Kari A. Battaglia - Venice Real Estate

There is nothing better than fresh cranberry sauce to compliment your turkey on Thanksgiving Day. It is so easy to make and it tastes like you put so much effort into it. There are of course many ways of preparing this delicious condiment but I love it plain and simple. Now my mother loves canned cranberry sauce and I have to serve it too on Thanksgiving Day just for her. What do you think? Do you agree with my mother that the canned variety is better? I guess everyone has their own taste.

Here is my recipe for fresh cranberry sauce: 1 package of organic cranberries, 1 cup of water, 1 cup of sugar and a little dash of ground clove. Cook in a medium sauce pan for about 10 - 15 minutes until the little cranberries start to burst. Put in a serving dish and cover. Refrigerate for about 2 hours and serve. Some people also prefer to serve hot off the stove but I find the sauce thickens up nicely after you have refrigerated it for a while.

I hope you enjoy.

Contact Kari A. Battaglia, GRI, Realtor®, Broker Associate, Coldwell Banker Residential Real Estate, Licensed Realtor® in Florida at 941-270-1851 to list your property for sale or to purchase a property in Venice Florida, South Venice Florida, Englewood Florida, Nokomis Florida, Laurel Florida and for Tennessee real estate investments. I am currently accepting referrals.

Contact me by email at kari.battaglia@floridamoves.com. Need information fast, call me direct at 941-270-1851.

Copyright © 2008 By Kari A. Battaglia, kari.battaglia@floridamoves.com/kari.battaglia, All Rights Reserved, www.karibattaglia.com.

I wanted to share with everyone something I learned from a real estate agent a few months ago during a GRI class I attended in Sarasota, Florida. I noticed that one of my fellow classmates had one of those cool new paper thin Apple laptops with a small box the size of a deck of cards attached to it. I had to go over and check out this great new laptop. After speaking with her I learned that she had recently gone through what she explained to be nothing short of a nightmare; her business laptop had been stolen! Replacing the stolen laptop is easily done, but replacing your customer data base, history of customer communications, tasks lists, calendar, emails, documents, spreadsheets, pictures, etc. may not be replaceable. It took her months and countless hours to restore her lost information. My classmate then gave me some valuable information that I took to heart. Store all of your information on a portable external hard drive.

A portable or external hard drive is quite a useful piece of equipment. It allows the user to back up or store important information separate from the main internal hard drive, which could become compromised by online or offline activities. Sensitive documents, large music files, DVD images, movies, disk images, and even a backup of the contents of your main internal hard drive, can all be kept securely and safely on an external hard drive. When you are online, you can even leave the external drive turned off.

Another advantage of an external hard drive is that it is portable and operates on a plug-and-play basis. Any computer with a USB will recognize the external hard drive as a storage device, and assign it a letter to designate it. The drive can then be accessed like a normal internal hard drive. It's a snap to transfer huge files back and forth from work to home, to a friend's house, or between your desktop and laptop. Just plug in the interface cable to quickly reconstruct a working environment, making your favorite programs virtually portable. You can even buy several external hard drives (storage capacity 40GB up to 750GB), using one for multimedia storage, one for imaging, one for backup, one for work and so on.

Also make sure that you password protect your laptop to prevent unauthorized access. You will be protecting the confidentiality of your customers, work product and any sensitive documents you may have stored on your hard drive.

Thank you to my friend in Englewood for your excellent advice!

Contact Kari A. Battaglia, GRI, Realtor®, Broker Associate, Coldwell Banker Residential Real Estate, Licensed Realtor® in Florida at 941-270-1851 to list your property for sale or to purchase a property in Venice Florida, South Venice Florida, Englewood Florida, Nokomis Florida, Laurel Florida and for Tennessee real estate investments. I am currently accepting referrals.

Contact me by email at kari.battaglia@floridamoves.com. Need information fast, call me direct at 941-270-1851.

Copyright © 2008 By Kari A. Battaglia, kari.battaglia@floridamoves.com/kari.battaglia, All Rights Reserved, www.karibattaglia.com.

Finally all of my hard work blogging, posting, and months of my husband asking me what are you doing on Active Rain again has paid off. I got my first call from someone who read my Active Rain profile. I have to tell you I was thrilled. When I got off the phone I yelled "Y E S it works!"

I got a call from buyers in Long Island, New York. They are looking to buy a winter home here in Florida and plan to retire here in 7 years. They first started their search in the Naples area and a friend of theirs told them they should check out the Venice Florida area and how beautiful it is here. The buyers went to the internet and found my Active Rain profile on About.com and gave me a call. I asked them when they plan on coming to the Venice area, that I would love to show them around and while they are here I can show them some homes. I scheduled the appointment. They were only in town for 2 days before leaving on a cruise to the Mexican Riviera.

I meet the buyers, showed them around town and showed them about 20 homes. They found a home they liked, submitted an offer and it was accepted the next day.

I am really glad I was able to help them while they were here and excited to receive my first Active Rain lead. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

Contact Kari A. Battaglia, GRI, Realtor®, Broker Associate, Coldwell Banker Residential Real Estate, Licensed Realtor® in Florida at 941-270-1851 to list your property for sale or to purchase a property in Venice Florida, South Venice Florida, Englewood Florida, Nokomis Florida, Laurel Florida and for Tennessee real estate investments. I am currently accepting referrals.

Contact Kari Battaglia by email at Kari.Battaglia@floridamoves.com. Need information fast, call me direct at 941-270-1851.

Please visit my outside web blog www.VeniceAreaHomesBlog.com, my personal website www.KariBattaglia.comand my business website www.floridamoves.com/Kari.Battaglia.

Copyright © 2008 By Kari A. Battaglia, GRI Realtor® Broker Associate. All Rights Reserved.

I just attending a Green Real Estate Professional Alliance Workshop at our local board which was a program developed by Steve Wooster of Michael Saunders in Sarasota Florida to help our Realtors® association develop a new committee under our local board called the Green Real Estate Alliance. Steve is currently the Chairman and founding member of the Green Real Estate Alliance of Sarasota and his goal is to spread the word. The Green Real Estate Alliance will help teach members and the general public about energy efficent and environmentally friendly home features, and the many ways to help protect our environment. Green real estate is attracting buyers. Green homes are not just good for the environment but also a way for your to make your listing stand out from all the rest. I am excited to help pioneer the Green Real Estate Alliance at the Venice Board of Realtors®. I feel we all should learn more about green building and sustainable living. It is not just good for our planet but our responsibility to help protect our environment. Please visit my web site for eco-friendly information for homebuyers looking to add value to their current home, save money on utilities, low or no cost ways to lessen your impact on the planet, create a healthier house and garden, and view list of green resource links.

Contact Kari A. Battaglia, GRI, Realtor®, Broker Associate, Coldwell Banker Residential Real Estate, Licensed Realtor® in Florida at 941-270-1851 to list your property for sale or to purchase a property in Venice Florida, South Venice Florida, Englewood Florida, Nokomis Florida, Laurel Florida and for Tennessee real estate investments. I am currently accepting referrals.

Contact Kari Battaglia by email at Kari.Battaglia@floridamoves.com. Need information fast, call me direct at 941-270-1851.

Please visit my outside web blog www.VeniceAreaHomesBlog.com, my personal website www.KariBattaglia.com and my business website www.floridamoves.com/Kari.Battaglia.

Copyright © 2008 By Kari A. Battaglia, GRI Realtor® Broker Associate. All Rights Reserved.

There is no required paperwork needed between buyer and realtor before the physical home search begins. But if you ask some Realtors who have been in real estate for a while you hear stories about how they wished they did have their buyers sign a buyers agreement. Just like the listing agreement, the buyers agreement spells out the responsibilities of both the Realtor and buyer. What could happen is that an agent will be working with a buyer who has emailed listings to customers, called other agents on behalf of the buyers to determine availability of properties and to schedule appointments, drive the buyers from one neighborhood to another possibly for months and then one day get a call from the buyer and they are told they found a wonderful subdivision and the new home of their dreams and they just signed a contract with the builder. From the agent's perspective this is not good news as they have spent valuable time and money with this buyer with the expectations of payment for services upon the purchase of a home and I am sure most buyers don't even realize what has just happened. Not many agents like to work for free and I am sure no one else does either. Should you sign an exclusive agreement? Many buyers are uneasy about signing any agreements now a day but you can take steps to protect yourself should the arrangement not work your in best interest; ask for a short term agreement, ask for guarantees (make it a two way street), specify terms of purchase and price range and request a non exclusive agreement that protects the agent for procuring cause but does leaves you free to search for homes with other agents.

Contact Kari A. Battaglia, GRI, Realtor®, Broker Associate, Coldwell Banker Residential Real Estate, Licensed Realtor® in Florida at 941-270-1851 to list your property for sale or to purchase a property in Venice Florida, South Venice Florida, Englewood Florida, Nokomis Florida, Laurel Florida and for Tennessee real estate investments. I am currently accepting referrals.

Contact me by email at kari.battaglia@floridamoves.com. Need information fast, call me direct at 941-270-1851.

Please visit my outside web blog www.veniceareahomesblog.com, my personal website www.KariBattaglia.com and business website www.floridamoves.com/Kari.Battaglia.

Copyright © 2008 By Kari A. Battaglia. All Rights Reserved.