Linda's Southeastern CT Real Estate Blog

I had a call about one of my listings today from an agent in Simsbury.  Simbury is about an hour away.  She wanted to know if motorized boats were allowed on the water at my Inchcliffe Drive listing in Gales Ferry. It was all I could do to keep from laughing.  The listing isn't on the water although it does have a nice winter waterview.  The agent would have recognized that if she was familiar with the neighborhood. The National Association of Realtors Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers rates "neighborhood knowledge" second of the reasons a consumer selects an agent.  I'm constantly amazed that agents representing buyers, show properties in towns and neighborhoods they know little about. 

On January 10th of this year, the Connecticut Multiple Listing Service was formed combining a number of MLS systems in the state.  It seems, as a result, some agents are showing properties out of their geographic comfort zone. While I'm sure their GPS system or Mapquest will get them to the listed property, they are unfortunately doing a disservice to their buyer clients.  How can an agent adequately represent a client in a town or neighborhood they know nothing about?  When I was new in the business, I had this fear that I would sell a buyer their dream home and they would find out the day after closing that a shopping center was being proposed right outside their backyard.  As a result, I was always diligent about following the newspapers concerning land use issues in the towns I cover in New London County.  I keep a folder of clippings about subdivisions being proposed and future development concerns. That's the easy part of knowing a Neighborhood

But how do you know that one subdivision in town sells for more than another even though the housing is seemingly the same?  How would you know if a subdivision or a particular street has had a history of water problems? Or the historic things like a former inground oil tank system?  Unfortunately that information isn't usually found in the local newspaper, a book, or as part of a real estate course.  Instead, agents spend time in licensing classes memorizing useless information.  Do you think a client cares if you know how much the fine is for violating a provision of section 20-343bb in Connecticut State Statutes?   

Neighborhood knowledge is accumulated from experience. If you are an agent living in West Hartford, don't be showing houses in my neighborhood. And before you call yourself a neighborhood expert, make sure you are one.

Know Thy Neighborhood. 

Amen.

Each Friday our team runs our typical weekly 1/2 page ad in the local newspaper real estate insert. The cost is about $460. Several weeks ago, because I had a little extra space, I also featured a dog from the local animal shelter.  The results:  The shelter had 8 calls on the dog and we had 0 calls on the houses.   And that is when I decided to give up print advertising forever. 

How important is newspaper advertising in getting a home sold? The 2006 National Association of Realtors (NAR) Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers reports some interesting statistics on how buyers find the home they purchase.  Despite what sellers may think, buyers are not very likely to find the home they buy by searching ads in the newspaper. In fact, they are more likely to find a home for sale by spotting a yard sign.  36% of buyers say they first heard of the home they purchased from a real estate agent, 24% from the internet and 15% from a yard sign.  Only 5% of buyers find their home from newspaper print advertising.

If buyers don't use newspapers to find homes, then why do agents invest in print advertising when it is clearly not the best investment for getting a seller's home sold? Most agents do print advertising to appease their seller.  After all, doesn't every seller expect to find their home advertised in the newspaper?  Regardless of what they expect, sellers would be better served if their agents put their advertising dollar where it matters most - the internet.  

I've never been sold on newspaper advertising.  It appears that buyers aren't sold on it either. .....Now..if you are looking for a dog at the animal shelter, that's another story.

hmmmm what should I do with the extra $30,000 I'll save next year??

August was another controversial one on Active Rain, complete with hundreds of red x's, rude members, vote tampering, banned members, ugly comments, and whiners.  Lots of whiners.  First...the only serious note of this post...always remember this..... receiving comments on your post is a privilege not a right.  If you aren't getting comments on your posts, it could be that people just don't like you.

Before we begin......I would like to announce that I will now be selling advertising space in the comment section of my blog.  Here's how it works:   Add your advertisement in the comment section of this blog.  Send $1.49 to my address for every time your ad appears. We can be on the honor system here since I trust each and every one of you.  Remember this blog has good readership so your $1.49 is much better spent than newspaper advertising at 10 times the cost!  Sorry but no ginzu knives are included, but there will be a free spatula for the first 15 advertisers.

And now on to the Rainie awards for August: 

The "Most profound blog of the month" award:  These bloggers do an excellent job of presenting an honest assessment of today's real estate conditions.  A Different Kind of Market  

The "Message to Mars" Award:  What say you???

THE "VERY VERY BEST RANT" AWARD:  PLEASE STOP...

 The "Schzophrenia" Award: Given to the person who comments the most on his own blog.  I'll let you decide who HE is.

The "Best single sentence in a blog post" award:  "The stated income borrowers are the mortgage industry's smokers." by Brian Brady. - Bravo Mr. Brady.

The HOLY KA KA Award.   Given to TLW for her post on rainers who try to game the system by rating blogs down.  Big mistake.  Be nice to TLW.  She carries a gun.  Holy Ka Ka!!!

 The Special Kind of Stupid Award.   Even the Hyphen is plagerized.  Need I say more????

http://activerain.com/blogsview/70331/Bargain-Homes*

http://activerain.com/blogsview/195038/BARGAIN-HOMES*

for stealing this blog:  http://activerain.com/blogsview/43799/Bargain-Homes

*Hopefully, is no longer active.

The "Most Creative Solicitation of Comments" Award:  Ralph Nudi for his How I got 500 comments in less than 3 days post.

Speaking of solicitation of comments -  By special decree of Carnac:  Subscribe to my blog buttons are allowed and encouraged on this blog but only on this blog.  The $1.49 advertising fee does not apply.

And now what you have been waiting for - here are next month's predictions:

1.  Craig Schiller produces, directs and stars in Inconvenient Truths in the Staging Industry. Upon acceptance of his academy awards he thanks the "little people" of Active Rain.

2.  87 new groups are formed next month including the most popular, Bloggers Against Drunk Bloggers group. Running a close second is the Things I did on my Summer Vacation group.

3.  A new Project Blogger contest is announced.  No one enters. Active Rainers rejoice!

4. The 15^th edition of the reality series Survivor begins mid September.  Each tribe is given a map at the start of the show to find water for their camp.  As the TV camera  pans to the water maps....., the TV audience sees it and gasps.....copywrite LennHarley.com.  Ah oh.  Lenn and her attorney retire as millionaires.   Again.

5. The Rain God's finally admit that the "Flag Post" doesn't work.  In fact, the flag has never worked.  Ever.  Caleb admits "We don't need no stinkin flag thingie."

6. Due to the quick sell-out of Moderator Dartboards and Moderator Voodoo Dolls, Moderator Punching Bags will now be available for $29.95.  If you order within the next 30 days, you will receive free comment creator software,  a blinking subscribe to me button and a chopomatic food processor.

7. Consumers, fed up with Active-Rain Drama, turn to MySpace for all their Real Estate news and information. .

8. The Active Rain Gods release their Custom Blogs platform; allowing members  to maintain an ActiveRain blog with its own domain name as long as Active Rain appears as the first two words of the domain name. A rush to Go Daddy takes place and http://www.activeraincrap.com/ is immediately taken.

9. Chris Elizabeth Griffith wins the lottery and buys Active Rain.  She renames it "The Griffith Reign"  and immediately changes the point structure - negative points are given for being stupid,  writing crap, and whining.  At any time your point balance reaches zero, you are permanently banned.  That means forever.  

10.  Membership in AR hits a plateau and in an effort to add new members, the Rain Gods announce a special MEMBERS ONLY blog by Al Gore, the first blogger on the Internet.  Algore blogs about the days leading up to his inventions of MySpace and FaceBook.

11. The following words are banned from future blog posts until further notice:  Find Your Voice.

12.  The Active Rain Referral Exchange is canceled but no one notices.

Dr. Phil makes his monthly appearance and has a message for all whiners:   This is Active-Freakin-Rain, not Burger King.  You can't have it your way!!

 And THIS JUST IN!!!!!   The new Active Rain Pinnochio Button has just been released  and Carnac has been given the honor of testing the prototype.  The new Pinnochio Button will activate automatically if you lie on your blog post.  Ok....ahem....testing testing.   I SOLD 451 homes last year and took a 3 month vacation. 

AND Just in case you missed Carnac in the past:

January 1st Carnac Predictions

February Carnac Predictions

March Carnac Predictions

April Carnac Predictions

May Carnac Predictions

June Carnac Predictions

July Carnac Predictions