Looking for Stones

I think that the story that follows is even more important today, especially since I am helping agents at Towne & Country, Realtors to find their way in New/Social media. Inevitably the question that all people wonder is, “So if we do all of this great stuff, when are we supposed to have time to sell real estate?”

I had originally published this in my other blog.  I gave myself permission to reprint it here. Thanks, Diane! You’re a peach!

A teacher stood in front of his class, and pulled a huge jar from under the counter. He began to fill it with large stones. When he had piled every stone into the jar, it was filled to the top.

He asked the class, “Is this jar full?” Of course, they answered yes.

The teacher then proceeded to add small stones that he had kept hidden under the counter. The class watched as a surprising amount of these filled the spaces between the larger stones. “How about now? Is my jar full yet?” he asked them.

He then brought out a bucket of sand, and slowly poured it into the jar, filling the spaces around the stones. When the sand had filled all of the gaps and threatened to spill over the edge, he asked, “What about now?”

Well, obviously nothing else could fit in that jar.

Then the teacher brought up a watering can and proceeded to empty most of the contents into the jar.

This story was told by my trainer at my old real estate agency. At this point, all of us agents were all thinking that this implied that whenever you complain that you are busy- you can always find more time, and indeed I have heard the parable told like that. Our coach went one step further, though.

He said, “You are probably thinking that what I am going to tell you is there is always more time. But what I am trying to tell you is everything wouldn’t have fit into the jar if the big stones hadn’t gone in first.”

Too true. Your business will fill up your days, whether you are contributing to your blog, selling real estate, or sorting paper clips. It is SO important to determine what is important- regardless of the business you are in- and place that into your schedule first.

Open houses- waste of time or key to selling a home?

I sat at an open house on Sunday from 2-4.  I met neighbors, a first time homebuyer couple represented by a buyer’s agent and someone in the real estate industry who stopped by.

Is this a productive use of time of my time? Essentially I opened the door for another agent’s client and answered their questions, and visited with people.

Here is what I think, and as usual I will take the slow horse getting there. A month ago I had to take continuing ed so that I could renew my license. Twelve hours is mandatory; I had already taken 6 CE hours in commercial, but decided to take the whole shebang at one sitting.

I had been hearing that Massachusetts was on the cusp of implementing online CE courses, and that sounded great to me. Sitting in my home, paying pretty good attention, sipping my coffee and multitasking through the mandatory 12 hours- yep, a match made in heaven. But that would have to be the next time around, so I signed up for 12 hours in a straight shot from Bill Morgan, the Hat Guy.

Because of that experience I swear I will never take a CE class online. The 12 hours went by- not in a snap, but pretty quickly. And Bill incorporated the 3 Es of good presentation (online or off, by the way): education, entertainment and engagement. I would expect education- after all, that was what everyone was there for. But he nailed the entertainment (thanks for the candy, Bill) and engagement parts too. He was funny, he involved individuals from the class, and he kept the attention of the class as a whole- no mean feat for a course lasting 12 hours that few people really wanted to be at.

So what does this have to do with open houses? A lot, believe it or not. Buyers can get a really good sense of some elements of a home from the Internet- where most of them are starting out anyway. They have an idea of what individual rooms look like. They do NOT have a sense of the neighborhood, a sense of the way one room flows to the next (and you don’t really get a complete sense of this with a virtual tour), or the overall gestalt (for lack of a better word) or “wholeness” of the place- how all of these characteristics fit together. And really, the sum of these parts is what makes a house a home.

You can’t get that online any more than I could have gotten the entire experience of my CE class online. The class was more than what was presented- it was the friends that I made on either side of me, the joking, the mistakes we made, and the teacher tying it all together.

That’s what an open house does. Was it a waste of my time? Even if no one had shown up, my time is never wasted. I could be sketching out a post, planning for my week, or any of a hundred things. But in this particular case I met an online business associate (and his two sweet daughters) face to face, I showed buyers through who left with a complete sense of the property, and met the neighbors who know of someone interested in the property.

So, the short answer is, “Yes, I think open houses are useful.” They take me out of the Internet world in which I find myself immersed and bring me face-to-face with people in general. I may not sell a home right then and there, but I will connect, and I will learn from these people what they think of their neighborhood and of the market.

And by learning and listening I will become better at what I do.

Diane is one of the remaining dinosaurs who enjoys Open Houses. What do you think, as a consumer or as an agent?

Becca and Jenny

I took a couple of days kind of off this weekend to celebrate the end of vacation with my daughter. She had been sick with strep for most of the time and that’s a sad way to spend a school vacation.

We just spent the better part of today hanging out, playing Guess Who and watching *gasp* South Park online. Just a few minutes ago, we played a quick game of “The Game of Things.” We cherry-picked the cards, only using the ones that were appropriate and funny, or that struck our fancy.

I like these games- I have played the ones that were popular at the time with whatever kids were at that age. When Meg and Becca were at the age where they liked games like that, those party-question books were popular. “If you were stranded on an island with only 5 foods, what would they be?”

This game that I played with Jenny was similar, except that it was in card form instead of book form. Some of the cards that we chose:
Things that confirm your house is haunted
Things you shouldn’t say to a police officer
Things about men that frustrate you
Things that confirm you are losing your mind (do we REALLY want to go there?)
Things you would like to add to the Ten Commandments (add?)
Things you would like to ask a psychic (Who needs a psychic when you have a Magic 8 ball- or a Magic Cheezburger, in Jenny’s case?)

Anyway, a day of fun, and napping, and hanging out. It has been a long time since I have been able to do this with her, to just snatch a few hours and snuggle up and play. In a couple of years she will be in high school, and I doubt I will be able to lure her over to share a few stolen hours with me.
Her older sibs are already there- they drift in and out of the house and are friendly, but they have their own things going on. The days of Rent, LOLcats, and Vlog Brother will be over in a heartbeat.

Things you would like to never come to an end.

I posted as my status on Facebook that February was the shortest month, but also the longest month.
It is so true for us here in Massachusetts, where winter sets in around November at the latest, and we see snow in October as a rule. I remember speaking with a teacher friend Beth Lewis who said that she used to tell people not to make any career decisions in February. The yearning for change in general is simply too great and can be inappropriately felt as job dissatisfaction.
Today is a nice day here. Much of the snow that we got last week has melted, although it would be silly to assume that more isn’t on the way. The birds are singing like someone has invited them to a party.
It is definitely a party that I want to join.
Sometimes I think that is the trouble with being human. I have just enough memory to remember warm weather, but not enough to create a feeling of comfort that it will come back again.
Same thing with this housing slump or bubble, and the surrounding recession- or however you want to categorize it. This winter of economy has created, in me and in others, this same February feeling except over a longer period of time. It doesn’t matter how many times I read about the cyclical nature of the economy; it doesn’t matter how well I remember my (now) ex almost losing his business during the last downturn; it doesn’t matter that I KNOW that if you are in business you look inept during a recession and a genius when the economy is great- there is still this feeling of wanting it to be over.
So what is faith? Is it the ability to tap into the knowledge of the cyclical nature of things and use that knowledge as a rope to pull yourself to the next peak? How do birds know when it is time to sing, or is it always time to sing?
Looking at economic trends, perhaps things are starting to pick up. New short term mortgage delinquency rates have fallen – and this is a good sign, since delinquency rates closely follow joblessness.

So this is February. I need to keep remembering that it can only get warmer.

It's not rocket science- it's sharing

It’s confirmed- I will be sitting on a real estate panel at 140 Characters Conference with my friends Maya Paveza, Eric Stegemann, and Amanda Wernick (@mayaREguru, @EricStegemann and @FunomenalRealtr, respectively, on twitter). The panel will be moderated by none other than @TopBrokerOC, Bob Watson.

I am excited- first because of the honor of being asked, but also for a different reason. If you stay floating around the same circles of friends and confederates, your business viewpoint stagnates. That is why I love being online and seeing different perspectives. When there are a half dozen people discussing business ideas face-to-face, things positively crackle with electricity. And take a step outside of your own industry- beyond the ones who are emailing you to try this idea or that, and if you close just one house it will more than pay for buying into it- and you will get a flood of new ideas.

My goal for this year? It used to be common practice to take a top producer to lunch. I am going to take it a step beyond this. I would like to take out a successful businessperson in a field other than real estate every week and share ideas. The industry could be related to real estate- like an attorney or a mortgage person- but anyone who has scrabbled to the top and stayed there in this economy would be someone from whom I could absorb new business practices from. And maybe they would pick up a thing or two from me, as well.

The real estate industry- and many others, I think- is in the midst of a rebirth. We need to rethink what tools we give to our agents, and this HAS to go beyond a phone extension and E&O insurance. And we need to rethink how we serve our clients. We need commitment to new ideas if the old ones are not working. The buck stops here.

A few  tidbits I picked up in the past week or so:

Quick and Dirty Guide: Making a Real Estate Fan Page that Delivers by Ian Greenleigh

Brokerage from the Ashes 1000WattBlog

Older article from RealtyTimes about short sales

Real estate info plugin for WordPress blogs by The Mortgage Reports

home sweet home- working to improve the industry

I am borrowing heavily in this post from my own post and from the Towne & Country blog (with permission).

Without a doubt, industries that do not try to change and improve are dead in the water. Looking at the way our industry is structured, I think the most change is going to occur locally, on the brokerage level.
Our brokerage is already different, and we have many ideas in the wings that are directly intended to raise the bar for real estate.
But we need you. We can talk about improving the industry, but we can’t do it without the input of you, the consumer. What was your last real estate experience like? What would you have made better? What did you like the best- that you would keep just the same if you did it over again?

- Towne & Country
Gerry, our broker/owner, has a slightly different slant here than most of the conversation on twitter suggests. Change WILL need to be initiated by the consumer. Change also has to come at the agent level. The individual agent needs to be aware of what the consumer wants- what is important to the consumer- and be the one to provide it.
We are no longer the gatekeepers of information. Consumers get upset if the information that they want about a property is withheld in hopes that they will call- and with the number of listings available in most markets they will just move on to the next one.
The NAR article that I quoted in my last post sums it up:

Sellers largely want agents to price their home competitively, find a buyer, market the property and sell within a specific timeframe. Reputation was the most important factor in choosing an agent, cited by 36 percent of respondents, followed by trustworthiness at 21 percent.

Home buyers thought the most important services agents offer are helping find the right house, and negotiating sales terms and price. The most commonly cited benefits of using an agent are helping buyers understand the process, pointing out unnoticed features or faults, negotiating better contract terms, and providing a better list of service providers. Comparable to sellers, buyers chose agents based on a referral or had used them in a previous transaction, with trustworthiness and reputation being the biggest factors in selecting an agent.

Agents- pay attention! The consumers have spoken! You provide expertise, NOT information. Let’s work on raising the bar together.

at home

I am a numbers girl. I can’t help it- it has always been the way that things made sense. I know I have mentioned it before, but my dad was an engineer at Raytheon and I apparently inherited the mindset.
So I loved when the National Association of Realtors sent out all of its aggregated stats in one big post. These stats are useful to consumers, and also helpful to me no matter what hat I happen to be wearing when I read them.

Some numbers I want to drag out:

• First time home buyers comprised 47% of the buying market- median age 30
• Buyers searched 12 weeks and saw 12 homes, on average
• 42% of sellers offered incentives to buyers- such as home warranties or help with closing costs
• Trustworthiness and reputation were the biggest reasons that buyers and sellers chose their agents
• Less than one percent of sellers chose an agent based on commission

But this is my favorite,  straight from the buyers’ mouths. No guessing or wondering- just the facts:

When asked where they first learned about the home purchased, 36 percent of buyers said a real estate agent; 36 percent the Internet; 12 percent from yard signs; 6 percent from a friend, neighbor or relative; 5 percent home builders; 2 percent a print or newspaper ad; 2 percent directly from the seller; and less than 1 percent a home book or magazine.

So yard signs were, on average, 12 times more effective than a home magazine, and 6 times more effective in finding a buyer than a print ad!! Something to consider when you are interviewing an agent to list your home.

This is how a photo looks on it:

Nice and bright because it is against the black background