James Wright SFR E-Pro

Spring is here, the sun is out, and the grass needs to be cut. This is an amazing time in Watertown. A time to get out in the yard and make things come alive! One problem, though: dandelions! The scourge of all lawns across America!

When I saw the yellow heads of the enemy popping out from their camouflage bunkers I knew I had to act fast. The future of the whole lawn hung in the balance! Both of my immediate neighbors have fought this war in past years and have won. For some reason, the guerilla warfare in my country has never been stopped. I blame the traitor that still likes the little devils (my wife). She seems to think they are beautiful, and I think the word has spread to all dandelions throughout Watertown! For this reason, my castle is besieged by this pestilence.

This year, I have asked for a flood of reinforcements to once and for all conquer this age long battle. I started with a pre-season weed and feed to bomb the whole yard, praying this would keep them from gaining a beachhead on the lawn. However, I knew this would not stop all of them. Once I spotted the telltale of little saw-tooth flags starting to claim their territory, I knew I had to bring out the snipers. For 3 days now I have walked the lawn twice a day spraying each head that dared to rise in defiance to my law. It is truly a wonderful thing to see them shriveling by the next day.

They are a persistent foe, but I will overcome. The country of Lawn will once more be a land of peace and lush, green tranquility!

For the last two years, home prices have been dropping. Some price ranges
were more affected than others, but they were all going in the same
direction. Recently, however, we have seen a slight rise in home
prices. There is a block here in Watertown that I like to watch. All the
homes are exactly the same. Some of the interiors are nicer than the
others, but they all have the same 3 bed 1.5 bath floor plan on the same
size and shape lot with a one car garage. When you watch the prices of
those homes, you can see what buyers are doing. Last year the average
price was around 85K. So far this year, there have been two that have sold
for over 100K! This is just an indicator, but it is a very good one.
What has been driving this market change? I believe it is simply that the demand is rising to meet, and in some cases exceed, housing supply. With
all the great deals from short sales and foreclosures, the amazing
rates(some as low as 4.8%), and the government stimulus, buyers have been
coming out of the wood work. This increases the number of offers on a
house, which in turn drives the price up.
Is this trend going to last? I don't know. Only time will tell. I just
have a feeling this summer is going to be one of the best in a long time
for the real estate market!

If you are like me, you have several blogs and countless social
networking sites. If I were to be on ALL of them I could be online for
7-9 hours a day! On a normal day, I am only on for 30-40 minutes yet I
manage to stay on top of everything. It can be done, but it requires
concentration and a plan of action. Here is a brief synopsis of my daily
routine:

1. Open up tabs in your browser for your social networking sites and one
or two industry-related news sites (for Real-estate http://www.inman.com/
). Now, if you are like me you would have just opened around 30 pages.
This is something that must be cut down. You need one page where you can
post and feed everything down to all the sites. The site I use is
http://ping.fm. You can, with this site, post once and find it on all the
sites you have, which is a HUGE timesaver. Now you have Ping and a news
site open, I also suggest you have 2-3 of your favorites open. I use
Facebook, Twitter, and Linked In.

2. Quickly respond to direct messages and contacts in the 2-3 favorites
that you have open. Don't let yourself get side-tracked by following
things for fun. Remember, move quickly!

3. Keep moving quickly and comment on 3-4 posts and discussions on each of
the 2-3 sites. Make them friendly but give them reason to respond to your
comment. This is a very important step- don't forget it.

4. Do all of your status updates for the day. This is tricky part! You
don't want to send out 5-6 updates all at 8AM because no one will see
them. Thankfully, you have http://hootsuite.com on your side. This will
post to a few of the sites you want to update through the day. It also
will update Ping.fm. With this tool you can schedule updates to be posted
throughout the day automatically!

5. Figure out what you want to post. You want your audience to realize you
are human. I suggest that more than 50 percent of your posts should be
about you and what you are doing. The rest need to be filled with
information that people are looking for such as news, how-to, and market
updates. Post links to other valuable articles. Give people a reason to
follow you! Remember, followers are the reason you started blogging in the
first place!

6. Repeat steps 1-5 again around 7 PM. This is when most networks are
about to become the most active part of the day.

7. Finally, it is blogging time. Rather than being a daily routine, this
should be a 2-3 hour a week time that you set aside to sit down and write
out the blog posts for the week. This will give continuity, and simplify
your day when it comes time to actually post.

This is just my personal formula for social networking. You should find
what works for you and make it a routine. Remember, social networking
will only work if it is a daily action. I have faith in you, keep it up!