Catherine's Must Read Musings

Today it was announced that David H. Stevens, the President of Affiliated Businesses for The Long & Foster Companies would be stepping into the role of President and Chief Operating Officer.  The announcement was made this morning by Founder and CEO Wes Foster in a company wide managers meeting a...

I'm working on developing materials for a new class I'm teaching on Social Networking and Blogging.  My first class, on Aug. 26th, is to a group of real estate agents.  My second class is to a group of real estate branch office managers.  Right at this moment I'm wondering why I chose one of the ...

There's a great deal of activity these days among various organizations to register as many voters as possible in advance of the Presidential election in November.  Citizens must be registered 30 days in advance of the election for the address where they are currently living at the time of the el...

What is so remarkable about the agent website I just finished?  It's for a 91 year old real estate agent who decided she needed to boost her online marketing presence.  That's right - 91 and a real estate agent for 50 years right here in Northern Virginia.  When I got the call from Sandy Augliere...

There's an interesting article in today's New York Times written by one of my favorite writers, David Brooks.  The article is entitled "The Character Factor" and it's about Senator John McCain, who is running for the Republican nomination for President.  In this article Brooks talks about how the...

My dog Murphy and I preview homes every morning from about 5:30 am to 7.  We don't go in, of course, we just like to look at what's new on the market and what's still on the market.  We take a different route every day making a mental note of who has listings from companies we've never heard of, ...

An article appeared in today's Washington Post, "Realtor Discourages Use of Outside Lenders," that was sparked by an email sent from Wes Foster, CEO & Founder of Long & Foster, to his agents urging them to refer clients to Prosperity Mortgage instead of "outside lenders."  Like many large real es...

It's interesting how agents can drive up to a potential listing and start making mental notes before leaving the car about what needs to be done to the yard, the front door and the windows to give the house some curb appeal.  Inside, the mental note-taking assesses what clutter needs to be remove...

I have Googled, I will Google, I must Google, I will Google in future.  Google is the "it" verb of this decade.  If you want to find something, you Google it.  I Google to find the phone number for a cab to the airport.  If I own a phone book, I honestly don't know where it is.So I always ask Lon...

I've spent much of the past month in Long & Foster offices giving classes on "Building a Web Presence."  A fundamental part of that class is discussing how to maximize the free agent website that every Long & Foster agent is given by the company.  The sites themselves are customizable, but the UR...