By Erica Christoffer, Multimedia Web Producer, REALTOR® Magazine
Happy Earth Day!! It’s a great day to catch up on some green reading. Here are three recently published books that can give both you and your clients tips and resources for creating a more eco-friendly home or listing.
New Natural Home: Designs for Sustainable Living: This book is filled with eye candy-delicious images of homes from all over the world that will spark ideas on how to incorporate symbiotic living between a home and its surrounding environment. It also offers tips to reduce energy use and add sustainable elements, such as lighting, architectural elements, and landscaping.
DIY Projects for the Self-Sufficient Homeowner: 25 Ways to Build a Self-Reliant Lifestyle: A great gift for a recent buyer who’d green-minded and isn’t afraid of DIY projects. This book covers the basics for solar, hydro, greenhouse, and gardening projects – building a chicken run and beehive, for instance.
As covered over at our Styled, Staged & Sold blog today, the instillation of solar panels can boost a home’s resale value, according to a new study by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. For those e-reader users out there, Solar Energy – Sustainable Green Energy For Your Home, Your Car And Your Business [Kindle Edition] covers the basics, from the pros and cons of residential solar energy systems, to making your own solar power source.
Don’t fear the online critics. Embrace them with positivity, truth, and know-how. Look at Internet and social network interactions as an opportunity for your real estate business to shine – even if it’s faced with adversity. Let Wild West 2.0: How to Protect and Restore Your Reputation on the Untamed Social Frontier (Amacom, June 2010) be your guide. Authored by Michael Fertik, and online reputation management expert, and David Thompson, a lawyer who specializes in Internet technology, the book lays out methods for being proactive online, identifying the original source of negative content, and building a plan to produce positive and neutral content about you and your company.
Excerpt from Chapter 1:
Imagine a place where anonymous vandals can spray repugnant graffiti about you or your business without any consequence. They may call you a criminal, accuse your business of fraud, or reveal your most personal secrets. And this graffiti is viewed not only by a handful of passersby—instead, it is spread worldwide and instantly broadcast to anyone who looks for information about you. You can’t remove the smear, and copies of it are permanently saved around the world.
Sound frightening? You don’t have to imagine this scenario. It happens every day on the Internet. The victims are innocent people—parents, teachers, students, managers, workers, craftsmen, business owners, and more. Real personal reputations are being trashed with just a few mouse clicks, real businesses are losing thousands of customers due to false reports online, and real relationships are being destroyed by anonymous gossip.
Welcome to the New Digital Frontier Continue reading »
Interior design on a budget? Don’t let your clients stress. Design expert Frank Fontana, a specialist in low-cost, high-style design, shares his techniques room-by-room and project-by-project in his new book Dirty Little Secrets of Design (Stewart, Tabori & Chang; November 2010).
In the book, Fontana analyzes several beautiful homes, dissects the individual design components of each room, and applies his “Look for Less” principle to help readers build their own look on a budget. The book also includes more than 40 DIY projects that are accessible and doable for readers of various skill levels, such as a multipurpose ottoman, a custom display case, unique artwork make from reclaimed items, and more. Plus, he gives advice on how to be a savvy shopper when looking for home decor items or furniture, leaving readers with practical decorating and fabricating techniques.
Here are five of Fontana’s Dirty Little Secrets of Design:
1. Work with one small space at a time. Advise your clients to create vignettes and groupings of seating furniture that provide additional conversation areas and help break up a room. Don’t just throw a comfy sofa in a room next to a hand-me-down coffee table and call it a day; it will feel empty.
2. There’s no need to fumigate. Try using low-VOC paint (VOCs are Volatile Organic Compounds, and paints low in them are better for the environment and less harsh on your nose.) For a cheaper, homegrown solution, drop a few squirts of vanilla extract into the paint can, and breathe easier. (Note: The fumes are only masked, not eliminated.) It won’t affect the color.
3. Exit courtesy. There is one piece of furniture that Fontana considers essential to an entryway — a chair. Continue reading »
By Erica Christoffer, Multimedia Web Producer, REALTOR® Magazine
Stop believing it’s impossible to break into the high-end real estate market. If you’re going to go for it, now is best time, says real estate veteran Jack Cotton, CRS, CRB with Sotheby’s International Real Estate in Osterville, Mass. In his new book, Selling Luxury Homes (Tide-Mark Press, 2010), Cotton outlines a three-step process for success in a competitive luxury market: 1.) Become a market expert. 2.) Serve as a trusted advisor. 3.) Provide top-of-the-line services to clients. “I don’t see real estate as a career – it’s absolutely a calling for me,” says Cotton, who will be speaking at the REALTORS® Conference & Expo from 12:30-2 p.m. Friday, Nov. 5 in New Orleans.
Here’s what Cotton has to say about his new book and his NARdiGras presentation.
Why is now a good time to get into luxury real estate?
COTTON: The great thing about this market is it’s a perfect time to improve your skills, expand your skills, and broaden your horizons. This is the third downturn I’ve been through since my career began in 1974, and this is the time to get out there and do better. Even if you decide not to become a luxury real estate specialist, all the tools you’ll learn in this book will help you treat every client like a million dollars, regardless of their price range.
What is one tip a real estate practitioner could put into action after reading your book?
COTTON: Luxury buyers and sellers are used to dealing with experts – whether they have a medical situation, a tax situation, or a real estate situation – they only want the best. Chapter four teaches you how to become an expert, and be perceived as an expert. The best way to do this is to become an expert on value in your marketplace. People with means are obsessed with the value of their property. Due to taxes, they want to know that the actual value of their property is correct compared with what municipalities are assessing it for. They need to know the value of their property so they can conduct their estate planning. Also, they have a real need to know the actual value of their property so they know where they stand financially. Continue reading »
Starr C. Osborne, owner and founder of Tailored Transitions, a Philadelphia-based home staging, moving-management, and design company, has put together these 10 tips to help sellers prepare their home for the market. Her new book, Home Staging That Works: Sell Your Home in Less Time for More Money (AMACOM, 2010) offers step-by-step and room-by-room instruction for professional-quality makeovers that will wow potential buyers.
1. In this market, it is wise to get a pre-inspection. Based on the results of your pre-inspection, schedule appointments with reputable vendors to get professional estimates on what repairing any major problems would cost. You, and your buyer, don’t want any surprises.
2. Identify the demographic of your most likely buyer. Keep them firmly in mind as you prepare to put your home up for sale. Is it for young couples starting a family? Is it for baby boomers downgrading after their kids have moved out?
3. Buy new house or apartment numbers to replace your existing ones if they’re dated or damaged. This is the first thing that buyers look for (to make sure they’re at the right place), so of course it’s the first thing they notice. You don’t want to start off with a bad impression. Continue reading »
By Erica Christoffer, Contributing Editor, REALTOR® Magazine
If you haven’t heard of Steve Garfield or seen his name floating around the social media world, it’s time to step into the light — the video spotlight, that is. One only needs to Google Steve Garfield’s name to get a glimpse at his vast online career where he has been charting the video blogging waters. He started his first video blog in 2004 and has since become a sought-after adviser to Fortune 500 companies, including Kodak, AT&T, Nokia, and Panasonic.
Garfield recently published a book “Get Seen: Online Video Secrets to Building Your Business” and it’s filled with tutorials, examples, and step-by-step instruction on how to effectively incorporate video into your online marketing plan.
When I approached Garfield about setting up an interview for REALTOR® Magazine’s Weekly Book Scan, he offered the opportunity to chat via wetoku.com, a site that records 10 minutes of webcam interaction — the perfect resource for conducting interviews.
Watch as Garfield explains how his career culminated into writing “Get Seen” and offers tips on forming online communities, using video to connect with people in your community, and tools for fast, easy shooting. (I apologize for the very poor sound quality on my end!)
By Erica Christoffer, Contributing Editor, REALTOR® Magazine
So much of the real estate business is about building relationships. But how do you achieve the kind of relationship with your clients where they would never think of choosing anyone else? Professional speaker and author Shep Hyken talks about his new book, The Cult of the Customer (read our review), about ways to attain client loyalty and how to create a business culture people love.
Shep Hyken
At the beginning of the book, you explain the use of the word cult and defend its meaning. Why would you want a cult of clients, and how can that cult improve your business?
HYKEN: The average home owner moves roughly every seven years. The idea is they’re going to come back and buy another home down the road. They are also going to have friends who are going to move. You’ve got to do such a great job that they won’t think of anyone else when it comes time for their next move. And when they hear of other people moving, they will refer them to you. That’s the whole concept of evangelism.
Most people think of the word cult as something that ties into a fanatical or religious group. Really, the word cult is playing off the word culture. A company with a culture of taking care of customers, while at the same time taking care of their employees internally, will have a cult of customers. Continue reading »
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