Lisa Meszaros

HomeSteps® Launches Nat'l Summer Sales Promotion! Closing Cost Assistance & Selling Agent Bonus!

HomeSteps, which is the real estate sales unit of Freddie Mac, is launching a nationwide sales promotion for its inventory of foreclosed homes starting today.

The HomeSteps Summer Sales Promotion offers: up to 3.5 percent buyer's closing cost, and a $1,200 selling agent bonus on initial offers received between May 16, 2011 - July 31, 2011, and escrows closed on or before September 30, 2011. This is only valid for HomeSteps owner-occupied home buyers.

In addition, a 2 year Home Protect® limited home warranty is offered on some eligible HomeSteps homes. Home Protect also provides discounts of up to 30% on appliances. Note: Rules apply, not all homes or borrowers will qualify. For details, see www.HomeSteps.com/smartbuy.

For HomeSteps Summer Sales Promotion details and conditions, visit http://www.HomeSteps.com.

Freddie Mac was established by Congress in 1970 to provide liquidity, stability and affordability to the nation's residential mortgage markets. Freddie Mac supports communities across the nation by providing mortgage capital to lenders. Over the years, Freddie Mac has made home possible for one in six homebuyers and more than five million renters.

WOW Your Clients

WOWing clients is premier to long-term success in our industry. The basis of this concept is that you cannot "WOW" a client if you promise too much and deliver too little. "WOWs" are created when you pleasantly surprise your customers by delivering more than they expected.

In sales, we tend to place ourselves in problematic situations by giving prospective customers the answers we think they want to hear. In doing so, we can set ourselves up for failure.

This failure is often generated by insecurity, which arises when we doubt ourselves or our ability to offer unparalleled service. That causes us to make unrealistic commitments we fail to keep. An example might be:

"How long will it take for me to get loan approval?"

An insecure mortgage professional might respond:

"I will have your approval by the end of the day."

This is a prime example of setting yourself up for failure. What if your internet goes down or you have a family emergency? Even if you deliver the approval notification first thing the next morning, you have failed to make good on a promise.

By contrast, a secure professional will ensure that "WOW" by purposely providing the customer with a response that's definitely possible to exceed. The most critical time to "WOW" a customer is when the relationship begins, when you are trying to establish yourself as a unique professional who can exceed expectations.

Take a moment to consider how you might respond in the future, in order to give yourself the opportunity to surpass your clients' expectations.

I must've missed this one... good to know!

ActiveRain's New URL Shortener

How many times have you tried to link your ActiveRain post on Twitter or another site only to get the response that the url is too long? Well Happy Holidays, ActiveRain has a gift for you.

Once you have written and posted a blog post you now have the option of generating a shorter url.

Simply go back into your post and click Generate short URL. Take a look at the screen shot below:

I hope many of you find this useful and take advantage of the new url. Here is what Lenn's shortened URL looks like once we generate the shorter URL for the post in the screen shot above.

The shortened URL for this post is http://actvra.in/45. As you can see, the shorter structure uses the actvra.in domain.

Did you know... 1 teaspon of cinnamon contains as many antioxidants as a full cup of pomegranate juice or ½ cup of blueberries!

Several lenders, including Freddie Mac, report more than half of homeowners who lose their homes to foreclosure never answer their lenders' phone calls or letters. Instead, homeowners feel embarrassed about being in default, don't believe their lender can help, and erroneously assume that contacting their lender will cause them to lose their home more quickly.

In a press release announced earlier this week, The Short Sale Association of America (SSAA) shared results of a Freddie Mac survey that reported "6 in 10 homeowners in pre foreclosure aren't even aware of the programs and services available to help them prevent foreclosure."

The release urges real estate professionals to reach out to distressed homeowners, knowing it is highly unlikely they will seek out assistance on their own.

Note: lenders are still behind the times when it comes to investment properties. They claim to have loan modification and other options for investors, but typically that is not the case.