Buying takes skill. It's a lot like extreme couponing. You get your ducks in a row and wait for that perfect sale so everything falls into place. But what if you don't have the time? It all depends on what you want, where you want it and how much you are willing to pay for it. Here are some vital tips to buying Sierra Vista real estate. We love our area and having an agent that knows the area can make all the difference in the world. If you use an out of town agent that may not know the market trends and what homes should be priced at, you may end up paying a lot more for a home. If you can wait and be patient for the right home the payoff can be amazing. Do you have a home sell before you buy a new one? If so, don't wait to sell before looking. It's ok to look and if you speak to a len... 12/14/2011

  The Dreaded Open House I love Open Houses! I know that makes me brain dead, because so many in our industry disagree with me. But, you know what? I'm sitting in one as I write this blog post, and I'm having to get up and answer the door; show the home; then sit back down; resume my blog; and then, the doorbell rings again. It's hard to get anything done at an Open House! Dang! I've met four of the neighbors, and had three unescorted buyer-prospects come in... two of them unrepresented, and the other unaccompanied by their agent. Double Dang! None of the buyers I met wanted to buy this home. But, they are interested in buying SOMETHING. Triple Dang! Three of the neighbors told me that the home is overpriced, while the last guy is considering selling and moving closer to Tucson. Now, I ... 09/10/2011

 Seismic Shift     Large earthquakes occur when tectonic plates, normally pretty stable, suddenly “shift.” Depending on their location, the damage can be immense. Gary Keller, in his great book “Shift,” several years before our current real estate turmoil, wrote that markets tend to “shift,” and that we must “shift" with them, if we wish to survive. None of us, in our lifetime, has ever seen a market like this. Has it “shifted?” You bet! When markets change, we must change, too… or we fail. Necessary "Shifts” are described in Keller’s excellent book. Read it… heed it. 09/05/2011

      For $ale By Owner               Myth:  Most  REALTORS®  Call FSBOs, And Ask For Their Business.   Au contrair… Most REALTORS®  (falsely) assume that all of their competitors are calling the FSBOs, but, in fact, few of us do that. Don’t get me wrong: the best of us do it as part of our business, but the vast majorities think that they don’t have a chance against the “fast burners.”   Fact: Every statistic says that, although many FSBOs do sell their homes (often regretting the outcome) most of them will list their home with a professional at about the three week mark.   Wow! You have a motivated seller, disappointed that they could not solve their own problem, and they will list at the three week mark… often with the last REALTOR® that they happened to talk to. Wouldn’t it make sen... 09/03/2011

REALTORS® Have Friends, Too!       Image courtesy of Lumaxart   My friends deserve the best. They deserve me. I know many real estate professionals who refuse to do real estate transactions with their friends (or family). I've heard it said, "Jack and Jill, your friendship means more to me than a business transaction. And, I'd hate for this to interfere with our friendship." Usually, then, they refer the clients to another professional. i've always disagreed with this idea, for the same reason: these folks ARE my friends! They deserve the best. Who is more likely to handle them with care, providing the ultimate service... a "stranger," or someone who knows and loves them? This forum, consisting of real estate and associated professionals, is hardly the place to boast. But, if you are a ... 08/28/2011

Please Contact A CDPE A few days ago, I received a call from a person, asking to speak with me about listng their home. During the phone interview, I learned that the owner was five months in arrears. Yikes! Then, I asked if the owner had received a Notice of Default. The owner had received lots of paperwork from their bank, but had not opened them. Typically, once a homeowner is unable to make their mortgage payments, they retreat, becoming paralyzed with dread, and simply do nothing, as their home is foreclosed. This homeowner, preparing to desert the property, received a phone call from the mortgage servicer, a major bank. The bank asked if the owner would like to avoid a devastating foreclosure... or cooperate with the bank in accomplishing a short sale. When the owner decided to w... 08/22/2011

Sorta Like My Smart Phone My smart phone is great! When I boot it up, it makes this cool sound, sort of like "DRRROIDDDDD," but with a Japanese accent, much like Godzilla. There's a real computer inside, that, like its larger cousins, lets me down every now and again, but, hey... No one ever promised me perfection. My smart phone has a calendar, a contact manager, a task manager, and a calculator. Not as good as my HP-12C, but it has a pretty good financial calculator inside. I could do real estate loan calculations with it, if I knew how. There's a camera, a camcorder, a text-to-speech converter, and a speech-to-text converter. It will read business cards, and put them in my contact list, find my "lost" car in a mall parking lot, and find the best gasoline prices anywhere I drive. How... 05/25/2011

(The Above Image Is NOT Me!) If you are in real estate: GET A LAPTOP. Desktops are often more powerful, but they are anchored on your trusty desk: not very portable. And, what if you have two desks... one at your home, and one at your office? Atop them are two terrific computers, probably. This certainly runs the risk of "scattering" your files. You work on a file on one computer, and then, later, decide to work on the file on the other computer. Oops! That pesky file is on the O-T-H-E-R computer. Dang! There are ways around the scattered files annoyance, but the solution isn't always available to you, if you are away from an Internet connection. Tablets have made huge strides, in a very short time. Apple led the way, with the IPAD, and now, the race is on! There are lots of competitor... 05/17/2011

I just did a Google search, on computer problems. I found 550,000,000 results, in.11 seconds. That proves the power if the computer... it took me 30 years to experience each and every one of those pesky problems.Industry, large, and medium-sized businesses, have internal Information Technology (I.T.) guys (and gals) on  staff, to make sure that all the computers, software, and personnel play together nicely.Small business often has I.T. guys too, usually on-call, and/or as a consultant.Then... there's us. We aren't I.T. guys, are we? We are real estate professionals, with laptops, a few programs, and some website resources. Our needs are simple: we just need everything to work! We want the computer to "boot," our programs to load, and our documents to print. What happens if  something ... 05/15/2011

All my life, I've known about momentum. Usually, momentum is most obvious in sports, where the term, "Big Mo," on your side, means that momentum is building. I normally have "Big Mo" on my side. Blogging is kinda fun, and I usually post (somewhere) at least once a day. But, you know, there are lots of excuses out there, and I've used a bunch of them. Making excuses is a heck of a lot easier than bloggin! Now, I feel "Big Mo" at my back, and feel her whispering in my ear, "Blog, you lazy ****, or I'll have your ***!" Tick! Tick! Tick! Tick! (That's what a clock sounds like, when your brain is vapor-locked.) My last two posts were pretty cheesy, taking aim at sitting targets. I can do better than that, I know. Soon. But, "Big Mo" keeps saying, "Just Do It!" So, here goes: All my life, I'v... 05/14/2011

I confess to taking the easy way out, on my last blog post. I posted on Mother's Day, about Mothers. I could have written just about anything, and lots of folks would have said, "Ohhhh... isn't that touching?" Well, since then, I've had an operation (that I survived), my puppy, "Hercules, The Immortal," also had surgery (that he survived) and now, it's back to business. And, what a business it is! Everywhere I turn, there are new web sites for me to exploit, new blogs to write, new lead generation tactics... and, best of all, some real, live, leads! Our market is different than any I've seen in over 30 hyears, but... there is a market. It is we, who must adapt to the market. It simply will not adapt to us. Gotta go! I'm activating a new web site on my Chamber of Commerce-provided platfo... 05/14/2011

Since everyone has a mother, does that devalue the proposition of "motherhood?" Not at all. I love Mothers. I have one. My wife is a Mother. my daughter is a Mother. My sisters are Mothers. Most REALTORS® in my office are Mothers. Most loan officers I deal with are Mothers. Most title and escrow officers I know are Mothers. About half of my buyers and sellers are Mothers. So... what's my point? The point is that Mothers are not usually, "simply" mothers. Being a Mother is usually an additional job, another crucial part of their lives that they do while being wives, daughters, sisters, real estate professionals, loan officers. title, and escrow officers. We just do not give them enough credit. I salute every Mother out there, and wish you a happy Mother's Day, from Sierra Vista, Arizona!   05/08/2011

After serving 250 years in The US ARMY, I am quite familiar with the ordeal of the PCS. Often irregularly scheduled, too frequent, and in undesired cities, even on unwanted continents, our military heroes and their families, besides keeping our nation safe, put up with lots of ordeals that are usually quite transparent to we, the public. Additionally, with frequent deployments by our war fighters, it many times falls on the spouse and kids to prepare for the move, and then carry it out. Then, when their loved-one returns from some their assignment, they learn that they have missed all the fun. The military has a system of "sponsorships," where a service member at the new destination helps the incoming family, (with or without the service member),  to coordinate and smooth the relocation... 05/06/2011

Once Upon A Time... Around the turn of the 20th Century, the Territory of Arizona was anxious to join the United States. The USA then consisted of 46 states, but, in order to join the union, certain prices had to be paid. First, the Territory was a lawless mess. Partially because the Texas Rangers had done such a great job of cleaning up their state, many "bad hombres" came to Arizona. After all, there were stage coaches and trains to rob, gambling, prostitution, and rustling... what fun for bad guys! The problem of lawlessness was solved by the Arizona Rangers. Formed in 1901, with a force never exceeding 26 men, the Arizona Rangers, by 1909, had done their jobs. Incredibly, with a territory consinsg of 15 counties, and a land area of over 110,000 square miles, those rugged lawmen "cle... 05/05/2011

Had surgery last week. It was supposed to be out-patient, but turned out to be in-patient, with one night stay in hospital. Then, a couple of days in bed, before I figured out who I was supposed to be. During that time, I lost a referral from an ActiveRain member, because the client could not wait. I also lost a direct referral from an out-of-town lender, because the buyers they sent me could not wait. (No kidding, I was in the pre-op room when this call came in.) Now, don't get me wrong: I could have rolled my Jeep over on Interstate 10 again. Or, I could have been hit by a meteorite. Those might have ruined my week. But, the optimist in me says that I'm doing some things right, or I never would have had the chance to work the referrals in the first place! Thanks to you who made the re... 05/03/2011

  1958 Chevrolet Impala Convertible... Sticker Price: $2,841.00 (in 1958) About 1958, the same year this gorgeous Chevrolet was built, my parents bought a new home in Anaheim, California. It was about 1,700 square feet, 4 bedroom, 1 3/4 baths, with a detached garage, and a fenced back yard. The price? $14,900. We tend to look backwards in time with favor, remembering the good, while submerging those memories that don't fit into our view. This wonderful old car, by today's standards, is hopelessly antiquated. Heavy, (made with REAL steel) the car was very comfortable in its ride, but burned gas as fast as you could fill the tank. Air conditioning had just arrived, and it did not come with standard-equipment seat belts. Homes of that era, also, while far less costly than today, lacked the... 05/01/2011

  Referrals are a two-edged sword. On the one hand, one owes a part of their commission to the referral source. Some REALTOR®s feel that their time is diluted, because they work just as hard on the rferral as on any other business, but, then are paid less money. On the other hand, the referral MAY be the accidental dropping of a client into our lives, because an agent in another city picked your name off of a page on their search engine. Increasingly, and best case, is when an agent in another city really does their homework while locating an agent for the person they refer, Either way, I enjoy working the referral, treating them as I would any other of clients. Other referrals are received because we have worked hard to establish our reputations, so, when an agent is looking for someon... 04/26/2011

Last month, I attended the Keller Williams "Family Reunion," in Anaheim, California. Coincidentally my hotel was about two blocks from where I grew up, in the late 1950's. Of course, I decided to walk over and take a look at my former home. Wow! Even though there was no one left in the neighborhood that I know, old memories overwhelmed me, surprising me, for I thought they were long gone. The faces and names of boys and girls returned to my consciousness, and I will now look for them via the Internet. Three houses away from my former residence, I saw a lady trimming the shrubs in her front yard, so I stopped to chit-chat with her. She told me that she would soon be selling her home. Then, I saw a FSBO sign... in her front window. Instantly, the "Terminator" in me kicked in! I was weari... 04/24/2011

Get Nekkid! I'm not especially comfortable, standing in front of TSA's full body scan, 'back-scatter' X-ray scanners. I'm less comfortable with a physical search, and always recall the frustrated gentleman's comment to a TSA screener, "Don't touch my junk!" ("junk?" or is it capitalized... "Junk?") Whatever. Yet, every day, as we plan our activities, we should emulate TSA's full body scan. Here's the deal... we all need someone to hold us accountable. Hopefully, we can teach ourselves to be our own Accountability "Czars." We all know that we must establish long-term goals to be successful. Long-range goals are supported by several (many?) short, and/or medium-term goals. These MUST have time frames attached... or, how else do we measure our progress? So, every morning, after your shower... 04/08/2011

Today, I was told that I am a dope, while someone else complimented me on my business choice. So, like Taylor Swift, you'd better not "Date" me, because I'll write a song about you! Of course, I would never use names, but let me describe the situation: Today, I had a "for sale" sign placed on some commercially zoned land. The sign is 4' x 8', and has my picture included as one of its elements. Someone told me that was pretty gauche, because buyers would not buy the property, just because my picture is on the sign. My business cards include my photo. My car signs include my photo. My email, and websites include my photo. Of course, my real estate brokerage info, the Fair Housing, and REALTOR® logos are prominently displayed. A colleague commented that I am overexposed, and, that personal... 04/07/2011