Top 10 Questions To Find Out If Your Realtor Is Really Using Social Media

I had put this in my last post but wanted to draw some attention to it. So many Realtors have hopped on the band wagon and started making strides and getting up to speed once again. To let your self be fooled by a fancy web site or a blog that looks pretty. Here are a few things to ask when interviewing your next agent to find out if they are who they say they are online.

1. What kind of online presence do you have in our community?

2. Are your site(s) easy to find?

3. Are you involved in Social Networking? If so, which ones? (the major ones are facebook, twitter, linkedIn, youtube)

4. How much time to you spend interacting and building your social networks? A week? A day?

5. Do you have a blog? How active is it?

6. Will you advertise my home on all your networks? How often?

7. Will my home have it’s own domain name so it is easy to find?

8. Do you own a smartphone (ie. blackberry, iphone, palm)? Does it have a data plan? (Believe it or not just because someone has a smartphone doesn’t mean they use it like one)

9. Can you be reached via email, text, twitter, facebook, linkedIn and have a 5 minute or less response time?

10. What percentage of buyers start there home search online? (Last time I checked it was 92%) Given that fact. where do you spend the majority of your advertising budget?

Hope this helps you prepare for the next time you interview an agent to help you sell your home. If you would like to hear more about how my no risk, hassle free, tech savvy marketing program can help you get your home sold, please don’t hesitate to call me today.

Cheers!

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Experienced…what does it mean to you?

Well since I have been in the business for less then five years and don’t look like I am a hundred years old, I often get the question so how long have you been doing this? Fair enough questions for the most part I guess. I tell them I have been at it for over 3 years and started as a buyers agent and did that for a year and half before I stepped out on my own to start building my own real estate business.

So here is my question. What does “experience” mean to you? I suppose you could throw the words “seasoned”, “veteran”, and “medallion for 20 years” etc. out there too. These are all great things but, maybe it’s just me, but I have been around long enough to see how this industry works, and how people do business, especially the “experienced” ones. One word is “old school” yes the can negotiate, and make you feel comfortable, but we can all do this for the most part.

Before I continue on, I am not trying to knocking experience because it is a part of the total picture. We also need it to help train and teach new agents.

Here is the problem though, no matter how much experience you have you can always get the legal help, or questions answered because there is always someone able to help with that (other agents, books etc).

Here is one thing you typically don’t get from a highly experienced or seasoned Realtor. Cutting edge technology, new school selling practices (not high pressure) , internet savvy, social networker, etc.

Yes the wonderful people where able to get homes sold, and for the most part they are still getting homes sold today, but I wonder home much money is getting left on the table because of a lack of exposure due to inferior methods of marketing and advertising. I am just saying.

Why spend your hard earned dollars looking for buyers where there aren’t any, or at best, very few. Don’t let a fancy web site fool you, we all have one, but take a look at how they are giving back to the online community? Are they giving information away for free? Have they made it very easy for someone to contact them? What is the response time? Are they social networking (I mean actively using it ie: twitter, facebook, linkedIn) I have access to at least 700 potential buyers on facebook that I know on a first name basis, I am not even talking about the 48,000 other people I haven’t even connected with yet. What about the other 1000 people on twitter. (I have already allowed for people from out of the country that I didn’t count in those numbers).

So next time you interview an agent for the job of selling your home, remember experience shouldn’t be the only thing on your mind.

Some questions to ask your next agent you interview:

1. What kind of online presence do you have in our community?

2. Are your site(s) easy to find?

3. Are you involved in Social Networking? If so, which ones? (the major ones are facebook, twitter, linkedIn, youtube)

4. How much time to you spend interacting and building your social networks? A week? A day?

5. Do you have a blog? How active is it?

6. Will you advertise my home on all your networks? How often?

7. Will my home have it’s own domain name so it is easy to find?

8. Do you own a smartphone (ie. blackberry, iphone, palm)? Does it have a data plan?

9. Can you be reached via email, text, twitter, facebook, linkedIn and have a 5 minute or less response time?

10. What percentage of buyers start there home search online? (Last time I checked it was 92%)

Having an agent who is younger, newer, and excited to get to work for you might be just the ticket to getting more buyers through your home, in less time, netting you more money at closing.

Next time you are interviewing an agent just ask the 10 questions above to find out how active your potential agent is in the internet world. It is important.

For questions, or more information about what I do to get home sold in this market place. Call me or email me at info@chrispenner.com

Cheers!

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Stats Summary for December 2009 (A Year In Review)

One word describe the year of 2009 in real estate: RECOVERY.

All thought we aren’t back at the highest prices we saw in the middle of 2008 we are definitely on the way back up. The average detached home in the Fraser Valley for December was 497,732 as opposed to last year December when it was 464,189 which is a 7.2 percent increase. Townhouses have done roughly the same percent of increase in average pricing while condo’s have remained low and actually dipped off 0.3 percent decrease in average price.

This is based on more new product becoming available then in the detached listing side of things.

We saw the slowest January in the last 20 years and we saw 3rd busiest December on record.

First- time home buyers made up 40% of the buying public as opposed to the normal of 25%. The big cause of this was continued low interest rates which seem to be staying low and should provide optimum buying conditions for the next while. But here is the disclaimer: “If you wait to long the deals can pass you buy in a hurry”.

Fine note, sales are up, inventory is down and prices are slowly rising up again. For a full look at the stats for the Fraser Valley please go check out Fraser Valley Real Estate Board Stats.

So if you are a first time home buyer sitting on the fence about whether to make the plunge into home ownership, I am not sure that the signs could get any more clear.

To get a list of best buys in the area and to find out how easy this process can be, give me a call today at 604.807.9020 or you can always email me at info@chrispenner.com

Cheers!

CP

Time For You To Set The Standards

Here is the deal, I am reading a book right now which is just awesome which I’ll tell you about later, but out of this came an idea, which reading typically tends to do.

The idea is this: That I will no longer set the standards by which I do business. You will.

As anyone who is in business will tell you, over time you start to get into a routine and a rhythm the seems to be working fine. We get busy, side tracked, and if we are a small business like most Realtors are, we tend to unintentionally take on far more then we can actually handle at once, which in return causes certain things to get forgotten or neglected unintentionally. In other words, are once main set of standards all of a sudden changes, because of time.

So often we assume everybody wants the same thing, and that they want to be communicated with in the same way, and so on. This isn’t true is it, you aren’t all the same and you don’t all want things done the same either. Do you?

So here it goes, this is your opportunity to tell me how would you like to be communicated with, how often, in what medium, what do you expect from me? Don’t worry you don’t have to have this all laid out a head of time I will ask questions to help guide you through this so it is as easy as buttering toast.

We need standards in our businesses, and I am sure we all have them in some manner of speaking, but remember everyone is different, so the days of having one system and one system only is gone, customized and tailored is in, now more then ever.

So if you want a buying/selling experience where you help set the standards by which the Realtor operates and conducts business with you. Email me or Call me today to find out how we can work together to make your next home buying/selling experience worth while.

If you have any more questions or comments on standards in business, feel free to leave them here, they are always appreciated.

Cheers!

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We Just Make Up Housing Prices To Screw You

I am almost certain over the last year or so this is what people think, We Just Make Up Housing Prices To Screw You. Whether they say it to my face or not this what they are thinking. Please tell me other wise after your done reading if this is not true.

My hope with this is to try to explain in an easy to understand way, why Realtors come up with the prices they do. I know it sounds complicated and at a professional level it is, but in this case I’ll try to make it easy for you.

Like I said before I am sure that most people think Realtors just pull a price out of the hat to screw the home owner. This is not true (although I can’t speak for all Realtors).

The price that I come prepared with to a particular home comes from a large pool of housing data that has been analyzed and sorted to narrow down a price point at which the home should sell at (based on reasonable selling efforts).

The price that is laid out for a home seller is based solely on the Buyer’s, that’s right, the Buyer’s. All the Buyer’s that are ready, willing, and financially able to buy make up what we call “Market Value”. So to get that home sold you might need to price the home a little lower than what you had expect too.

There is no point to over price a listing because you only have about a 6-8 week window to get maximum value for you home before time starts to de-value the home. The effect of over pricing is far worse then under pricing. See graph here Over Pricing.

If we under price what happens is we get multiple offers and it drives the price up to “Market Value” and if we over price we don’t sell and/or lose money. The longer a home sits the harder it is to sell for a whole host of reasons.

So to be in the market you need to price accordingly, especially now. See The Tail Of Two Markets.

So remember the next time you feel like choking a Realtor because you feel the price he gave you for your home is WAY to low, remember we don’t make up the prices the Buyer’s that are buying do. We just do our best to interpret the data that we have to help you achieve your goals.

For more information on pricing feel free to email me. Or for a free market report visit http://www.yourfreemarketreport.com

If you like what you read, please leave a comment or RT on twitter it’s always nice to hear from the readers.

Cheers!

CP

Sellers Have Financial Obligation to Clear Title

Hello, I was just reading through one of our regular Realtor News reports and there was an article that I thought would be worth telling you about. Sellers read carefully because this involves you.

Sellers are responsable to provide clear title to the purchaser appon completion of the Real Estate transaction. This means that if there are any penalties, liens, or outstanding interest etc. the seller is responsible to pay out all parties involved. This can cause a transaction to collapse if the seller can’t pay to clear title.

To make a long story short make sure you look at all your financial obligations before listing your home for sale. If you are thinking of selling and would like to know more about what costs might be involved please comment here or email me at info@chrispenner.com.

Cheers!

CP

Barefooting Waterskiing Up North in January. Are You Crazy?…

…well that is just what people say when they here I am still barefooting with a few guys from the area. Mind you, we are prepared for the the cold with some specialized equipment, but it still has a bit of crazy attached to it.

Anyway here we are warming up in the boat a bit before we take another run at it:

Getting Warm

Getting the Feet Wet Jan. 3 2010

As you can see we are all in dry suits which I think is about the only way you can survive in these conditions. Did I mention this was yesterday? January 3, 2010.

Well I just wanted to share a little bit about what life looks like when I am not helping people buy and sell Real Estate. Here is to starting off your 2010 with a bang.

Cheers!

CP

Fraser Valley Real Estate Board Stats Summary for Novemeber 2009

Fraser Valley Real Estate Board Stats for November 2009

Well as expect we hit another sales record this month with 1,522 sales which was a 200% increase from the same month last year (This is where we all say WOW). We are down a little bit from last month by only about 10% but that is to be expected as we head toward Christmas.

The major cause for this abnormal market activity is continued low interest rates, with this November being the 2^nd busiest in the last 10 years.

Prices are on a slow rise, but keep in mind that 70% or all homes sold (detached, townhouses, condos) and 46% of detached homes sold for under $500,000, which is real a testament to the affordability that has arrived in the market place.

The average days on market where 56 days for detached homes, 46 for townhouses, and 58 days for condos, which is what you would expect for a balanced market place.

I know you are thinking what kind of market are we in and if you look on page 9 of the pdf link you will see we are right around the buyers market/balanced market.

If you also look at page 11 on the pdf you will notice that the gap between condo prices and detached home prices have separated quite a bit over the last few years and the look to be continuing in that direction. So if you are currently looking at moving into a bigger home or even just to a detached home, if you would like more information on what it would take to move up to a detached home let me know.

If you would like specific stats for your city please check out the full stats report at Fraser Valley Real Estate Stats. If you need more information of help understanding what all the numbers mean please email me atquestions@askchris.ca.

Cheers!

CP

For information on Chilliwack Real Estate Stats please email me at questions@askchris.ca

Real Estate and other posts coming soon.

Hi guys, I have been running a few different blogs that all are real estate related so I thought I would put them all in one place and that will be here. So I will do my best to bring over some of my older posts from other blogs as well as to the majority of writing here from now on. I also a lot of video so keep your eyes peeled for that too.

Cheers!