It's Not Paris Hilton, But Maybe Interesting Anyway

Picture has nothing to do with anything. Just for your amusement. Desparate times call for desparate measures, I guess.


Just another recitation of where we are in the market, and a small peek into the trials and tribulations of a real estate office. Chico sales (MLS records) of single family homes for May; 88. Compare to 2006; 97, and 2005; 102. Inventory stands at 531 currently, in 2005 it was only about 120. Looks like we're going downhill, but for year to date comparisons we're currently 381 sold, 2006 it was 353, for 2005 454. Not really all that dramatic a difference in sales but as a percent of the hopeful sellers it's a dreary picture. A broker friend of mine from Red Bluff tells me that of their 500+ inventory over 200 of them are vacant and that's kind of scary. Our Orland office is getting more than it's proportionate share of business in the resale market, but that's not surprising given our business model and the quality of our agents, but the total market is way down in Glenn county in resale homes. I'll start here with the peek inside our office. We just lost two listings to other offices, one after having one offer submitted, numerous showings by our office and other MLS agents and our ability to demonstrate exactly how many times the property had been viewed on the 20+ web sites it appeared on, plus the heavy traffic on our own site. Shoot the messenger. The other loss did not involve an offer and had fewer showings. The seller resisted our agent's attempts to get a price reduction to increase showing activity and listed with a %fee broker from out of town, (much higher commission obligation) and reduced the price $40,000. This property, as with all of our listings, had web visits numbering in the thousands. We don't even know of anyone doing as much as we do to expose properties to prospective purchasers, but that's all any marketer can do. We can not manufacture a buyer, we can only get property in front of them. To extend this peek inside, just one more example of a client moving on. We had a property listed for 175 days, showed it repeatedly to local and out of town buyers, had it shown by MLS agents (we track these showings by lock box activity and contact the agents for feedback) and tried to get the seller to reduce the price, couldn't even get an agreement to concede $2000 to a prospective buyer for costs. The seller listed at a full 6% with a franchise office, reduced the price by $35,000 and it has now been listed with that office for 113 days and the price has just been reduced an additional $10,000. It goes without saying that the current listing offices in all of the above are not even in the same league with us for exposing properties on the web. You may gather from all of the above that this is not a rational business. The folks with property for sale can be excused perhaps for listening to the blandishments of professional sweet-talkers, because they are at least concerned and maybe even a little frightened by events swirling around them, but the logic of lowering the asking price for a replacement agency rather than dropping it for a known marketing pattern really baffles me. Embarrassed perhaps for not listening earlier. Just thought it might be interesting to view some of our "trial and tribulations". This is not a complaint by any means. What is, is.
We are in the process of being trained and certified by the largest reverse mortgage lender in the nation, and will shortly be able to offer these products. Much of the industry seems to have a pyramid scheme flavor to it, pamphlets on display wherever seniors gather, and referral fees being paid I'm sure. For that reason I've been suspicious that some of the selling of this product, maybe most of it, has been focused on income for the agent and not the benefit to the senior.
Our involvement will be the same as all of our other mortgage activities. If it is in the clear best interests of our client, we'll make it happen at the lowest price possible. If it is not we'll suggest the best alternative.
I've had some nice comments recently about our company, our agents, and our focus. Nothing can be more rewarding to us than a recognition that our efforts are appreciated. Thank you.
As usual,
thanks for visiting.