Apr07news08

Have you seen the new NAR television ads? They are well done and they explain that the house is a great investment and that 60% of America's wealth is their house.

NAR also has statistics that over the past 30 years, home values have risen more than 6 percent annually. Also, that the average value a home doubles every 10 years!

Okay, based on these statistics, here is a great 'elevator speech' for you when you meet someone, like on an elevator.

"Our market is pretty strong and now we are in one of the strongest buyers' markets in history. Did you know that 60% of American's wealth is from the equity in their home? That's right and that's mainly because the average house doubles in value every 10 years. In fact, according the National Association of Realtors, over the last 30 years, home values have risen more than 6% annually? Do you know anyone thinking about getting in the real estate market I can call?"

Work on your elevator speech so you can pick up some new buyers! If you don't have one, you are liable to turn them off!

Sam Thompson, Senior Mortgage Advisor

Carolina Mortgage Co.

This past week, I saw an $8.00 utility charge-off that was 5 years old and one $10.00 collection from Shoe Show that was 3 years old. Most consumers are probably unaware that these kind of deficiencies exist.

It looks like the collection industry is going after new business and they are going after lower and lower derogatory items trying to get every penny they can from every type of retail or service provider they can.

It's good that these companies are finally getting their money and that is helping our economy but, the credit bureaus need to lessen their hits for these smaller items in my opinion.

Right now, we are burning the candle on both ends in the credit industry but if something is not done about it, soon, we are not going to get anybody pre-approved in the future...

The lesson here is to get your buyers pre-approved fast!

Where are the good Buyers?

Are you getting any good buyers? Over the last several weeks, it seems like the buyers I am seeing are a lot worse than normal.

So, how can we find some good buyers??

Here are some ideas:

1) Call me and let's take an HR Manager to lunch! Let's sell them on our team approach to helping their new hires or interview prospects feel more comfortable with our market and the home buying process. Relocation buyers are the best in the industry and since I worked in HR for several years and I am sure that together, we could impress them with our service.

2) Put together some good reference guides and see if you can get some local hotels to distribute them for you. Work with the hotel management on developing these with their input so it is a valuable document for their guests. The higher quality the hotel, the better and don't forget about the extended stay hotels.

3) Promote yourself as a VA expert so you can capture some of the thousands of troops that now qualify for veteran benefits that will be getting out soon. As long as you have us on your team, you will be an expert! We know VA!

4) Put together a professional looking buyer pre-purchase guide and offer to give it to all of your prospects free! Then, promote this on all of your print advertising and website. This will help your phone ring. The word 'Free' is the key!

buyersguide

6) Promote high-touch! Let your prospects know how you do it and make sure to focus on your communication system. Also, practice setting appointments for all of your meetings with prospects or clients. This sets the tone that you are a professional and that you have set aside time just to meet with them. If you do, you are also going to be able to build better rapport too.

7) Finally, but not the least important, work on your website and start blogging everywhere you can. Each blog is another webpage that might show up when online visitors are searching for various things on the Internet so make sure you link back to your home page. Make sure your site is very professional looking with good resources and links too. Spend some time on making the home searching easy. And add a link to my site on your too!

If you need me to help you with any of these things, CALL ME!!

And if you get any good buyers, please call me! Don't think that we only talk to the bad ones looking for a manufactured home!! We love the higher quality buyers much better!

UNC couldn't compete with the Kansas Jayhawks causing most of the pickers to come up short. And how about those former Laurinburg Institute prep stars that started for the Memphis Tigers? Joey Dorsey, Robert Dozier and Antonio Anderson all played for the Laurinburg Institute and they helped the Memphis Tigers bury the UCLA Bruins!

And in the final game for the National Championship is tonight but my contest is over because no one picked the 2 finalists, so here's how the 2nd Annual Realtor Bracket Challenge ended up!

*Names*	*Points*
Dianne Wall	76	*Winner!*
Jamie Moss-Godfrey	75	2nd place
Tom Tallon	73	Tied for 3rd
Craymon Strickland	73	Tied for 3rd
Jane Smith	70	5th Place
Amy Guinn	62	6th Place
Michael Humble	61	7th Place
Joey McMillan	59	8th Place

That's right, Diane Wall won it again!!

Housing cycles: lessons learned housingcyclevideo

Housing cycles: lessons learned
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