WERE BACK !

Welcome back to our Greater Tampa Bay Real Estate site.  As of this post we are on the eve of our offical re-launch of the Greater Tampa Bay Real Estate – BLOG -   

We have spent several months working with our design team at Virtual Interactive Systems to get the right look and feel to this site.  We wanted to be able to keep the blogging portion of the site yet we also  wanted a more traditional feel of a Real Estate Web site but, we did not want a boring old static site or cookie cutter site like so many Real Estate sites that still exist in our market.  Our goal is to re-enable our client base and re-energize the communications standards we set out with early on with our first blog site.

Yes, it has been some time since be posted to the old blog. With all the bad news on the economy, we just kept our heads down and ploughed right along vowing to continue to work our best with our clients and to go back to the designers on retooling our site.  We now have a portal that we can use to better communicate with our current client base, potential clients and well anyone that wants to know more about buying or selling their residential real estate in the Greater Tampa Bay Area of Florida.  

Stay tuned, we have a bit more tweaking on this new platform, and quicker than we have a new president we will be up and running full steam with all our listings, new content every week - including much more video in and about the Tampa area.  Starting off with our very own – Meet your Future Home Team Video right on our front page. Be sure to check it out and don’t forget to sign up for our Email News letter while your at it.  Just click the link rigth above the video.

DOT HOMES submits to US Real Estate BROKERS – dont worry – be happy !!

Earlier today I received the following from DOT HOMES:

New pingback on your post #117 “MLS Data compliance and NAR vs. DOJ “

Website: BYTEPLAY ? Blog Archive ? For US listing brokers (IP: 195.62.28.205 , www.ec1m.net)

URI : http://www.byteplay.com/blog/archives/57

Excerpt:

[...] [...] some of the ensuing controversy (Lenderama, CBS5.com, InmanNews, GreaterTampaBayRealEstate), I?m going to attempt here a crude recap of my conversation with Kevin. If you?ve any [...] [...]

This is related to an earlier post I made regarding the DOJ’s lawsuit against Realtor.com and the issue over MLS (Multiple Listing Service). It appears that the presence of this new venture on the scene in the Real Estate Search community, had ruffled some feathers of a few of the Top Real Estate Brokers (BLOGGERS). Some suggested that what Dot Homes was doing may not be entirely legitimate or in compliance with MLS regulations.Seems that this answer is right on the money: After you have clicked on the link above you will also see my reply:

“I think this is an excellent review of Dot Homes capabilities as well as highlighting the short sidedness of many Brokers in the Real Estate industry today. I don?t think you can explain it any clearer than this. This is a tool that Brokers should welcome with open arms?especially given the current economic climate.
Also, keep in mind that there are well over 150 MLS associations in the U.S. alone, that all have their own version of what constitutes compliance. This entire MLS issue is so overblown and in many opinions has been the major issue that has suppressed innovation and competition in our industry. Why else is the US DOJ going after Realtor.Com with such vigor? Could it be that they represent monopolistic tendencies when it comes to the MLS ? Going forward, I think this kind of makes Kevin?s entire comment on the MLS issue kind of baseless. ”

read more | digg story

Related Post:

MLS Data compliance and NAR vs. DOJ

A Real Estate Story of another cyclical time

Most every thing related to Real Estate sales is cyclical. Even if we had not had all the issues with the sub-prime market conditions…the bubble had to burst. The gains made by many here in Florida over the last year…at the height of the industry were rather ridiculous and I think this resetting will normalize things out.

During the Holiday’s I visited my ailing Father in California who at 90 still recalls his heyday in the market and also a large down turn. He was very big into Real Estate in the early to mid 60′s for about 6 years. He was active in the Oakland Bay Area Real Estate scene and even had his Brokers license. He recalls that about 3 years into his business that the market started a correction and prices and commissions went down along with many of the Realtor s.

The later 2 years, as a full time Realtor he took on odd jobs in the shipyards in San Francisco because he had a family of 6 to provide for. My mother was a stay at home mom with two toddlers and two other young boys just starting elementary school. My father was also a trained mechanic and a member of the merchant marines,so he would do his real estate during the day and at night would drive to SF and work as a first mate on several ships. When the market continued into it’s 2nd year of correction, he had to make a choice that I think was almost ordained for him. He did not make enough to pay the mortgage and keep 4 boys and their mother fed and clothed. At that time many women were not working, it was not the norm. He was offered a position to go back to sea. At that time my father was in his mid 40′s and he stayed on in the merchant marines until he retired in his mid 60′s as a chief engineer. He still dabbled in Real Estate through out his working time. When he retired he sold several duplex he owned and bought an apartment complex in Hayward, California that he managed for many years. He finally sold it about 6 years ago. Not something he wanted to do but age had caught up with him and my step-mother was afraid he would fall off a ladder trying to fix something. My dad did not like to hire sub contractors to do repairs. He did almost everything himself. I recall the week he sold the apartment…he was very sad and told me that he felt like he had lost a family member.

My wife is the Real Estate professional in the family. I am the Technical guru and having worked on the National Scene as a VP of IT for New Homes Realty, I know my way around the industry and have many contacts. If the market had not taken a down turn, who knows I might have even taken a license. For now I am happy to help my wife and her partner Marie get a leg up on their competition in the market and keep them at the cutting edge on the technology side.

This is a rather tough blog for me to write as my father is in the last stages of his life having been diagnosed with a terminal form of cancer a few moths ago. So the lengthy discussions I had with my father over the holiday?s will be the last. He wanted to impart on me how tough he knows conditions can get, but said that the market will correct itself. He has had long discussion with Theresa as they connected a lot on the Real Estate front. So I know things will get better.

My Dad?s parting comments on this conversation were ?be sure to take care of your customers?. Which is something that we see a lot of comments about. I read a great article over at Inman news today written by Marc Davidson of 1000 Watt Consulting, (which by the way is another great Blog to read up on) Where he discusses among other things that 2008 should be the year of CEM or Customer Experience Management. You can read his article from the links I left but a few bullet points I think are worth repeating here.

• 2008 should be the year of CEM
• 2008 needs to be the year of crystal vision.
• 2008 is the year to reduce expenses.
• 2008 must be the year we begin to conserve.

I am also resolving here to not use the term down market anymore as it appears by all measures that the market is returning to a normal cyclical correction.

Related Posts:

Is there an upside to real estate downturn ?

Are Florida Realtors up for the challenging time ahead ?