Originally posted in the Towne & Country, Realtors blog:

Shirley MA:

October 26-6:30 PM – 7:15 PM HALLOWEEN MAGIC SHOW with TOMMY JAMES, Contact: Shirley Library 978-425-2620
TOMMY JAMES returns with his HAUNTED HALLOWEEN MAGIC SHOW (for children) This 45 minute performance has it all! A very spooky magic wand. A haunted Jack-O-lantern. A skull that takes on a life of its own and floats all over the stage! There are ghosts and goblins and a visit from his dear friend Bunnicula the Vampire Bunny, a real live bunny appearing from his magic castle! Also added into the performance are plenty of “Trick or Treating Safety Tips” to keep our children safe on their night of spooky fun. The show will begin promptly at 6:30. Attendance is limited to the capacity of the room. To avoid disappointment, please take careful note of the start time and plan your arrival accordingly. Children are invited to come to the show dressed in their Halloween costumes. A bag of candy treats will be given to each child at the end of the show. This event is sponsored by the Friends of the Hazen Memorial Library.
Location: Hazen Library

Leominster MA : The Haunted Trail at Barrett Park- “Terror in the Woods” with ghosts, ghouls and other assorted creatures. Not recommended for young children, this haunting will happen on October 15 and 16 from 7:00 until 10:00. Tickets $7

Leominster Trick-Or-Treating : October 31 from 6-8

Fitchburg MA : Halloween Concert at the Public Library – Peter and Ellen Allard will be presenting a Halloween Concert; after there will be a costume parade and trick or treating throughout the library.Free – no costumes or registration required. October 19.

Trick or Treat Fitchburg Downtown: Saturday, October 30^th from 12-3pm – there will be three starting checkpoints this year; one on Putnam Street – Premier Subs; another near the intermodal station – Second Chance, and a third at Faith United Parish.  Face painting, Halloween bags and maps will be available at each site upon sign-in.  Face painting will also take place here.

Fitchburg MA trick or treating: Official Trick or Treat hours for Fitchburg will be on Sunday, October 31st from 5-7pm

For other events in the area: check our 365 Things to do in MA blog for a list of Spooky Halloween activities

I came back from RainCamp Boston full of ideas, and about two weeks of work to implement.

I plan on integrating more video into my marketing, and this is the first one I came up with. It’s a spoof of the Old Spice Guy video, and includes a link to a post about the Top 5 Things You Can Do To Sell Your Home.

Check it out and tell me what you think!

I had written a post about the value of entertainment in real estate video. While I think video should be of fairly decent quality so that the consumer can judge the attributes of the home, the product doesn’t have to look like it was produced by Steven Spielberg.

Okay- it can’t look like the Blair Witch Project, either. Hold your hand steady, don’t make the viewer sick by whipping around from side to side, and if you will be speaking, make your voice sound natural. To see my three favorites, check here.

That really got me thinking- about video, about blogging, about online interaction- and off-line as well, I suppose. I have heard people complain about twitter as far as interaction goes. I decided to scout out one of these people and see what they were up to and this was the total of their commentary:

Just posted on ActiveRain…

Just posted on ActiveRain…

Just posted on ActiveRain…

Just posted on ActiveRain…  Day after day, THAT WAS IT! Would you watch the station on TV that was all ads? 

Which leads me to this morning. I saw a post on twitter by @theRealClint (who is here on Active Rain- Clint Miller of RECR) with the comment “Google is Funny” and a link. Well, okay, I bit that bait, and saw this: 

Okay, maybe you might be offended by it, but dang! This is funny- and playful! I checked other words out, and I think Google is doing this intentionally on the broadly used words what, who, and where because I didn’t see it for more narrow scopes. You can check it out for yourself if you have time.

But my point is this. If your interaction level on twitter is less than that of a search engine, maybe it is time to step it up before complaining. You have a chance to be seen before potentially thousands of people, and all it costs you is a little time. 

orig. published on my blog http://www.heyamaretto.com

Getting involved in these social spaces and wondering how to pass that information along? Just trying to fit your contact information and your purpose can be daunting.

Yes, Virginia, there is an easier way. There are several ways to store your contact information in online repositories and add the link to your business card, website or blog. These storage places are good looking and make a one-click bridge to the sites where you are active. Two of these that I have tried are Retaggr and Card.ly. Both are similar in their motivation. I have used both in my Yahoo email signature, which is kind of neat. I have used Retaggr for a long time, relatively speaking, but I am thinking I like the setup of Card.ly better. [Retaggr landing page] Retaggr lists all of your social media and “real life” contact information and has widgets that you can use to integrate interaction. It is more comprehensive than Card.ly- and that is perhaps why I prefer Card.ly. Card.ly offers 38 skins (some of them are premium, but most are free) and you can locate something professional there- regardless of your profession. You add your contact information in- just as you do with Retaggr- and choose the look:[Card.ly] So in addition to being embedded in an email signature, you can put that one card.ly address onto your twitter homepage, on facebook, on your business card, on your social media card- anywhere that listing all of your links is too “bulky”.

Check out my card.ly profile at http:..www.card.ly/heyamaretto

Something to Sing About...

I was looking at the March 19 post about new listings, and noticed this: two of the three have already gone under agreement. In fact, our office has sold or put under agreement 11 properties in the past 30 days, with more that I know of in the works.

Of course, part of this was due to the fact that the Homebuyers’ Tax Credit was due to expire on April 30. There were plenty of buyers out racing around trying to put a contract together under the wire.

But there are plenty of buyers out there who want to purchase without regard to the Tax Credit. A lot of economic indicators are pointing to a recovery (see post in Towne & Country blog here). I think the thing about these indicators that is impressive is that they are based on data as opposed to one person’s opinion.

Recovery, of course, will be slow. This has been a long recession, and there are fears about a huge wave of foreclosures hitting the market, depressing home prices further. Legislation has been proposed or passed that may delay or reduce the number of foreclosures on the horizon- check out this article about what is going on in Massachusetts. This is good news, I believe… foreclosures hurt everyone.

If you are considering selling? Go into the process with your eyes wide open. Look at the numbers yourself – not just comparable listed properties, which may or may not sell.  Attend open houses of comparable listed properties to see how yours compares. Consider hiring a home stager to walk through your house and tell you how it looks through “buyers’ eyes”. And realize that it may take longer than 30 days to put under agreement.

If you know of someone who can benefit from this article, feel free to email the link to him or her. Pass it along.

Homeowner's HOPE Hotline: 888-995-HOPE

If you are behind on your mortgage payments- or having great difficulty making them- it is important to take steps before your lender takes legal action.

If you have tried speaking with your lender and don’t feel that you are being heard, or if you don’t know who to speak with because your loan is not serviced locally, there are people who can help.

Making Home Affordable is a great government site that has tons of helpful information about home loan refinancing and modification. If you are having trouble making payments on your primary home, the amount of the first mortgage is less than $729,750, your home was mortgaged before 1/1/2009, and the mortgage payment is more than 31% of your total gross income, modification may be possible. This means you would have to prove that you were capable of consistently paying a lower payment.

From the site:

SERVICERS HAVE MADE A COMMITMENT TO DELAY FORECLOSURE SALES ON ALL LOANS THAT MEET THE MINIMUM ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA FOR A HOME AFFORDABLE MODIFICATION WHILE AN APPLICATION IS UNDER CONSIDERATION.

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If you have already missed one or more mortgage payments – contact your mortgage servicer immediately or call 1-888-995-HOPE (4673) to reach a HUD-approved housing counselor.

A HUD-approved housing counselor can help you understand your options. This counseling is FREE.

This could be the lifeline that will keep you in your home.

The information on the site is also available in Spanish.

The site also points out things to be aware of when seeking help:

There is never a fee to get assistance or information about Making Home Affordable from your lender or a HUD-approved housing counselor.

Beware of any person or organization that asks you to pay a fee in exchange for housing counseling services or modification of a delinquent loan. Do not pay – walk away!

Beware of anyone who says they can “save” your home if you sign or transfer over the deed to your house. Do not sign over the deed to your property to any organization or individual unless you are working directly with your mortgage company to forgive your debt.

Never submit your mortgage payments to anyone other than your mortgage company without their approval.

Looking for Stones

I think that the story that follows is even more important today, especially since I am helping agents at Towne & Country, Realtors to find their way in New/Social media. Inevitably the question that all people wonder is, “So if we do all of this great stuff, when are we supposed to have time to sell real estate?”

I had originally published this in my other blog.  I gave myself permission to reprint it here. Thanks, Diane! You’re a peach!

A teacher stood in front of his class, and pulled a huge jar from under the counter. He began to fill it with large stones. When he had piled every stone into the jar, it was filled to the top.

He asked the class, “Is this jar full?” Of course, they answered yes.

The teacher then proceeded to add small stones that he had kept hidden under the counter. The class watched as a surprising amount of these filled the spaces between the larger stones. “How about now? Is my jar full yet?” he asked them.

He then brought out a bucket of sand, and slowly poured it into the jar, filling the spaces around the stones. When the sand had filled all of the gaps and threatened to spill over the edge, he asked, “What about now?”

Well, obviously nothing else could fit in that jar.

Then the teacher brought up a watering can and proceeded to empty most of the contents into the jar.

This story was told by my trainer at my old real estate agency. At this point, all of us agents were all thinking that this implied that whenever you complain that you are busy- you can always find more time, and indeed I have heard the parable told like that. Our coach went one step further, though.

He said, “You are probably thinking that what I am going to tell you is there is always more time. But what I am trying to tell you is everything wouldn’t have fit into the jar if the big stones hadn’t gone in first.”

Too true. Your business will fill up your days, whether you are contributing to your blog, selling real estate, or sorting paper clips. It is SO important to determine what is important- regardless of the business you are in- and place that into your schedule first.

Open houses- waste of time or key to selling a home?

I sat at an open house on Sunday from 2-4.  I met neighbors, a first time homebuyer couple represented by a buyer’s agent and someone in the real estate industry who stopped by.

Is this a productive use of time of my time? Essentially I opened the door for another agent’s client and answered their questions, and visited with people.

Here is what I think, and as usual I will take the slow horse getting there. A month ago I had to take continuing ed so that I could renew my license. Twelve hours is mandatory; I had already taken 6 CE hours in commercial, but decided to take the whole shebang at one sitting.

I had been hearing that Massachusetts was on the cusp of implementing online CE courses, and that sounded great to me. Sitting in my home, paying pretty good attention, sipping my coffee and multitasking through the mandatory 12 hours- yep, a match made in heaven. But that would have to be the next time around, so I signed up for 12 hours in a straight shot from Bill Morgan, the Hat Guy.

Because of that experience I swear I will never take a CE class online. The 12 hours went by- not in a snap, but pretty quickly. And Bill incorporated the 3 Es of good presentation (online or off, by the way): education, entertainment and engagement. I would expect education- after all, that was what everyone was there for. But he nailed the entertainment (thanks for the candy, Bill) and engagement parts too. He was funny, he involved individuals from the class, and he kept the attention of the class as a whole- no mean feat for a course lasting 12 hours that few people really wanted to be at.

So what does this have to do with open houses? A lot, believe it or not. Buyers can get a really good sense of some elements of a home from the Internet- where most of them are starting out anyway. They have an idea of what individual rooms look like. They do NOT have a sense of the neighborhood, a sense of the way one room flows to the next (and you don’t really get a complete sense of this with a virtual tour), or the overall gestalt (for lack of a better word) or “wholeness” of the place- how all of these characteristics fit together. And really, the sum of these parts is what makes a house a home.

You can’t get that online any more than I could have gotten the entire experience of my CE class online. The class was more than what was presented- it was the friends that I made on either side of me, the joking, the mistakes we made, and the teacher tying it all together.

That’s what an open house does. Was it a waste of my time? Even if no one had shown up, my time is never wasted. I could be sketching out a post, planning for my week, or any of a hundred things. But in this particular case I met an online business associate (and his two sweet daughters) face to face, I showed buyers through who left with a complete sense of the property, and met the neighbors who know of someone interested in the property.

So, the short answer is, “Yes, I think open houses are useful.” They take me out of the Internet world in which I find myself immersed and bring me face-to-face with people in general. I may not sell a home right then and there, but I will connect, and I will learn from these people what they think of their neighborhood and of the market.

And by learning and listening I will become better at what I do.

Diane is one of the remaining dinosaurs who enjoys Open Houses. What do you think, as a consumer or as an agent?

home sweet home- working to improve the industry

I am borrowing heavily in this post from my own post and from the Towne & Country blog (with permission).

Without a doubt, industries that do not try to change and improve are dead in the water. Looking at the way our industry is structured, I think the most change is going to occur locally, on the brokerage level.
Our brokerage is already different, and we have many ideas in the wings that are directly intended to raise the bar for real estate.
But we need you. We can talk about improving the industry, but we can’t do it without the input of you, the consumer. What was your last real estate experience like? What would you have made better? What did you like the best- that you would keep just the same if you did it over again?

- Towne & Country
Gerry, our broker/owner, has a slightly different slant here than most of the conversation on twitter suggests. Change WILL need to be initiated by the consumer. Change also has to come at the agent level. The individual agent needs to be aware of what the consumer wants- what is important to the consumer- and be the one to provide it.
We are no longer the gatekeepers of information. Consumers get upset if the information that they want about a property is withheld in hopes that they will call- and with the number of listings available in most markets they will just move on to the next one.
The NAR article that I quoted in my last post sums it up:

Sellers largely want agents to price their home competitively, find a buyer, market the property and sell within a specific timeframe. Reputation was the most important factor in choosing an agent, cited by 36 percent of respondents, followed by trustworthiness at 21 percent.

Home buyers thought the most important services agents offer are helping find the right house, and negotiating sales terms and price. The most commonly cited benefits of using an agent are helping buyers understand the process, pointing out unnoticed features or faults, negotiating better contract terms, and providing a better list of service providers. Comparable to sellers, buyers chose agents based on a referral or had used them in a previous transaction, with trustworthiness and reputation being the biggest factors in selecting an agent.

Agents- pay attention! The consumers have spoken! You provide expertise, NOT information. Let’s work on raising the bar together.