This is purely anecdotal evidence with regard to any big turnaround locally, but I have been happy and a little surprised at how much luxury home buying and selling activity we have seen at our company in the last quarter of 2009. Over the past week or so, agents at our company have been working on the following:
Needless to say, this would make for a phenomenal final quarter for us.
As always, I get the same question many times each day, "So, how is the market doing these days?" I'm never one to pull punches, so if things are rough, I say so. These days, whenever I say that we've been really busy in the second half of the year, most people assume it's because of the much-talked-about tax credit for first-time buyers. In our case, nothing could be further from the truth. I have exactly ONE buyer that will benefit from the tax credit (the current one, not the proposed one).
With that in mind, it makes me hopeful for 2010 and beyond, as the economic indicators seem to be improving at last and the general vibe is a positive one. As I've written before, perception becomes reality, so when people think the economy is getting better, they spend money and it happens. The converse is also true. When people are told that times are bad, they stay home and stop spending money.
As a quick example, I still remember the reaction of our clients after 9/11 happened. They froze. Our team closed one deal in the entire last quarter of 2001. Was there less money at that point? Nope. Had any of our buyers who cancelled lost their jobs? Again, no. They were worried about the financial future of our country, so they stopped buying, at least for awhile. Unfortunately, THAT is what made things truly bad, not the original source of the fear.
I never advocate lying when friends or clients inquire about the state of the market, but I do advise sharing success stories if you have them. As economic news (hopefully) continues to improve overall, this could lead to increased consumer spending on many fronts, and we may just see a real recovery.
Quick disclaimer: Although I minored in Economics in college, the stuff above is just my own opinion.
Thanks for reading!
I am happy to report that our company has been quite busy selling homes lately here in Austin, with the last quarter shaping up very nicely. In fact, this has probably been the most active season for our company in about two years.
My friend Brian Block, who is a broker in the northern Virginia/D.C area, sent me a link to an interesting and encouraging article from Realtor.com, which states that Austin took the top spot in year-over-year search increase on Realtor.com, with a 91% jump from September 2008 to September 2009. WOW! This is clearly very exciting news for us. Brian spotted this article on Twitter.
Thankfully, we have seen similar results with the traffic to our website at www.austintexashomes.com, which is in the top 5 results on Google for almost every major real estate term that I care about.
The other cities in the top five were Las Vegas, New Orleans, Reno, and Tyler, Texas. Tyler came as an interesting surprise to me. My parents lived in Tyler just before I was born and we have relatives in that area.
If you would like to see the entire article, visit http://bit.ly/THTQd.
Austin remains one of the most affordable and desirable places to live in the U.S. If you're considering making a move, you might be interested in checking out my online relocation package right here:
Austin Texas Relocation Package
I would love the opportunity to help you find the right home in the general Austin area. You can also visit our Austin real estate website at www.austintexashomes.com. Thanks!
Every week or two, I get a handful of requests regarding the archives for our BlogTalkRadio show, Social Media Edge. Sometimes these requests are via email, and other times I get quick notes on Twitter or Facebook asking about a particular show that we had before.
In an effort to make it easier to find all of our shows in one place, I had written a post about this a few months ago. Since then, I got too busy to keep that post updated properly, so I would like to publicly thank Mike Mueller, who is a regular part of our show, for keeping the archives up to date.
You can pretty much see where Mike took over, since the summary notes dramatically improved over my own. :)
So, if you have any interest in hearing a previous show, with our phenomenal guests, head over to the Facebook URL above to find some great info from authors like Shel Israel, Paul Chaney, and Tara Hunt, or social media specialists like Sarah Evans, Reggie and Nicole Nicolay ("Nik Nik"), Connie Reece, Jay Baer and Mike Chapman. Once, we even had the World's Strongest Redneck. We liked having the Twitterqueens founders so much as guests, we gave them their own one-hour show on the network!
Mike is now hosting "The M Files" and Diane Guercio, Maya Paveza, and Lesley Lambert now host TQ Radio - both shows air on Monday at the same URL as Social Media Edge: http://blogtalkradio.com/jckc
We hope to continue expanding the network, and I like the sense of community that we've managed to foster. Join us sometime!
Here's this week's episode, to whet your appetite a little:
Oct 20th - Special Guest Mike Chapman
I was excited to see that the very first virtual Real Estate Barcamp is being held on November 17th. They are anticipating over 1000 agents to attend from across the United States (there are already 272 registered attendees as of this writing). Having attended a live version in Houston last year, I can attest to the value of this event.
They will have some terrific sessions and teachers, from the list I saw earlier today. There are still openings if you're interested in hosting your own session. There have enough virtual "room" for 27 total.
Current session topics include:
Social Media Risk Management
Flickr for Real Estate
Developing Your Brand
Online Advertising Secrets
Facebook for Real Estate
WordPress Training
Daily Goal Tracking
Starting a Real Estate Blog
...and more.
Following the virtual event, there will be many "in real life" meetups around the country. I am considering hosting one of these myself, depending on the interest level here in Austin.
The sessions will run from about 11am to 6pm Central time (9am to 4pm Pacific). You can get more details and track the progress here: http://rebarcamp.com/virtual/. I hope to see you there!
Our guest today on Social Media Edge was Mike Chapman, a local friend of mine that I met via Twitter a few months ago. He talked about an upcoming event that his company is helping to promote. I think it's a very worthy cause, and I wanted to help him spread the word. It's for International Adoption Month and it benefits the Gladney Center for Adoption: http://www.adoptionsbygladney.com/
Both of my parents were adopted, so without adoption I wouldn't even exist! Clearly, this is a cause near and dear to my heart. :) My wife and I were very close to adopting back when we got pregnant in 1998. That was four children ago for us! I am always in favor of any initiatives to help bring children to couples and families that really want them and can give them a better life.
Here's some information that Mike provided for this post:
The event is a benefit concert called "Adoption Rocks!", and it was inspired by a local Austin family who adopted their beautiful Ethiopian daughter through Gladney. Upon learning of the trip to Ethiopia, friends hosted a live musical event last November to raise money for the Ethiopian orphanage.
The event was so special and so well-received that those involved decided to do it again but in a much bigger way! This promises to be a unique, fun event that will donate money raised to support the many programs and services Gladney provides.
The Gladney Center is a licensed, not-for-profit agency that has been creating bright futures through adoption since 1889. Today, Gladney stands as an international leader in adoption services and has placed thousands of children in loving homes. Gladney facilitates domestic as well as international adoptions from 9 different countries including Russia, China, Guatemala, and Mexico. Besides education, social events and life long support, post-adoptive services are provided from the Gladney Center for birth parents, adopted children, and their families.
Location: Long Center For Performing Arts (near downtown Austin, TX)
Entertainment:
Tickets: $100 each ($50 of each ticket is tax-deductible) To order, just click on desired show time link below and enter the promotional code "ADOPTIONROCKS" (all caps)
7:30 pm link = http://budurl.com/adopt1
9:30 pm link = http://budurl.com/adopt2
Sponsorships are still available, and there will also be a silent auction held. Hors d'oeuvres will be served, and there will be a cash bar available as well.
For more information, please contact Mike Chapman: mikechapman2.0@gmail.com
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I have been working as a full-time Austin area Realtor since January 1997. My years of experience serve me well as the broker and co-owner of Austin Texas Homes, LLC, which began operations in 2004.
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