Bill Blog

During my lunch break today I toured a home that was placed on the market yesterday. This home is a couple properties over from my own house. I considered purchasing it a couple of years ago. The home was in too bad of condition for me to purchase it and make repairs at that time. I was also interested in it for the reason of purchasing the property between my lot and that lot so I could clear the trees off and make my front yard much larger and add more value to my property.

Shortly after I didn't buy it 2 years ago, someone bought the home. I saw him cut the tree down in the front yard which improved the curb appeal. He built a porch railing similar to what I've seen on many decks lately and he replaced the roof shingles on the front porch (not the whole house). I wondered what repairs he was making on the inside.

He and his family lived in the home for about a year. Then I noticed it had been vacated. I sent him a letter assuming if he had moved it would be forwarded. I was interested in either selling the home for him or buying it myself. After all, he had lived in it and made some improvements so it couldn't be too bad inside, right? He he called me a week or so later when he got the letter. He was interested in selling it to me for what he paid for it. Unfortunately, between the time I sent the letter and he called me something changed in my finances and I wasn't willing to buy it at that time. He told me he was going to make more repairs and sell it. I offered to list it for him or help manage it while he was another state away. He said he had someone from another office that was helping him.

Anyway, I was so excited about purchasing it last night when I found out it was available that I grabbed my flashlight and went to see the home. The MLS said "Show Anytime". I drove my car since it was dark and I didn't want anyone seeing me walk through the neighborhood with a flashlight after dark. Might get shot!  :-)  After all, there was a burglary suspect running from the cops this week. Took the police from all counties involved a couple of days to find him a couple counties over in an Amish buggy.

So I got over there, parked in the driveway and left my headlights on so I could see AND I didn't want anyone who might be watching to think I was being sneaky with my flashlight. I quickly noticed the power meter was gone so I couldn't expect any lights when I got in. I went to the front door and started looking for the lockbox. It wasn't on the front door. I checked all over the front porch, couldn't find it. Since it was just listed and the listing agent's office was 30 minutes away I assumed he hadn't put it on there yet. There was no yard sign either.

I shined the flashlight in through the front door. I could see the same old ratty carpet that I saw 2 years ago. Some of the vinyl from the soffit was missing or hanging in several places. There was a car's drive axle sitting in the back yard. Which reminded me there was an old shed back there that he had torn down completely - for good reason.

I walked around the house trying to see inside but most of the blinds were closed so I left and called the listing agent. Left him a message asking about the lockbox. He called me back the next morning telling me that lockbox was now in place and he had someone else interested in the home so I needed to get him a contract in a hurry if I was going to make an offer. I believed him because I saw two pickups with gentleman waiting at the house when I was headed to the office this morning.

Right before noon I went to the house to look inside. To my disbelief it was pretty much exactly the same as it was when I had looked at it 2 years ago. The carpets were the same. There was a large hole in the floor of one of the bedrooms. The really bad roof leak on the back porch had actually been repaired. The kitchen was the same and it wasn't too bad. The vinyl flooring had a large tear right down the center. It was a trip hazard. The bathroom was in aweful condition. The whole floor was slanted. most of the floors in the back weren't in good condition. The floor near the water heater looked as if it could fall through at any time.

To sum it up it was in need of more repair than I cared to endure. I can't believe someone would live in the house like that. I called the listing agent up and left a message on his phone stating I wasn't interested any longer after I had been inside. Hopefully the buyers will repair the house properly and get someone in it. I'd bet the neighbors who have been mowing the yard would appreciate someone taking care of their own yard.

Michelle, a client of mine, told me recently that Paducah Water (PWW) gives a one time credit each year to customers that fill a swimming pool. She mentioned this after we were talking about our pools and I told her it cost me nearly $25 to fill our portable pool at my house. That's when she told me PWW gives a one time credit for that initial fill.

I called the water works and they confirmed that was the policy until the board changed it. So I got my credit of nearly $25 on my water bill. I'm sure if they advertised this they'd be flooded with calls each summer. At least, I've never seen it advertised and I read the water works newsletters from time to time that are included in the monthly bills.

As many agents do, I'm always looking for new ways to market my listings and find new ones, especially, during these slow times. While reading RIS Media's Real Estate magazine this month I found a few new ways to find prospects that I hadn't seen before. These ideas were in an article written by Darryl Davis. The magazine only had the first 5 or 15 ideas listed so I cheated and found them all online here. Listed below are a few intriguing ideas that might work for me.

• The first interesting idea I found was working a high turnover area. This article described printing a list of homes from the MLS in the past few months and analyze it by neighborhood. The article actually described looking at the strengths and weaknesses of the brokerage that lists most of the houses in that neighborhood.
  
• Another idea was a call to action seminar. This method appears to recommend you hold a public seminar describing how to market a home, hold an open house, utilize creative financing or help buyers search for homes faster. These public seminars allow you to gather public attention and represent yourself as an expert.
  
• Another interesting approach is the work "orphans". The orphans in this context are clients that were represented by an agent who is no longer with your company or in the business.

I checked the MLS yesterday to see what homes are available in McCracken County, KY for under $25,000. There was one for $3,900. It's a 1 bedroom, 1 bath, 800 sq ft and it's in pretty rough condition. It's owned by a nationwide lender.

The foreclosed homes have been selling pretty quickly to investors. They usually sell for the asking price and within 2 months. Investors are likely having a field day in this market. It may be bad times for some but for opportunistic people it's fantastic. Someone told me the other day that wealthy folks look at the long term. In terms of real estate that means buying properties in this down market, fixing them up and holding on to them so that when the market comes back you can reap your profit.

An example of a recent foreclosure was a home on Oaks Road. The asking price for this home was $23,000. It's a 2 bedroom, 1 bath, 963 sq ft. The offer was received 6 days after it went on the market. The offer was $23,000. The home apeared to have multiple offers and from listing date to closing date there were only 36 days. And, the home was sold by another agent known for listing foreclosures. I drive by this home frequently. The new owner has an RV parked in the driveway. They put a new roof on it last week and appear to be renovating the inside as well.

Another foreclosed home in this area I'm somewhat familar with was purchased by a gentleman for around $35,000. He's purchased a few homes in this neighborhood at foreclosure. He renovates them. I had the pleasure of walking through a project recently and found the home in very good shape. The asking price on it is $89,900.

I got a phone call today from someone outside my area code. I hate to but I typically let those calls go to voicemail because a lot of the time it's someone trying to sell me something. The caller didn't leave a message so I Google'd the number and found it was a Tennessee phone number. The caller called 3 or 4 more times, no message left. I finally answered the call thinking it might be a client who was in town and who happened to be from western Tennessee.

It wasn't who I thought it was.The caller was a guy that said he would put mine and my wife's business on a CDROM he was making and going to pass out at a local restaurant for free. The advertisement would only cost $35 / business ($70 total). He was going to make 2,000 of these CDROMs. The CD would contain music and advertisements between the sonds.

I asked the gentleman who else was advertising on the CD. He mentioned several local churches and an  insurance company. So I tell him let me talk to my wife first because I wanted to know if she had already talked to him. Sometimes these people will act like children who will go to another parent to get the answer they want.

So I ask my wife, she's not familar with him or what he's doing. I ask others in my office and they've never heard of that restaurant doing this. I call the insurance company and can't get in touch with anyone who should be familar with the offer if it was true. I called someone I advertise with pretty regularly and she knows the restaurant owner as she eats there often. When she talks to the owner he's not a happy camper. He tells her that the guy does make CDROMs with music and advertisements on it but he's not working for the restaurant owner. The owner says he's going to call him up and yell at him.

I still have to talk to the insurance company to see if he's familar with this. I wonder how many people he's called. Besides something smelling fishy about this whole thing his he was putting popular songs on a CDROM and passing them out. I don't expect he was going to pay a royalty to the owners of that music which could get him into really big trouble.

Ok, I'm going to complain and/or write a letter to the editor of the Paducah Sun regarding this fantastic idea someone at city hall just came up with.

A few years ago the city of Paducah had a "meter maid". He walked up and down Broadway marking tires with chalk and giving out parking tickets to people that had been parked in the same spot for more than the allowed time. Nothing special, no one likes getting a ticket but this parking enforcement was necessary to keep downtown businesses happy. Available parking means customers. No parking, no customers.

For some reason the city did away with the "meter maid" position. Ever since downtown employees, business owners, etc. have taken advantage of the situation and parked in limited time spaces for as long as they needed. This presented problems to wanna be customers needing a place to park.

My wife, and I, own a consignment store called Trendy Repeats that was located at 428 Broadway. My wife attended Paducah Main Street meetings from time to time like a lot of other downtown business owners. She complained about the parking situation. I complained about the parking situation. We both stated the parking laws needed enforcement. They needed to get the parking laws enforced again. I even wrote a letter to the editor at the newspaper once about the issue. Did the parking situation get addressed? Nooooo!

It seems like it suddenly became a problem when some particular people began moving into the new condos downtown. Only then did it become an issue that was worth hiring a part time "meter maid" to enforce the parking laws.

Are your listings posted on Google Base?

Google Base is a free online classifieds system. It has an area for real estate ads. It's growing in popularity even if you've never heard of it before. Not sure why they call it "Base" though.

I spent about an hour tonight studying how to add my listings. It's quite a chore to add them whether you use the easy way or the harder way. The easy way is time consuming, similar to adding your listings into the MLS - for anyone who does that themselves. The bulk method might be easy if you use Microsoft Excel and export the file as a tab delimited text file and upload it using their manual method.

Part of my interest in this is most listings are currently Century 21 and Coldwell Banker. Some listings are from sites like owners.com, visualtour.com, fsbosellbuy.com, etc.. Prudential isn't adding our Prudential listings at this time but intends to very shortly. For this reason I decided to go ahead and add my own listings.

I can add other items to their classifieds system. For instance, my wife has a retail business. I may try adding items, individually or in bulk, to see if we can sell the items on Google base for free. Worth a shot, huh?

On August 3rd the third round of the St Jude Dream Home Giveaway takes place. For anyone familar with this giveaway it's quite a special event relatively new to the Paducah area. The event offers anyone willing to spend $100 for a ticket a chance to win a great home in a great neighborhood. Only 8,000 tickets are sold. All the ticket sales go to help the kids at the St Jude Children's Research Hospital where they fight cancer and other catastrophic childhood diseases.

The home is valued at approximately $285,000. The home is approximately 2,449 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 2.5 baths, office, 2 car garage, custom built cathedral style oak cabinets and fireplace.

Besides the home, participants also have a chance to win the following prizes donated by local business:

• Free gas or groceries for a year
• six-person Soria Spa
• Dell Laptop and 2008 QuickBooks Financial Software
• a sewing machine
• $1000 Visa card
• $1000 Visa card
• a vanity package
• 3' x 3' piece of artwork
• more prizes not listed

St Jude also conducts these giveaways in other cities across the country.

Ever want to advertise on a popular local web site but didn't want to pay the outrageous fees they charge? This might be a way for you to pay a lot less. A lot less!

Use Google's AdWords advertising? For anyone not familar with it, this pay per click service, their cash cow, allows you to easily place ads on their web site. You specify how much you want to spend, what keywords you want you ad to match and your web site gets hits.

I use it, I get out of towners that contact me about properties in my region. I limit my spending to $50 per month. I got a sale because of it a few weeks ago. These buyers called me just because they saw my name first on the search engine. I wish it was always that easy!

Anyway, they have a really great new addition to the service. They call it the "Placement Tool". Some other ad sites have been doing it for a while but Google just followed suit.

The Placement Tool works in conjunction with Google's content network. The content network refers to the ads that are placed on other web sites instead of Google's site. The owners of these web sites get a portion of the money paid for each click on their web site. Google gets the other portion of the money.

Here's the great part! This new feature allows you to pick which web sites you want your ad displayed on in their content network. For example! I'd like to advertise on our local NBC television station but I really don't want to pay their outrageous fees. Since they have Google ads on their web site I can get on their site using those for a fraction of the fees they charge.

The Placement Tool allows you to select what web sites you want you ad placed in several different ways. My favorite being the URLs. You can also select by Demographics, web site topics or categories.

I'd love to hear stories from others about how you've used it.

I have a complaint against Jeep's marketing team. What does this have to do with real estate? If you set asking prices for homes or other products or services it affects you too.

As I sit here working on my computer, I again hear the Jeep commercial saying something like buy a Jeep, at full price, and get gas for $2.99 per gallon for the next 3 years.

Is it just me or does anyone else realize the marketing mistake made in this ad?

The 99 cents is supposed to make items appear cheaper. In this particular offer, discounted gas for 3 years, why would you want the offer to appear cheaper or discounted? IMO you would want it to appear higher so the viewer thinks they're getting a good deal. Pricing using .99 is supposed to emphasize the $2. This makes viewers think they are getting gas for $2.00 per gallon.

IMO, this ad should say get gas for $3.00 per gallon for the next 3 years, not $2.99

More info concerning the 99 cent pricing strategy at http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06351/746545-28.stm

Am I crazy in thinking this?