Yesterday I published 10 styles of negotiation.

Here are some additional tips, many of which I learned as an arbitrator and settling lawsuits.

The Do Not Do’s of Negotiation

1. Never “tip your hand” on anything

Don’t say that you have to move, got a new job or hit the lottery. Never say you love the place. Play it cool. It’s the same when you like a girl. You don’t tell her. Same with buying a house. Keep your mouth shut.

2. Don’t bring your relatives to see the house after you’ve seen it.

That is a sure tip off to the home seller that you like the house and want to show it off to the family. Continue reading this post

The key to effective negotiation is your ability to convey interest while at the same time being willing to walk away. It is important to establish your interest, else the seller think you are only a tire kicker out to waste their time.

Once he or she knows you are interested, their job becomes one of getting you to make an offer. Therein begins the delicate dance of negotiation.

Here are some tips, many of which I learned as an arbitrator and settling lawsuits.

Remember, every price is an “asking price”, not the price the seller is willing to accept.

1. Do Your Homework.

In order to know whether you are getting a good deal, you have to know the current marketplace. This includes the inventory and the economic reality of the local market. You also need to know the seller’s situation and motivation.

Don’t be afraid to ask questions. Continue reading this post

I just wanted to start a random act of kindness for all of our hard working Realtors. I am going to give you all the free things I have found on the web and use all the time.

If everyone could add a service and not be afraid of sharing good secrets, we can all benefit. After all, we are all in this together. Let’s all share what we have found!

1. Lowes Site for Realtors: Lowes sends out a 10% discount coupon along with other offers in a classy postcard with your name and photo/logo to all of your clients. I love this one.

2. BDTV: Offers Realtors® free TV excerpts for their site with Designer, Moving, Recipes, Travel and more.

3. Picture Resizer: Free software to reduce the size of you photo files for use in the MLS and the web.

4. Mortgage Rates: Up-to-the-minute mortgage rate running live on your web site. Continue reading this post

We have just completed a survey that we sent to 14,000 of our AgentEvaluator home buyers and sellers. We sent the survey to two customer groups: those who bought or sold a home using a HomeGain real estate agent, and those who failed to select one of our agents.

Our goal was to get consumer feedback that our AgentEvaluator agents could use to attract more potential clients by tailoring their proposals to meet the consumers’ expectations.

We are still digging through the data, but the preliminary results are very important so we wanted to pass them along now rather than wait until we’re done.

Survey Results:

• Nearly 9 out of every 10 customers who bought or sold a home using a HomeGain agent said that receiving a personalized proposal was either very or extremely important in their decision to select their agent. Only 4% said this was not a factor at all in their decision.
• 4 out of 10 expected to receive their first proposal within 4 hours of their profile.
• 1 out of every 4 consumers selected their agent within 24 hours, while 8 out of 10 selected their agent within 1 week.

The results are clear— Continue reading this post

Many of you have heard me tout the advantages of capturing and converting leads. There are other great benefits to building a large database of home buyers and sellers.

Of course, as you know, the best way to build your database is excellent lead capture through your website.

Over the past 4 years, we have built our database to 18,000 active home buyers and sellers, mostly buyers. At last check we were just under 18,500 leads in our system. With that said, a funny thing has been happening lately; many people have been contacting me to advertise on my site.

Since we have over 55,000 people on our site monthly, and more than 13,000 of them are from out of state, we are quickly becoming the only local company that carries such a large database of consumers moving to the area.

This was one of those things that make you go hmmmmm.

So let’s look at two potential opportunities you can create by building a large database. Continue reading this post

Financial markets are taking pause today in honor of Good Friday. It was another dramatic week with Ben Bernanke playing John Wayne.

Last weekend, Bernanke brokered a deal that handed Bear Stearns over to Jamie Dimon and JP Morgan Chase.

Last week, a share of Bear Stearns traded for thrice the price of the monthly HomeGain AgentEvaluator subscription, this week, it trades around the price of a Starbucks cup of coffee.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac agreed to buy a lot of mortgages, $200 billion worth to be precise. This buoyed up the mortgage bonds market and had a positive effect on most mortgage rates.

Let’s lock those rates, now.

I don’t see a whole lot more reward on the horizon and the risk of higher rates will increase next week.

ARM rates are out of whack, again, and the fixed-rate mortgages are the best priced. Continue reading this post