We all know many of the facts that engulfed the residential real estate industry in 2011; shrinking # of agents (some 50,000 left the biz), many brokerages maintain "business as usual" strategies, and the Internet portals continued to gain momentum with some going public (Zillow, HomeAway) - we k
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01/03/2012
Buyers around the world are replacing older, functionally obsolete housing (and commercial) stock with new structures. Whether on the lower end i.e. inner-city Cleveland where 1,000 homes were torndown in 2011 and over 20,000 are on the demo deck for 2012, or the high-end i.e. million dollar tea
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12/21/2011
Today, we saw an article in Echo, an Essex publication from the U.K. It appears that a certain community is undergoing some significant redevelopment. Like here in the U.S., tearing down and replacing older obsolete housing stock is most often designed to rejuvenate a community - the purpose of
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12/07/2011
teardowns.com makes its debut on YouTube with its marketing and lead gen tool for real estate agents - something we've used everyday in our own brokerage business for over 10 years! We'd like to thank the academy and all those responsible for making this film possible :)
11/29/2011
I'm jealous. The last stat I saw said there are about 1.1 million Realtors in the U.S. The total on the invoice I've just paid from my local board is $544.00. They did give us the opportunity to opt out of paying a $100 fee for RPAC - which I did, not just because it was an extra $100, but I
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11/28/2011
Lots of banter in the blogoshere about the state of the MLS, NAR, IDX, Boards and brokers - it appears to be gaining some momentum.As a broker-owner should we be concerned? Don't think so. Brokerage is all about the transaction, the deal - we can leave the mapping, "what's my home worth" and d
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11/23/2011
I've been following all the banter in the blogoshere about the death of the MLS, NAR, IDX, Boards and brokers - it's becoming quite serious (so it appears).As a broker-owner I am concerned. Not so much about the demise of any of those particular entities - most need to be restructured and brough
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11/21/2011
We've been in this situation before, it's rare, but it happens - having nothing left to sell. Demand but no supply. And yes, I am talking about the residential real estate market.In the markets I personally cover for our brokerage in the Western Suburbs of Chicago, the only listings we do have o
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11/14/2011
The battle for the real estate business is heating up quickly. On one side are the Internet portals; Zillow, Trulia, AOL, HomeFinder etc. On the other-side traditional brokerages; Coldwell Banker, Century 21, Keller Williams, ReMax etc.Today these two sides are in different businesses. The Int
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11/04/2011
We have all read about the shift in home ownership to a "for rent" society. Today's article from NAR's blogtalks about this using a supporting report from Morgan Stanley.What got me, was not the part about the decrease in home ownership, but how it impacts the business of residential real estate
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10/31/2011