Content Building Blocks

The first month of your real estate blog’s life is the most important.

What you do during the first month can affect the way Google will see your blog for the next year, so it is extremely important to build hyper local, keyword rich content in a structured and cohesive way.

The following are tips to building your first month’s worth of blog content.

Plan to post between 3-5 times a week.

Write “About Me” on Day 1. This includes:

• Your past experiences
• Your Team (if applicable)
• Reviews
• Boast posts: This is my favorite way to let you boast about your talents while couching it in an example and expert advice.  As a Realtor, you have the unique ability to solve problems most people feel are overwhelming.
• Talk about your past experiences. People like to know that not only do you understand their problem, but that you have solved the very same problem for other clients. Example marketing helps you to establish your position as an expert and problem solver while also emotionally connecting with potential clients that share a similar problem.

On day 2, select another topic. Work your way down the list on each of the sections and by the end you will have a full blog of hyper local real estate content that WILL get you found on the search engines.

Think writing real estate blog content is like pulling teeth? Continue reading this post

I mastermind with agents from my area on a regular basis and a question came up in discussions with this mastermind group of top agents in Tampa, Florida, that I thought would be a great blog topic.

So, when do you know it’s time to add a full-time assistant to your business?

I was asked this question and the first response I could think of was: “When you can afford it”. I’ve learned in the last year, as our business has more than doubled, that if I hadn’t taken the plunge to hire my assistant, I’d still be in the same place I was last year.

Looking back a year ago when we decided to build a team, hire staff and add agents, I realize there were some tell tale signs it was time for us to get “people leverage” and help to take our business to the level we wanted to.

We were very productive and profitable (I sold $7 million that year and was “lean” on expenses) but we had lofty goals and knew there is no way I could keep up with it all myself.

Ultimately, I knew if I wanted to sell more real estate, I would need someone to handle the paperwork, admin tasks, transaction management, appointment setting, photo taking, lock box hanging, and all of the other tasks that can take us away from our lofty sales goals.

However, you have to have enough income or savings to be able to afford it for a few months. It’s always a risk because you could hire the wrong person, lose money, disappoint clients, etc. Continue reading this post

While we’re in an expected seasonally increased sales period, market activity for existing home sales for the Denver real estate market shows signs of continued strength.  Sales volume on pending contracts and sold properties has trended up for several months now. In a recent national survey, Denver was nominated to be the top of 20 cities per the S&P/Case-Shiller® Home Price Indices and number one of the top housing markets on the rebound as announced on MSNBC Today.

Combined residential sales volume, for May, including single-family homes, townhomes, condos and lofts was 3,628 properties, up 7.02% % from April’s volume 3,390. Temper this with the fact that sales are still down 22.21% from May of 2008, per Metrolist Inc., Denver’s Multiple Listing Service.

There were 5,343 homes under contract last month. This includes 4,301 single-family homes and 1,042 condos and townhouses. This is an overall increase of 3.09% from April, but down 15.7% from year-prior last May. Single family homes contracts are up 3.56% while condo and townhomes are up 1.17%.

In May, the Denver MLS had 20,734 homes for sale, an increase of .14% from the prior month, down 21.26% from the same time last year. The average home sales price was $243,022, an increase of 4.09% from last months average price $233,482, down 5.05% from a year ago, $255,944. Continue reading this post

Here we are, half way through the year almost. Have you looked in the mirror lately?  On a daily basis I receive emails from Realtors all around the world struggling to succeed in this business.  I am a little perplexed at all the emails actually.  As soon as I ask them my first question, though, the answer is clear.

My question is usually something like, “How are you doing compared to your yearly business plan?” or “What are you doing to ensure you have implemented your business plan?”  I always get the same old answer: “Well I don’t really have a written business plan” or “Sure, I wrote my goals down, I always do…what’s an action plan?”

So what seems to be the disconnect between Realtors and running a business?

Firstly, let’s look at yourself.  Do you run your business as a business?  I had a great letter from an Agent of mine this year, it was for me to read to all my Agents.  Anna May has been in real estate for 20 years and has had many successes.  I don’t have the email handy, but I’ll paraphrase it:

Continue reading this post

In this 2nd quarter press call, moderated by Peter McCullough, we heard from Realtors from across the country discuss the results of HomeGain’s second quarter REALTOR survey on home prices.

Do Realtors feel that we’ve hit the bottom? How have home values changed in the last few months? Do they think Obama’s plans are bringing the market back to life?

Listen to the brief call on HomeGain Radio to find out!:

Highlights:

Continue reading this post

I had a conversation with a new client for about 20 minutes on the phone the other night and about half way through he revealed to me that he has been looking at houses for the last 6 months, but, could not understand why real estate agents would stop contacting him after showing several homes.

Three agents had the opportunity to sell this buyer a home and would have, except they did not want to show him more than 10 houses to make it happen.

Perplexed? Amazed?

Really, I’m still not sure what I feel after having this conversation, but, one thing I did know was that I was going to find him a home and close the transaction. In a time where many real estate professionals are struggling to make ends meet, I simply cannot understand the mentality that many agents have.

Maybe it’s the water that we can drink at the cooler in the office or maybe many agents are simply demoralized after looking at their shrinking bank accounts and rising credit card balances. Either way, once we get an opportunity to work with a pre-qualified buyer who will buy a home, we need to make it happen.

Maybe the difference for some agents and teams who are successful today is that they seize the opportunity when presented while others just want things to fall in their lap – unwilling to work hard enough to make a deal happen.

If I could just offer a simple recommendation in what is generally a tough real estate market: seize every opportunity presented. Do whatever it takes.

Continue reading this post