PRLog (Press Release) – Jun 29, 2009 – The Wall Street Journal/LORE 2009 Real Estate Top 400 Professionals list was released in June. It is based on a survey of more than 7,000 brokerage firms, associations of Realtors® and hundreds of other sources to determine the top agents in the United States. Atlanta-based Realtor Mark Spain and his RE/MAX Greater Atlanta real estate team of 10 people were honored as the #2 team in the United States for most transaction sides.

Only three other Georgia real estate teams made this list, with the next team placing 64th (review complete list at http://online.wsj.com/ad/top100teamsides.html). The ranking is broken down by teams and individual agents, with a top 100 list each for transaction sides and for sales volume. Mark Spain also appeared on the team sales volume list in the #9 spot and was the sole representative for Georgia on this ranking.

Mark Spain Team’s 2008 sales marked the eighth consecutive year the team has exceeded the $100 million annual sales mark. They averaged more than a closing a day with 535 closings for a total of $131 million in gross sales. Based on this performance, the Mark Spain Team was named the #2 Team in the U.S. for closed transactions by RE/MAX International, earlier this year at the company’s annual sales convention.

“We’re seeing some positive signs in the metro Atlanta market with sales activity picking up and foreclosure inventory continuing to get snapped up. Once there are fewer available foreclosure properties, it’s very likely we’ll start seeing home prices increase. This summer is an excellent time to begin searching for a home while it’s still a buyer’s market, including excellent mortgage interest rates and the very generous first-time home buyers’ $8,000 tax credit that expires in December,” said Mark Spain.

Mark’s team regularly ranks in the top 10 teams worldwide out of nearly 100,000 RE/MAX agents in more than 65 countries. At the end of 2006, Mark Spain surpassed the billion dollar sales mark for lifetime transactions and is believed to be the youngest Realtor to accomplish this in the least amount of time—11 years. Spain has also received numerous industry honors, like twice being named a Top 50 Realtor on the Rise in the U.S. by Real Estate magazine as well as being inducted into the RE/MAX Hall of Fame and earning the Lifetime Achievement Award from RE/MAX International in 2004.

An Atlanta native, Mark Spain is a University of Georgia graduate. He is affiliated with the RE/MAX Greater Atlanta office at 5591 Chamblee-Dunwoody Road in Atlanta, an office frequently named the #1 RE/MAX location in the world in terms of sales volume. The Mark Spain Team specializes in assisting home buyers and sellers in the North Atlanta region in all price levels.

To learn more about the Mark Spain Team, call (770) 886-9000, toll-free at (800) 241-3970, or visit http://www.markspain.com.

Tucson, AZ, June 28, 2009 –(PR.com)– The flavor of real estate foreclosure web sites changes dramatically with the launch of WhyteSmoke.com by veteran Realtors Kate Ryan and Nicole Brule-Fisher of Realty Executives of Southern Arizona.

“WhyteSmoke.com signals the beginning of many changes in our world, our nation and especially our community,” said Ryan. Both Ryan and Brule-Fisher are accomplished Realtors in Tucson’s Real Estate Community and they pledge to blend their experience and proven talents to breathe new life, a higher level of professionalism and renewed compassion into an industry itself in the midst of sweeping changes. It is no coincidence that we launch this site in June, when we celebrate National Homeownership Month.

“As Realtors, we see the sweeping impact of the housing market and it’s translation of pain in a down market to members of our community. We are here to move in a new, healthier and meaningful direction. We wish to revive and renew our community. Our mission is to help homebuyers and sellers understand what it is they can do to green those properties. This will be a new and fresh look at restoring our community and our homes, our dwelling. This is a bright new look at what we can all do, collectively, to reduce our impact on our environment and live more comfortably, more simply along the way,” they said.

“Further, as a significant commitment to our community, we wish to Share the needed help and attention with those homeowners that wish to remain in their homes by supplying information and support and guidance to those entities who can truly help.

“Alternatively, we are also equipped to help those homeowners choosing not to stay in their homes,” they continued.

“WhyteSmoke.com is here to assist owners of property, including lenders and their facilitators, (i.e. asset managers, etc.) in creating expedited sales of their properties while assuring the buying public professional and authoritative care,” said Brule-Fisher. “WhyteSmoke promotes our intention to share ideas in Greening up our homes and communities to insure a safe and caring environment for all.”

“WhyteSmoke.com is built on a platform for change. We invite the public and guest bloggers to share their gifts. We will offer time sensitive resources to consumers from those ‘in the know.’ Watch for the continued signals of change!”

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Contact Information
WhyteSmoke
Kate Ryan and Nicole Brule-Fisher
520-979-2098
nicolebr@aol.com
http://www.whytesmoke.com

The average time users spent per visit fell on 17 of the 30 most-popular newspaper websites fell during May 2009 compared with May 2008, according to Nielsen. Below, we chart this decline for four of the top most-trafficked sites.

Less engagement doesn’t necessarily mean a news site is getting less traffic. In fact, some speculate that these numbers indicate newspapers are actually doing a much better job attracting visitors from short-attention-spanned search engine users.

Here’s the problem: In order to charge brand advertisers expensive rates, newspapers need to show that readers stick around for awhile. Not happening.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The results were from the fourth annual “Real Estate Top 400,” a national sales ranking sponsored by The Wall Street Journal, lore magazine, and REAL Trends. Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage had the strongest showing among local real estate companies, with more than three times the number of agents making the prestigious list than any other firm. The annual report ranks top practitioners in the United States by sales volume and number of transactions, both for individual agents and teams of agents.

Ten Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage sales associates from the Bay Area and Sacramento ranked among the top 100 nationwide for sales volume last year, while another four agents ranked among the top 100 real estate teams. One other Bay Area agent ranked among the top 100 for number of transactions. The 15 agents outpaced the results of more than one million real estate agents nationwide.

In its announcement, The Wall Street Journal noted that the housing professionals succeeded in one of the most difficult markets the nation has ever faced. Sales of existing homes fell 13 percent last year while new-home sales dropped 38 percent. In addition, consumer credit was extremely hard to come by as banks dealt with loan defaults and foreclosures. “Yet amid those wheezing numbers, many agents and brokers have found a way not just to breathe easier but thrive,” the Journal reported.

“The best individual agents and teams found a way to keep business steady or keep growing,” said Steve Murray, founder of REAL Trends, the Denver-based publishing company that compiled the list. “They cranked it up, understanding it’s about communications to past customers and prospects, marketing, and staying face to face with clients.”

James Madison, an agent in Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage’s Santa Rosa office, led all company sales associates last year with 486 transactions valued at more than $149 million. That ranked him 10th nationally for transactions and 13th for sales volume in the Top 400 survey.

The other Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage sales associates who made the top 100 ranking for individual sales volume were Tim Allen, a Carmel agent; Nina Hatvany, San Francisco; Hugh Cornish, Keri Nicholas, and Hanna Shacham, Menlo Park; Carlos Kozlowski, Sacramento; Erika Demma, Woodside; Jim Arbeed, Burlingame; and Glenn Beaubelle, Orinda. Kozlowski and Glenn Adams of Vacaville ranked in the top 100 for number of transactions.

Four Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage agents from the Bay Area also ranked among the top sales teams last year, including Malin Giddings of San Francisco, Tom LeMieux of Menlo Park, Bill Gorman of Saratoga, and Royce Cablayan of Los Altos.

“We are extremely proud of the national recognition these 15 outstanding agents received,” said Rick Turley, president of Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in the San Francisco Bay Area. “These agents are the best of the best in the real estate industry. They’ve succeeded in the most challenging housing market we’ve seen in years because of their long track record of delivering results for the most discriminating home buyers and sellers. This reaffirms that the very best Realtors in the country work for Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage.”

Nationwide, Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage once again had an excellent showing in the Top 400 rankings with more agents and teams than any other company in the U.S. Company agents earned 18 of the top 100 spots for sales volume and 14 of the top 100 rankings for number of transactions. In addition, Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage teams secured 20 of the top 100 spots for sales volume and 13 of the top spots for transactions.

The Real Estate Top 400 awards program was developed jointly by The Wall Street Journal’s Business Development Group and REAL Trends, a leading source of analysis and information for the residential real estate brokerage industry, and lore magazine, the “people” magazine for the industry. The Real Estate Top 400 honors America’s elite real estate agents and their companies and is compiled and analyzed by REAL Trends. Winners were published in a special advertising supplement of The Wall Street Journal, lore magazine and on www.loremagazine.com.

About Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage
Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage is the largest residential real estate brokerage in Northern California and serves the markets from Monterey to Tahoe and nearly every market in between. The company has 61 office locations and more than 3,600 sales associates throughout Northern California. Last year the company handled more than 16% of all home sales in the Bay Area, more than double its nearest competitor. Through its internationally renowned Coldwell Banker Previews® program, the company leads the luxury home market, selling more than 27% of properties that sold for more than $3 million and more than 33% of homes priced above $5 million. Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage is part of NRT LLC, the nation’s largest residential real estate brokerage company. NRT has more than 900 offices and 56,000 sales associates operating in more than 35 major metropolitan areas. A subsidiary of Realogy Corporation, NRT operates Realogy’s company-owned real estate brokerage offices. For more information please visit www.CaliforniaMoves.com or call 925.275.3085. DRE # 00313415.

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Contact Information
Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage
Stephen Maita
510.739.0620
samaita@yahoo.com

A month ago, I received the strangest email ever: An agent in LinkedIn blasted an email to her connections announcing her next open house. Sadly, it was little more than a cut-and-paste of the abbreviation-dumb newspaper ad she probably also ran. No photos, nor punctuation. Not even a hyperlink. More recently, a steady-stream of Facebook invitations have been arriving, with impersonal introductions like, “If you know someone who needs a REALTOR in AnyTown, USA, send me your referrals!” Oh, sorry; I thought you wanted to be my friend. But the social networking abuse reached a tipping point yesterday: It seems some virtual tour vendor has made it “quick and easy” to mass-post your tours across multiple networks at once. Oh, goody: REALTORS are about to have no more friends.

It was enough to make me scream, No, No, NO!

If this is how REALTORS plan to use social networking, then disconnect me now. I don’t need to connect with more people fishing for referrals. Or posting their listings on my wall. I’m not even in the market for a home. And if I were, I’d know how to find listings on my own. In the meantime, get me out of your stream of advertising drivel. Stop dripping your listings, open houses and self-aggrandizement marketing to me.

I don’t really care.

Nothing will more quickly prove agents don’t get social networking than polluting their networks with mass-blast advertising. It’s been tried before. It’s called SPAM. Just because it’s on a social network, and not in your email, doesn’t make it any more desirable.

Contrary to popular belief, social networking is not an advertising forum. It is not a Web 2.0 replacement for postcards, listing sheets or newspaper ads. I’d even argue it’s not even a marketing channel, at least, not in the traditional sense of posting pictures of bedrooms and toilets. But don’t be confused! Social networking is about sales. Especially the kind that are based upon relationships and trust.

But social networking won’t create sales built on campaigns of one-click spam advertising.

If you sell widgets, like books, tickets or seats, then your sales strategy is built around advertising to anyone who can click-and-fulfill such needs online. Real estate, however, isn’t sold the same way as hotel rooms or computers online. Blasting out listings is barely one step away from miracle-medicine spam.

When you sell a complex service that mixes high finance and high emotions, blast advertising doesn’t work. The research is clear: Whether it’s a postcard or an e-blast, advertising doesn’t trigger buyers to buy homes, or sellers to select a broker. Real estate isn’t a click-and-fulfill sales transaction. Complex sales require significant customer relationships, not shopping carts and credit cards.

So why are so many REALTORS hell-bent on smothering social networking in a deluge of e-crap? It’s already getting messy. The only good news is that consumers can de-friend such spammers with one quick click.

News flash: Consumers do not need your help finding listings. They can search your site, aggregator sites and the other places REALTORS ignore, like for-sale-by-owner sites, to find all the homes they want. They can find them faster than the floor-duty agent can log into MLS. They can sign up for their own email alerts – if and when they want them. There is absolutely no reason to think the modern Gen X and Gen Y buyers need agents to “make them aware” of listings, price reductions or sales. And more importantly, modern consumers don’t want this stuff plastered all over their MySpace or Facebook walls.

Stop treating consumers like drips. Start treating them like customers.

Don’t take my word for it. Look at the research. Your handy copy of the NAR Annual Survey of Home Buyers and Sellers describes why people bought homes last year. (For the million-or-so REALTORS who don’t even know this study exists, here’s what it says.) The research says people bought homes because of life-changes, not ads that popped in front of their face. Consumers found the homes they bought primarily on their own. By searching for them online. Not from an ad - in the newspaper or online.

On the seller-side, consumers listed their homes with agents they already knew one-third of the time; and with agents referred to them by friends the next third of the time. They even “secret shopped” agents at open houses, then selected them to list their own home, another fifteen percent of the time. They hardly listed their homes with the agent who sent them their mug-shot on a postcard or in an e-newsletter.

None of this is to say advertising isn’t important. There are things to advertise – to make people aware of your company, your services, the marketplace. But there are channels for that – like your website or search engine advertising. Such advertising is already well accepted by consumers. They accept those ads in return for a desired service, like using a search engine.

They do not, however, accept your advertising plastered all over their private social wall.

Consider this: There’s a reason why Facebook and LinkedIn actually aren’t making money from their systems. Most normal people would leave – and almost certainly wouldn’t join - networks that were nothing more than pages and pages of ads. It has been tried before. Remember NetZero and Juno? Consumers ultimately opted to pay for internet service. Remember pop-up ads? They are gone today, too. The real estate industry should be careful not to lose their own customers these ways, by inundating their social networks with open house announcements, property flyers, virtual tours and air-brushed agent photos.

Left unchecked, it could be the fastest sob story on the web: How real estate gained and lost a lot of friends online, in record time.

It doesn’t mean you can’t generate business on social networks. There are plenty of social networking success stories. None, however, have to do with anyone who looked up an old friend and demanded, “Connect with me and buy my listings!” Who does that in real life, when they meet an old friend or catch up with a relative? Is the first thing you say at a party, “Do you need an agent?” Is every holiday card accompanied by a “Send me your referrals!” post-script?

It’s time for the real estate industry to focus on customer relationship management. Social networking offers the best opportunity to build and maintain these relationships. We can put the high-touch back into the high-tech and move away from processing people into databases and marking them for death-by-deluge with advertising. Just treating people as people, not prospects, would change everything. That’s what most social networking already is. A backyard barbecue with friends, not an endless loop of late-night infomercials. People talking to each other, about normal things, maintaining relationships. They know what each other does for a living: one friend is a plumber; another a computer technician; one is a REALTOR. When they need any or all, they simply click to find them or ask friends to recommend one.

It happens already in offline life; it can happen online, just as easily.

But you can’t manage your customer relationships if you don’t have any friends left. That’s exactly what’s going to happen if every status update or recommended link or posted photo is yet-another of your ads. People just won’t stand for it; they don’t have to. They will disconnect from the real estate industry and never look back. They might even become fans of a Facebook page called “Why REALTORS don’t get it.” Goodness knows they could post a good many listing photos to make such a case.

The opportunity for sales through social networking is tremendous. It’s already happening – as simply as a “glad to catch up” becomes a “by the way, we’re thinking of moving.” Unlike our credibility on real estate websites, polluted with bad data, poor photos and fish-eye virtual tours, maybe for once let’s not ruin a good thing, by killing our social networking credibility with one-click blast advertising.

Some folks out there still seem to think the housing market is bottoming or even turning around. It’s not.

Freddie Mac is out with its latest housing market update, with a wealth of data on the housing market from its perch. One graph that stuck out for us: total delinquencies near 2.5% are way beyond the GSE’s historical norms.

When the numbers for things like delinquencies or foreclosures start to flatten or turn around, we can start talking about a turnaround. Granted, like the Case-Shiller series, some will say this particular chart is 3-months old, though nothing we’ve heard since the end of March suggests things are much different.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Eugene, OR, June 28, 2009 –(PR.com)– RETS is an acronym for Real Estate Transaction Standard. The RETS standard has become the de-facto emerging standard for MLS data transactions nationwide. Still, MLS’s across the nation have only begun to provide IDX data based on RETS. RMLS members are fortunate to belong to an innovative and forward-thinking MLS.

“We’re pleased to be able to offer this service to IDX Broker and our other third party vendors on behalf of our subscribers,” said Kurt von Wasmuth, Senior Vice President of RMLS™. “We believe it will help them better serve their clients with more timely access to MLS data.”

IDX Inc., an Oregon provider of IDX solutions for agents and offices nationwide, connects the IDX Broker software with RMLS listing transaction data via the new RETS server. IDX Broker software interprets RETS feeds and then maps those feeds to the appropriate IDX data fields. This provides many local Northwest brokers with a way to further leverage their membership in RMLS in order to broker more properties.

Below are some benefits of using RETS for local IDX feeds:

·Rapid refresh of RMLS active listing data.
·RMLS Open House listings.
·Additional RMLS fields available for search/results pages.

“We have long enjoyed our partnership with the Regional Multiple Listing Service in Oregon” Says Chad Barczak, CEO of IDX, Inc. “We are proud to be one of the first IDX providers in the area to offer the RMLS data using the new RETS system they have put into place!”

IDX, Inc. is one of the largest IDX providers of RETS available data available nationwide with over 100 of the 275+ data feeds under management being delivered via RETS.

RMLS™ produces and provides multiple listing and related services to facilitate cooperation between its more than 12,000 REALTOR® subscribers. It is the primary source for real estate information and the premier Multiple Listing Service in the Pacific Northwest. For more information, visit www.rmlsbenefits.com.

About IDX, Inc.
Based in Eugene, Oregon, IDX Inc. is nationally known as a leading provider of real estate search applications. IDX, Inc. manages over $1 trillion worth of active listings data from over 275 Multiple Listings Services (MLS). IDX Broker is IDX, Inc.’s principle real estate software utility. The easy to manage and customizable software helps real estate professionals display home listing data from their multiple listing service (MLS) on their individual and/or office websites. For more information on the services provided by IDX, Inc. please visit www.idxbroker.com.

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Contact Information
IDX, Inc.
Cara Anderson
800-421-9668
Cara@idxbroker.com
http://idxbroker.com
PO Box 71866
Eugene, OR 97401

Cynthia Connors: Realtor and philosopher:

Mark Stein: Realtor and Action Hero

Sharon Meadows: Realtor, Genius and Tent Dancer:

Any ideas on how to list these five ‘homes’?

1. The Fallingwater, in Pennsylvania (USA). It was designed by American architect Frank Lloyd Wright in 1935 and built partly over a waterfall.

2. The Mushroom House, in Cincinnati (Ohio, USA).

3. The One Log House, in Garberville (California, USA). It is a one-bedroom house hollowed out from a single log that came from a 2,100-year old redwood tree. After felling this 13 foot diameter forest giant, Art Schmock and a helper needed 8 months of hard labor to hollow out the log into a room 7 ft. high and 32 ft. long, weighing about 42 tons.

4. The Kvivik Igloo, in Kvivik (Faroe Islands).

5. The Walking House, a 10ft high home that’s solar and wind powered and can stroll at walking pace across all terrains. Made by the MIT and a bunch of danish artists.

Click here to view the embedded video.

There’s a little bit of flattening out at the bottom of this chart, but the latest Case-Shiller numbers confirm that the housing market is still tanking. The nearly 19% decline in March was the second worst on record (February was the worst). Housing prices are now 30% off their peak nationwide, and will likely fall to at least 40% off the peak before things turn around.

Fort Lauderdale, FL, June 25, 2009 –(PR.com)– The real estate team of Dennis Stevick and Dale Atkins, DND Associates, announced today that amidst current economic circumstances, they continue to see real estate success with the sale of Fort Lauderdale luxury and waterfront homes. With market prices near seven-year lows in South Florida, the Florida lifestyle is more attractive than ever.

Recent Fort Lauderdale real estate sales include a Las Olas waterfront estate for $3,995,000, a Coral Ridge waterfront estate for $1.7 million and a 12-room boutique hotel on Fort Lauderdale beach listed for $1,999,000. With more than 10 years of local market experience in east Fort Lauderdale real estate and more than $130 million in sales, the team continues to help people achieve their real estate dreams.

“We credit our success to extensive market knowledge of current inventory and past sales in desired neighborhoods, as well as a high level of professionalism and customer service for our clients,” said Dennis Stevick and Dale Atkins. “In addition, our unparalleled marketing plans with local and international reach and giving clients the knowledge necessary to make educated decisions in today’s market have helped us achieve phenomenal success in Fort Lauderdale real estate sales.”

For additional information on the company, contact DND Associates or visit: http://www.dndfloridahomesbythesea.com

About DND Associates:

DND Associates ranks in the Top 1% of Realtors in Fort Lauderdale. The company has achieved recognition for their power to produce successful sales transactions consistently year after year (Top 1% of Realtors in Fort Lauderdale, Top 1% of Realtors in Broward County), and achieved the designation of Fine Home Specialists for their exceptional representation of distinctive homes, plus exclusive membership in Prudential Fine Homes International.

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Contact Information
DND Associates
Dale Atkins
954.592.3457
dndassociates@msn.com
www.dndfloridahomesbythesea.com

As a business owner I constantly look at the numbers but have always felt that on their own they are useless. Perspective is needed, specifically I ask “What is the trend?” Looking at last month’s sales, new client numbers and profit are all very interesting but seeing if they go up or down relative to the previous month, quarter or same period last year is far more valuable. It’s why the following chart is of particular interest. News Corp recently announced it was cutting almost 30% of it’s MySpace workforce. This ComScore graphic from Business Insider highlights a potential reason.

More interestingly is the closing gap between Twitter and MySpace. Twitter has it’s problems but as it matures I expect marketers (and advertising revenue?) to flock to it.

Ultimately what I draw from this graph is that Facebook stands alone as ‘the’ social network with Twitter it’s sole running mate. The vast service offering difference between these two companies suggests they can co-exist but we don’t know where Twitter is heading; ‘to infinity and beyond’ or the path of so many other ‘ dot coms’ that failed to live up to the hype. It will be interesting to see how Twitter monetizes it’s business (apologies to Barry Diller for use of the term ‘monetize’), it will be interesting to see how MySpace turns things around, it will be interesting to see how Google fights the momentum of Facebook growth, it’s simply an interesting time to watch technology.