of our classmates. Sales and getting your next listing is a little bit different. When you go on a ... Continue Reading
If you are like most real estate professionals, you are probably far too busy to keep your database neat and clean. For top producers, that activity by itself (database maintenance and management) can be a full-time job. Lately, I’ve been chasing my tail trying to motivate some of the agents at my office to get moving on their databases. We’ve started using a new CRM, and nothing helps nurture leads better than a ... Continue Reading
So, we are heading into the end of the third quarter of 2014. I’m curious… on a scale of 1 to 10, what score would you give your database management? (10 meaning that you rock the house, and 1 meaning you don’t have one.) As lots of you already know, I’ve a systems girl. Give me a system and I will work it ceaselessly. Over the last several months, I’ve been checking out Real Estate CRMs (customer relationship ... Continue Reading
Thanks to Michael McClure of T3Experts for turning me on to this super-interesting New York Times article about the direction of online reviews. You’ve definitely got to read the article, but here it is in a nutshell: the author, Delia Ephron, tells of her personal experience riding in an Uber car, where she learns that not only can riders rate drivers, but… get this: drivers can rate riders. It’s like a cabbie ... Continue Reading
I read this agent comment the other day… I am in shock and my heart is broken. I was supposed to close on Friday with a client that I had been dealing with for 6 months now. We started by improving her credit, finally getting her approved, finding her a home that fit her lifestyle and budget perfectly. The loan officer stated that the process was so easy and clean. Appraisal perfect- buying a home with equity. ... Continue Reading
For some people, your Facebook cover photo may focus on family. For others, it may focus on hobbies. For a third group, your Facebook cover photo may focus on business—telling the world what you do through imagery. They do say that a picture is worth a thousand words. Given the fact that most people prefer visuals to the written word, real estate professionals need to be craftier than ever when it comes to getting ... Continue Reading
A long time ago, when our kids were in kindergarten, a friend of mine made an interesting comment about how her kid approached classroom projects. She said, “When all the other kids are cutting paper, my son cuts the air.” It was a funny little comment about how easily distracted he became in the classroom setting—and this was well before the years of text messages, YouTube and Gen Y. With the insane amount of ... Continue Reading
In my email inbox last week… Subject: Shame on you For a time now, I have really come to respect you, Missy. But it all came tumbling down when I saw you sell your soul to Zillow. They are incompetent and you know it. Their brand of valuation has been a little better than high-school journalism, certainly not done by real professional real estate people. By them getting you to write an un-truth article for them ... Continue Reading