So glad to have our new office opened for business, and being able to make clients dreams become reality.
Darren James Real Estate Experts, LLC is located in Denham Springs, LA. We are servicing the buying/selling needs of real estate clients in East Baton Rouge, Livingston, and Ascension Parishes.
We just launched our new website at http://www.Agent225.com. It allows a user to search all the active listings in real-time, get foreclosure homes, and all other properties on the market.
Be sure to visit it at www.Agent225.com for all the Denham Springs, Baton Rouge, and Prairieville, LA homes for sale.
As a real estate professional, we have the fiduciary responsibility to look out for the best interest of our clients at all times. One of those duties in doing so, is trying to get a home warranty on both ends of the transaction.
When I'm representing the seller, I try to get them to get seller coverage to protect them during the listing period. The same goes for the buyer when purchasing the home, we like for our buyers to have many years of happiness in their new home, so a warranty should cover most issues that arise regarding mechanical items.
One company where I live promotes, the "No Pre-Existing Conditions" on when promoting their warranties. Recently, a home was inspected, with no issues/defects noted in the inspection report regarding the Air Conditioning. The home inspector attributed the lack of cooling in the home to that of extreme temperatures/preference of the buyer on the day of the inspection. He did not note any defects with the worksmanship or function of the unit.
Less than two weeks after purchasing their home, my buyers were expecting a child, and hired a second A/C company to come out to see if something was wrong with the unit. They made mention of the dampers being defected and not opening when they were supposed to open preventing the unit from cooling. Furthermore, the clients noticed that there was an issue with the Pea Trap not being installed on the sewer line in the laundry room, and paid the warranty company to come out to check. The clients mentioned when they made the service call that they thought this was the issue, and the warranty company stated they understood. The warranty company gladly took my clients money for the service call, but stated the this item was not covered due to lack of parts installed!!!!
My clients are now faced with faced with having to contact an AC Repairman and a Plumber to fix what could be major problems in their home at their own expense.
Preaching no Pre-Existing Conditions is one thing, but poor customer service is another.
What would you do?
I've been thinking long and hard about my marketing plan, and how things rank regarding their Return on Investment (ROI). After thinking about this for some time, I decided to post this blog to all my friends at AR.
I've been studying and following successful REALTORS for many years, and most of the highly productive ones have a Real Estate Coach of some sort to hold them accountable to their systems, and make sure they are consistently working "IN" their business, and also working "ON" their business at some point as well.
Looking into the coaches, I've been considering Brian Buffini, Joe Stumpf, and some others regarding their By Referral Only programs. Also, I've looked into those coaches that teach lead generation, and marketing strategies to go after new business.
I've been licensed for almost nine years, and have tracked every aspect of my business. I noticed that the amount of clients that I email/stay in touch with consistently are not generating the referral business that I think it should. I should have a steady stream of referrals. On another note, I spend a considerable amount per month on advertising through radio, websites, and internet pay per click services.
What has worked best for you in today's market? Working your past clients or concentrating on new business. A mixture of both would seem to be fine, but how do you decide how much for each source is adequate? I'm thinking of cutting back on some of the monthly advertising, and put that into a coach that helps you nuture your past clients.
Looking at the # clients that have done business with me, would that be enough to provide for over 100 closings a year just in referrals?
Any suggestions you can give is greatly appreciated!
With the rave of Smartphone revolution, the word App has now become part of most everyone's vocabulary. Being a real estate trainer on technology, and an avid user of ANY device to make me more productive, I wanted to share with you some helpful APPS for the Iphone REALTORS out there!!!
Here are my favorite apps on my Iphone for real estate!
1. Dropbox for Iphone - This app lets you store all your files in a secure location, and access them from your Iphone. Imagine needing to get a signed purchase agreement to the lender, and having to return to the office just to do so...now you can. You can email any document in the form of a link. Another good app that is similar is SugarSync. Check them both out. They are both great!
2. Mail2Group - This app allow me (non-MAC user) to send emails to a group of people at once. To save me time, I put all the people involved in a transaction in one group. To provide updates to everyone throughout the transaction, just Mail2Group. A great time saver.
3. Maildash - This app is a template based email program. It allows me to set up email templates for the most common tasks that we deal with during a real estate transaction. In other words, I have a template for a new listing, home inspection, final walkthru, etc. Whenever I take a new listing, before I leave the home, I send the homeowners a thank you email for listing their home with me. I didn't have to type a thing, because it was already set up in a template for emailing.
4. Q-Checklists - This is basically a to-do list for your Iphone. This to-do app lets you create a template as well, so I developed one specifically regarding my marketing for sellers. Once everything is complete, I check it off, and send to the seller to keep them informed. A great time saver as well.
5. DaVinci - This app will sketch the measurements for the home, thus calculating living area square foot. You can then, email that information if needed, and keep in the folder for reference.
These are my top five apps. I'd love to hear from you if you liked this post, and I'll be sending my next top five as well. Hope you enjoyed my first post on ActiveRain!
Please visit my website at www.Agent225.com to contact me directly.
Providing Baton Rouge Real Estate / Property & Home Listings To Everyone! Darren James Real Estate Experts!
• Consistently a Multi Million Dollar Producer - since 2001 • Associate Broker, Coldwell Banker Mackey Co. - Feb. 22, 2005 • Experienced in the Real Estate Industry • Uses Technology to Manage all aspects of Life • Teachs other REALTORS Customized Technology Systems to enhance business •Active member of the National Association of REALTORS •Active member of the Louisiana Association of REALTORS •Active member of the Greater Baton Rouge Association of REALTORS • Positive Testimonials attributing to success from several clients • Real Estate Motivational Speaker, Trainer, Mentor, and Coach • Author of "Raising the Bar - the Next Generation REALTOR" Seminar Course • Formerly worked for the Louisiana State Police and have adapted several Core Values that fit well within my business plan for success that are as follows:
•L - Loyalty to the client
•D - Duty to clients and to fellow REALTORS
•R - Respect for myself and for others
•S - Selfless Service to do the right thing, at the right time, for the right reason
•H - Honor for my Lord, my family, my co-worker, and my clients
•I - Integrity for making the right choices at all times
•P - Personal courage to stand up for what I believe in, and lead by example through hard work, motivation, and leadership
Specialize with First Time Homebuyers and Relocating individuals/family.
Used technology to improve the overall customer experience, and increase productivity.
Dear Darren,
Wow! finally settled in our new home thanks to you and your team. The transition from our old house to our new home would not have been so smooth with out you. Actually would not have happened at all without you. You closed the deal on our old house! Best Real Estate Agent we have ever used. You and your team are very impressive. We recommend you and your team to our friends. And plan on using your team in the future. Thank you so much!!!
As you know our house was on the market for over a year before we signed with you. The previous two competent real estate agents could not sell our house. They tried with TV, newspaper ads, and had several open houses. We barely had 8 showings. We had given up. Then the van with your smiling face caught our eye. The professionalism was impressive. So we signed on the dotted line. I was skeptical when you said the showing would begin soon. Wow was I wrong. We had so many showings. We got tired of leaving. We actually had more showing cancellations with you than showings from the other two agents. Impressive.
SOLD less than 60 days later.
But your team was just warming up. Found us a new home in 2 days. Helped with finding all the things we needed for the move such as movers, telephone numbers needed for the transfer, etc,etc. You even got the paper work straight with Walker Gas when you were in Florida on vacation. Then we experienced cold showers, which ruins the appeal of a new home. You contacted the Warranty Company, and had our water tank repaired on a Saturday night.. You got a plumber at 10:30 pm on Saturday night. Now tell me that is not impressive!
If I had to name only one thing that puts you above the rest. That one thing would be communication. We had 152 emails, hundreds of phone calls, not sure how many personnel visits by either your or a representative. Selling / buying and moving is a stressful endeavor at best. Then things go wrong. You made the process much much better, actually easy. We sincerely thank you, and hopefully by copy of this letter is noted.
Warmest regards,
Jeff and Diane Zettlemoyer
What a blessing to have Darren James,a true professional, to work with in selling our home!This home sale made number 7 for me and from my experience with other realtors that I thought had done a pretty good job,I was absolutely impressed from his initial presentation all the way to closing. We were never left to wonder about prospective buyers, kept fully informed,and treated with 100respect.We were amazed at how the home was marketed.The number of quick responses was an obvious sign that we were being greatly represented.We have and will continue to recommend your company to anyone and everyone. Again,we would like to thank Darren for a wonderful job!
Most sincerely,
Keith and Carol Rachal
Integrity, professionalism,caring and honesty. These are just some of the words that I would use if I had to describe Darren James. We had been looking for a new place for almost a year before we met Darren. If we would have contacted him first we could have saved a lot of disappointment and stress because if he says something is going to happen then it does. As a first time home buyer, I had no idea what all was involved with the buying process. Darren told me not to worry that he would walk me right through it, and he did. Whenever I called him, I always got the feeling that I was talking to a friend who was helping me buy a house instead of a Realtor. You can just tell by talking to him for a few minutes that he's going to do whatever it takes to make you happy, and he delivers. Not only can I say what a great Realtor he is, but also a great friend.
The Gannon Family
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