News of Abbott Realty Group’s decision to stop syndicating its listings to real estate aggregators such as Trulia and Zillow renewed the discussion in the industry regarding the value of third-party sites in marketing properties. To summarize the point made by the likes of ABR and Edina, which made the decision in November, is that third-party aggregators take listing information (which is ‘owned’ by the listing brokerage) as content for their sites, which drives traffic to these sites. The resulting traffic then becomes a valuable commodity which can be leveraged into selling advertising, whether to individual agents, brokerages, or add-on services (i.e. moving companies). A consensus among the anti-syndication crowd is that data is often outdated, automated-valuation models (i.e. Zestimates) are inaccurate, and that ultimately these portals are using listings to attract traffic to their sites, so that they can sell those ‘leads’ and ad space to real estate agents.

The flip side of the argument, at least as made by Zillow’s CEO Spencer Rascoff, is that portals such as Zillow are ‘most likely to provide the most exposure to the most buyers,’ which results in listings selling faster and at a higher price. He goes on to say that ‘not putting listings on Zillow, Realtor.com and Trulia is tantamount to abandoning any hope of finding a buyer who is using a mobile device’ (emphasis added by Mr. Rascoff), which would lead one to believe that the big aggregators have a monopoly in mobile technology – a point that many leading innovators could argue against.

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Today is the 4th anniversary of the HomeGain Real Estate Blog!

We’ve come a long way since 2007. Thanks to all of our contributors and readers for their support!

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HomeGain, a leading website that connects REALTORS® with home buyers and sellers, today announced that one of its agent members has reached two million dollars in gross commissions with the HomeGain AgentEvaluator program, with another 18 members being inducted into new award clubs. The total number of award clubs members now exceeds 1,000.

In 10 years using the HomeGain AgentEvaluator program, Eric Pakulla of RE/MAX Advantage Realty in Maryland has reached two million dollars in gross commissions. He is HomeGain’s first inductee in the Million Dollar Club and has been an AgentEvaluator Top Performer for the last five years.

“HomeGain continues to be an excellent source of leads for my business. The bottom line is HomeGain generates high quality, motivated leads. I highly recommend this company to any agent that wants to add additional lead generation sources,” said Eric Pakulla.

“We are extremely proud of Eric’s accomplishment and success with the AgentEvaluator program,” stated Louis Cammarosano, General Manager at HomeGain. “HomeGain is also proud that over 1,000 agents have earned admission to our award clubs by assisting home buyers and sellers with their real estate needs.” Continue reading this post

True story….on the way up to the office this morning, a nice lady held the elevator for me and asked which floor I was headed to. It turns out we were both going to the same floor and she is one of our neighbors. She said to me, “You must be from HomeGain. Wow, you guys are still around huh?”

I replied, “Yes we are still around and in fact, it’s HomeGain’s 12th anniversary today!”

There’s a slight chance I may not have said those exact words, but it really is our anniversary today. Thank you to all of our members and employees for your hard work this past year!

On Monday March 21, 2011 , Louis Cammarosano, General Manager of HomeGain, was a guest on the Real Estate Radio show on The Big Talker 1580 AM, hosted by Ryan Sloper.

Listen to highlights of the show!

Part 1 (24:14)

Ryan and Louis discuss the situations in Japan and Libya and their impact on interest rates; Japan’s decision not to sell U.S. treasuries;the potential for Japanese insurance companies to sell U.S. treasuries to cover earthquake and tsunami claims in Japan;speculate on the Fed’s influence’s on Japan’s decision not to sell U.S. treasuries;the Fed’s statement that its “target rate” of inflation is still lower even though the cost of living is the highest since the 70′s;the real inflation rate and deception caused by low interest rates and low official inflation rates;low interest rates on equity prices;the impact of cash purchases on the real estate market;the advantage of purchasing a low interest rate mortgage on a home where the rent to buy ratio favors home purchase;the advantage that cash purchasers have on getting first dibs on attractively priced homes;why banks should not over lend at these mortgage rates;why home ownership is not at the top of many consumers lists;why real estate is a selective not universal opportunity;the difference in availability of mortgage credit vs consumer credit;the weekly unemployment claims; the debt ceiling and the Fed’s decision to sell mortgage backed securities;the Fed’s inability to control the free market indefinitely.

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On Monday March 14, 2011 , Louis Cammarosano, General Manager of HomeGain, was a guest on the Real Estate Radio show on The Big Talker 1580 AM, hosted by Ryan Sloper.

Listen to highlights of the show!

Part 1 (23:51)

Louis and Ryan discuss the impact of the earthquake and tsunami on the world economy; inflation, interest rates, the Fed and Bank of Japan action and the U.S. budget negotiations; the profile of home purchasers today;the paradox of government intervention to make “homes affordable for everyone”; the direction of the rental market, rent vs. buy ratios; the comparison of Fed action during the Volker years vs the Bernanke era;  Charlie Sheen, oil prices; the direction of the dollar and other currencies race to the bottom; the status of the dollar as the world’s reserve currency;the abandonment of the gold standard; the fate of fiat currencies; Utah’s gold standard push; the actions states are taking to cut spending;the price of gold and silver and their role as stores of value;real estate vs. gold and silver as investments; the impact of shadow inventory on general inventory;the impact of the numbers of government workers and their salaries on the D.C. area housing market.

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