On Monday March 26, 2012, Louis Cammarosano, General Manager of HomeGain, was a guest on the Real Estate 360 Live radio show on The Big Talker 1580 WHFS AM, hosted by Ryan Sloper.

Listen to the show.

Part 1 (15:18)

Ryan and Louis discuss the controversy regarding the allegations of a Congressional Budget Office employee who claims that the CBO prohibited statements in their reports indicating that foreclosures  had an impact on the housing market and that the decline in housing prices had an impact on household wealth. Louis notes that economic data is often politicized as data can be included and excluded according to political aims. Louis notes that manipulation can also occur in the unemployment and inflation data. Louis notes that the Federal Reserve official manipulates the market and therefore its not surprising that economic data is also subject to manipulation. Louis notes that statistics and science are also manipulated in other areas ie. cigarettes and cancer and global warming findings. Ryan and Louis discuss shadow inventory and foreclosures impact on the market. Louis notes that bad assets should have been sold off by the banks rather than having been bailed out. Louis notes that the current low interest environment forces savers to put their money into stocks. Louis notes a recovery can be built on savings, but that with low interest rates borrowing, rather than savings is encouraged.

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Seventy-two percent of real estate professionals and 77 percent of home owners think home prices will increase or stay the same in the next six months.

Last month, HomeGain, the first company to provide free instant home valuations online, released the results of our first quarter 2012 nationwide home values survey of over 400 HomeGain current and former members and more than 1,700 home owners. The survey asked their opinions on home prices and what they thought of President Obama’s performance as President. On this real estate blog we published the 1st quarter 2012 national results as well as the complete 1st quarter 2012 regional results, including commentary from real estate agents and brokers.

Earlier this month we released the California 1st quarter 2012 home values survey data, the Florida 1st quarter 2012 home values survey data, the 1st quarter 2012 Texas home prices survey data, the 1st quarter 2012 Illinois home prices survey data, the 1st quarter 2012 New York home prices survey data and the 1st quarter 2012 Arizona home prices survey data. In the coming days we will be releasing home values survey data from Pennsylvania, Washington and other states.

See all past Maryland home values surveys.

Today we are releasing the Maryland home prices survey results.

Set forth below is the first quarter 2012 real estate professional and homeowner Maryland home prices survey data along with the fourth quarter 2011, the first quarter 2011 and the first quarter 2012 national home prices survey data. Click on each question to see complete results:

1. Have home prices increased, decreased or stayed the same in the last year?
2. On average, what do homeowners believe that their home is worth?
3. How do buyers feel that homes for sale are priced?
4. What is the average difference in price between what sellers believe their home to be worth and the amount at which the home gets listed?
5. What is the average difference in price between what a home is listed at and what a home sells for?
6. In the next six months, will the values of homes in your market increase, decrease or stay the same?
7. What percentage of homes for sale are foreclosures in your area?
8. What is the average home price in your area?
9. What percentage of your clients are first-time buyers?
10. How do you think Barack Obama is performing in his role as President?
11. If the Presidential election were today, who would you vote for?

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If you have spent anytime learning about search engine optimization (SEO) then you know about the importance of links. Backlinks, also known as incoming links, inbound links, inlinks, and inward links, are incoming links to a website or web page. In basic link terminology, a backlink is any link received by a web page, directory, website, or top level domain from another web site. If you want to rank well in Google for any remotely competitive phrase then you need links from other websites. Plain and simple.

Getting links to your website raises your search engine ranking, ideally getting you more visitors (which hopefully translates into more cash). So where do you get more links?

Matt Cutts of Google has provided a valuable video on how to build links. You can view it here.

In a nutshell here are a few of the ways to build links:

1. Controversy
2. Participate in a community
3. Original Research
4. Get a blog
5. Run a service (or create a product) that people find useful and give it away for free to the community.
6. Website architecture
7. Make videos

One thing Matt Cutts didn’t mention is buying links. Yes, you can buy links. If you poke around a little but you will find websites willing to add a link to your site for some cash. This is frowned upon by Google.

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Eighty percent of Arizona Real Estate Professionals think home prices will increase over the next six months; Thirty-eight percent of home owners think home prices will increase

Last month, HomeGain, the first company to provide free instant home valuations online, released the results of our first quarter 2012 nationwide home values survey of over 400 HomeGain current and former members and more than 1,700 home owners. The survey asked their opinions on home prices and what they thought of President Obama’s performance as President. On this real estate blog we published the 1st quarter 2012 national results as well as the complete 1st quarter 2012 regional results, including commentary from real estate agents and brokers.

Earlier this month we released the California 1st quarter 2012 home values survey data, the Florida 1st quarter 2012 home values survey data, the 1st quarter 2012 Texas home prices survey data, the 1st quarter 2012 Illinois home prices survey data and the 1st quarter 2012 New York home prices survey data. In the coming days we will be releasing home values survey data from Maryland, North Carolina, Washington and other states.

See all past Arizona home values surveys.

Set forth below is the first quarter 2012 real estate professional and home owner Arizona home prices survey data along with the fourth quarter 2011 real estate professional survey data and the first quarter 2011 national home prices survey data: (click on each question to see complete results):

1. Have home prices increased, decreased or stayed the same in the last year?
2. On average, what do homeowners believe that their home is worth?
3. How do buyers feel that homes for sale are priced?
4. What is the average difference in price between what sellers believe their home to be worth and the amount at which the home gets listed?
5. What is the average difference in price between what a home is listed at and what a home sells for?
6. In the next six months, will the values of homes in your market increase, decrease or stay the same?
7. What percentage of homes for sale are foreclosures in your area?
8. What is the average home price in your area?
9. What percentage of your clients are first-time buyers?
10. How do you think Barack Obama is performing in his role as President?
11. If the Presidential election were held today, who would you vote for?

Continue reading this post