In today’s ever competitive Internet arena, we, as real estate professionals are drawn every direction for the perfect website solution.  With website companies offering multiple color schemes to integrated IDX search engines including all the bells and whistles, it’s easy to fall into information overload.  Finally, we make our best guess, choose the lucky winner and begin our journey.

Almost predictably there is a progression that the new agent takes until they find a website solution that works for them.

And, just how does it truly work for us?  Have we reaped the desired net return or do we ignore it and continue to pay the $35/month just so we have a website like everyone else?  Or, are we truly investing into our website, time, passion and money, so on the flipside it generates a positive ROI?

Late 2006, I began using HomeGain’s BuyerLink product.  Through trial and error I have learned to produce a positive cash flow through lead conversion.  Since then I have come to understand you can point BuyerLink traffic to just about any IDX search engine and generate some form of lead capture.

Quite literally you could point BuyerLink traffic to a brick with any flavor of lead capturing home search feature and make money at it. Continue reading this post

We have had a lot of positive changes to our MLS system recently.

We use MRIS (Metropolitan Regional Information System). There have been quite a few additions to our drop down menus. You can now choose short sales and foreclosures in a home search. We have had quite an interest from home buyers that feel they are getting a great value with these type of sales.

MRIS has also added features such as a highlighted banner in the remarks section. Here we can boast the best features of the home, and it will catch the attention of other agents. We also have the capability to relist a home after it has been off the market for at least 90 days and the total days on market starts over at zero.

In the past we had to wait 6 months for a property to be relisted to start with zero days on market. This benefits the seller tremendously if they want to take a few months off and then relist their property. We have a fairly new feature of virtual earth map which gives you the option of a birds eye view or aerial view of the property. Continue reading this post

This week we announced the launch of our 3rd annual Agent Appreciation Campaign, which is a way to thank our customers for their support and loyalty each year.

As part of the campaign this year, we are providing agent customers with complimentary white papers, a downloadable version of Home Sale Maximizer™ for their website and other special gifts, and encouraging agents to participate in a video contest.

“In addition to the day to day support and service we provide to our members, we think it important to highlight our appreciation each year through this campaign” said HomeGain General Manager Louis Cammarosano.

Read the full press release

If you are a real estate agent who is a member of AgentView, AgentEvaluator, BuyerLink or AIMS, and did NOT receive the announcement email from us with a link to our Agent Appreciation Campaign website, please send an email to AAC@homegain.com.

Market update provided by Julie Brittain of Team Brittain with Keller Williams Realty First in North Atlanta.

I’m a numbers person.  I love to present my clients with the facts…

Closings for single family homes have dropped 34.2% since last July.

The average sale price for a single family home dropped 8.3% from July of 2007 to July of 2008. The average sales price for condos and townhomes dropped 6.2% from July of 2007 to July of 2008.

Year to date average prices for condos and townhomes are below what they were in 2003 and year to date average prices for single family detached are slightly higher than they were in 2004.

When this housing market turns around, the sales prices will recover rapidly.  I believe that prices have neared a bottom, so this is a great time to buy.  Our months-supply of homes is at an unprecedented high. The reason… Continue reading this post

Market update provided by Teresa Mihelic of OCDreamhomes in Orange County, California.

This has been a very interesting year for our real estate market in Orange County. And this time of the year, we would have expected that the demand (the number of new pending sales) would have started to decline as we head into the holiday season.

Well, not this year.

It didn’t follow the “expected” cycle for the first half of the year (it constantly kept growing with a few step backs), and it has increased by 130 homes in the past 2 weeks and now totals 2974 pending sales.

To give some perspective, at this time of the year over the last few years, these were the numbers:

2008: 2,974 pending sales
2007: 1,180 pending sales
2006: 2,208 pending sales
2005: 3,058 pending sales

Interesting fact:

Demand is surpassing the prior 2 years, and looking like 2005 numbers. We will continue to see an influx of Continue reading this post

It’s Fall now.  That means football season.  My local team, the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) Miners have got off to an 0-3 start and, of course, the coach is starting to feel pressure.  He has been telling all of the fans that the team is not made up of losers – they are doing all of the little things right — and if you keep doing all of the little things right, it is impossible not to end up with the results that you want.

After I heard that comment I thought he is right — and it applies to real estate as well as football.  Sure the market is tougher now than it was a year or two ago, but people always need a place to live.  People are being transferred into town, getting married, having babies, etc.

So, how do we find these people?  By doing the little things.

Real estate is a contact business.  We have to keep putting ourselves in front of potential buyers and sellers.  If we do this enough, then we will find plenty of clients to work with.  Keep contacting those for sale by owners and expired listings.  Keep calling and emailing your buyer prospects.

What I’ve found, though, is that it’s not enough just to make the contact.  It’s the follow through that separates the top Realtors from the rest of the pack.

Continue reading this post