I have known for some time that I am no spring chicken. I have enjoyed many good years and plenty of awesome experiences in my time, but lately I find that a few things here and there aren’t exactly in mint condition! Although I have always felt young on the inside, the outside parts of my morta...

01/31/2010

Staying focused in an era of real estate fuzziness! It’s not as easy as you think!

13 Comments

The real estate market is topsy-turvy right now, and the sudden onslaught of technology designed to help both consumers and real estate professionals muddle through the confusion seems to have only wreaked more havoc. Because the ways that we do business now can change from day to day, we can o...

01/31/2010

Time v. Money. It applies to both sellers and buyers.

56 Comments

It is an inviolate tenet of real estate. When selling a property, one must determine whether it is more important to sell a property quickly and possibly accept less money, or to hold on for a longer time to get a higher price. And one can statistically estimate for a seller what those time fram...

01/28/2010

I did a “flashlight” showing last night, and it was kind of fun!

20 Comments

With plenty of REO and other distressed properties that do not have the utilities turned on, late showings in the winter can be a challenge. Not only is it very cold inside the properties, if you are out in the country in the middle of the woods it can be very, very dark. I carry an LED flashlig...

01/28/2010

Is it really “hump day” if you work seven days a week?

31 Comments

Well, it’s Wednesday, but since I have been working straight through the last few weeks I have completely lost that “middle of the week” feeling. Of course, in today’s world, there are but a lucky few left that work the traditional five-day nine to five work week. And there is always pressure t...

01/26/2010

“Under all is the land.” Some thoughts about owning real property.

18 Comments

The preamble to the Realtor® Code of Ethics begins with the words: “Under all is the land. And while at first that may seem a bit cryptic, the fact of the matter is that it has never had more meaning than it does today! Where I live, in Coweta County Georgia, land was the hottest commodity in th...

01/25/2010

Sometimes the digital camera is just a little too razor sharp. Or are we just not pleased with what we see in the mirror.

28 Comments

Since we recently changed our affiliation to Better Homes and Gardens Metro Brokers, I have been asked by a lot of agents to take their photograph for their new business cards. And it is good to update one’s portrait every once in a while, I guess! But to a person, no one is entirely happy with...

01/25/2010

If you want to sell me something by making a claim about your success, why not try proving it?

100 Comments

I got one of those SEO company spam emails today that made this claim about their company: “Our company is on the first page when you Google our primary search term "SEO Company." How would you like us to do the same for your web site? Only there was one important thing missing. The name of the ...

01/24/2010

How much is passion worth when making an offer on the purchase of a house?

24 Comments

In our area, Newnan Georgia, we have a lot of value priced properties that attract many buyers. In many of these cases, the highest bid is either accepted on an electronic Internet system, or the listing agent calls for “highest and best bids: by a certain deadline. When I am representing a clie...

01/23/2010

An alarming news statistic! Nearly HALF of the people in the country are below the average level of intelligence! Bad news sells.

20 Comments

While my obvious conclusion has been proffered as tongue-in-cheek, the title of this post probably did grab your attention! After all, I am certain that we encounter many individuals each and every day that would fall into the below-average category and we relish confirmation of that fact. And ...

01/21/2010