Lisa Spalding, REALTOR, CDPE

There is a marketing campaign out there for a pretty well-know real estate company that plainly states that an agent's life IS real estate, plain and simple. Pretty catchy sentence that they use and while I agree with it to a certain extent for many agents, I personally do NOT say that MY LIFE IS Real Estate. What would be the point? Rather, I would say that Real Estate is Real Estate and My Life is My Life and sometimes the two meet but, typically, at any one moment I'm all in to one or the other and not both.

Sometimes I cheat and will bring my SmartPhone with me to family things but most of the time I will leave a voicemail message about where I am and what I'm doing and, if a customer needs something real estate-related, what they can do to either contact me or my business partner.

This is me exercising a horse at Orlando Police Department's stable facility by the Citrus Bowl when I used to VOLUNTEER there to keep the police horses in shape. The picture doesn't do the horse, "Buddy," justice b/c he is really a large, good-looking horse. Plus, both me and the horse both look kinda wide in the hips, but that's another story. :)

With my real estate business, what I choose to do is have a personal and family life, THEN build in a successful real estate business. When I talk with other successful agents, I find that many of them, too, don't LIVE to sell real estate; they sell real estate to get money to LIVE. It all depends what your definition of what SUCCESS is.

Sometimes I speak with agents that are top producers monetarily that work 80 hours (or more!) a week. Seriously--80 hours a week to get X number of dollars per year. I personally work 40-50 hours a week to get the same amount of money and I'm always looking to decrease that number by increasing the systems in my business so I can take more time off to be with my family and make MORE money by investing less time to sell real estate. Can it really be done? Absolutely.

I attended a 3-day real estate seminar this week in Orlando with other top real estate agents (and mortgage lenders). Throughout the seminar, many of these people in the real estate industry continued to share their stories with respect to business and family time. The underlying theme was: These professional real estate and mortgage people utilize business systems to work less and earn the same or MORE money through helping people with their real estate sales and purchases. And, to do that, they have streamlined the systems within their businesses! ANYONE can do that for ANY business--You Just Have to Be Focused and Purposeful.

Anyway, success to me is helping enough people to get what THEY want with their real estate sales (buying and selling) so I can get enough money to be home with my family more and do things with my family and for myself.

If you are a Buyer or Seller, contact me and I'll explain what I can do to help YOU with what's important to YOU about Buying or Selling so you can get on with YOUR life and dreams.

If you are a real estate agent or mortgage lender that may need a few tweaks to your business systems, contact me to discuss what small or large changes you can make to your real estate practice to make more money in less time.

Okay. I am working with a Buyer (well, actually a few Buyers) that needs and qualifies for Down Payment Assistance with Orange County, FL. The hoop that a Buyer with OC in FL needs to jump through, though, is that the PROPERTY must also qualify. For a house in Orange County, FL to qualify for the program, it MUST have something APPRECIABLY improved or replaced within it within the last 12 months. For example, it needs to have something NEW like a reshingled roof, updated electric, updated plumbing, or a new hot water heater. You can't just use the funds (up to $35,000) for just any old house--it needs to be improved. Why? I have no idea. But, for this particular Buyer to get $30,000 FREE from the county, it needs to have something updated or improved about it. So, of course, not every house will qualify for the funds, plain and simple. AND, the work has to be completed by a licensed person and proper permits pulled, if necessary. AND, the Sellers need to provide the proper receipts, etc.

So, a small pool of Buyers that are approved for the OC DPA program have a small pool of houses that fit the bill to get the funds.

My Question to Agents and the Public is this:

If a DPA Buyer puts an offer on a house and ANOTHER Buyer puts an offer on a house that is similar but DOESN'T need/qualify for the DPA money, which offer do YOU think is stronger in this market? (For this example, say the house was just re-shingled in September of 2008. The proper permits were pulled and the Seller has the receipts from the roofing company to get to the Buyer's lender.)

Things to think about:

The DPA Buyer will have the funds necessary to close unless the County runs out of money

The DPA Buyer needs to make an offer to close within about 60 days or so (if you write it for 30-45 days to close, it most likely will NOT close by that time)

How good is ANY Loan Officer?

Did both parties provide a Letter of Pre-APPROVAL to the Seller/Seller's Agent?

Have both Buyers made APPLICATION for a loan?

Were all THREE Credit Bureau reports pulled? Or was just one and the Loan Officer is hoping the other two are in line with the one that WAS pulled?

For OC, the loan must be an FHA loan. FHA is NOT a bad word. I usually means that there is less down payment REQUIRED than a conventional loan and the down payment may come from a number of places. The only REAL difference b/t an FHA and a CONVENTIONAL loan is that, with FHA, the Seller MUST pay for the TAX SERVICE FEE, or TRETS. That's it.

The STRENGTH of an offer typically means "How likely is it that the contract will be executed?" So, for financed offers, How likely IS it that the particular Buyer will be able to perform under the contract terms and conditions?! Or, more pointedly, CAN the Buyer CLOSE ON, or BUY, the PROPERTY?

So, WHICH do YOU think IS THE STRONGEST OFFER? A DPA LOAN OR A TYPICAL LOAN? AND WHY?

Today, a Buyer and I were viewing homes and most of them were bank-owned and vacant. Bank-owned (R.E.O.-Real Estate Owned) properties are fine and sometimes they're even exceptional deals. But you really never know what you're going to get, though, when you finally get there to take a look.

1. Getting the Property on "The List" of Homes to be Shown to a Buyer. This can be the easiest or the hardest thing to accomplish. First, the home must be priced very well for Buyers to take notice of it, especially with the large number of bank-owned properties for sale in our Central Florida area.

2. When the Buyer Wants to View the Property, the Buyer's agent needs to get showing instructions. Thank goodness for the "ShowingDesk" button on our MLS. All we have to do is click that button and the showing instructions miraculously appear--unless the listing agent hasn't recorded any instructions, which happens very often. Sometimes, those instructions are incorrect or are outdated. If the ShowingDesk button isn't activated, then we have the option of calling the listing company or agent. When viewing one property recently, I had gotten the showing instructions from the ShowingDesk button (it was a combination lockbox code) but the code given was not opening the lock. I called the agent and he said he had so many listings he couldn't possibly remember the code for the house I was at and I was to call the listing office for the code. Well, it was after hours and there was no one at the office to receive my call. I had to call the agent back and nicely try to finagle any kind of help. We finally resolved it and got into the house about three different combination codes later.

3. Buyers Want to See Lots of Pictures of the Home. And many (although not all) REO listing agents take the required Front Exterior picture of the home and may not take other pictures of the interior of the property. Some REO listing agents do an awesome job and have plenty of pictures and even take pictures of issues with the home such as a roof leak/moisture issue, mold issue, or whatever. With our Mid-Florida Multiple Listing Service (MLS), we are allowed up to ten pictures of the home. Buyers--ALL BUYERS--want to see pictures of the home, both exterior and interior. A Buyer wants to see pictures of the front of the home, the kitchen, the living area/living room, the master bedroom and master bathroom, the other bathroom, the backyard, any interesting features about the property, and any/everything else about the property that can be photographed. Buyers use pictures of the property to make decisions on whether or not to view the property.

4. The First Impression and Door Prizes at the Home are Anyone's Guess. Once it's been decided to go and see a bank-owned home, then comes the fun! Often, the pictures of the home seen on the MLS may not be a true picture of how the home looks when you go see it. Imagine that you and the Buyer drive up to the house, and the grass may or may not have been recently cut. It will have that look that only vacant homes can have. Often, there are door hangars on the front door or jammed in between the screen door and its frame promoting the local pizza place or other services such as coupons from house-cleaning agencies, etc. Today, I was surprised to find a door hangar from the water company on one home that indicated the water company had fixed a pipe leak at the property. The paper hangar looked like it had been there for some time, as it was very weathered. This freaked the Buyer out, though, and she looked through the house for evidence of a plumbing leak. The most interesting door prize I have found in my years as an agent was one from Animal Control saying that the owners of the property had 24 hours to contact them about a possible abandoned dog on the property or face fines.

5. The Owners of the House Before the Bank got the House may have Roughed Up the Property a little--or a LOT. No matter what is written in the public marketing remarks for the house (if anything), what the listing agent has written about some properties cannot prepare you for what you encounter AT the property. For instance, some REO properties are very well-maintained and have all the appliances and light fixtures, and the HVAC unit(s) while others do not. Depending on when the listing agent or the bank's servicing company was last out to the home, the grass may or may not be cut and the property may or may not be secure. Secure in this case means that the front door is locked and there is no other way of entry to the property--broken window, side door in the garage is locked. Today, we entered a property that appeared fine upon entering, then noticed someone had thrown something through a bathroom window, possibly to just vandalize it or maybe to gain entrance. Thankfully, there was not anyone inside the home to greet us unexpectedly--but that kind of thing DOES happen with vacant houses.

I'm sure I'll post again about vacant houses again soon. Looks like they are here to stay for a while. I still view that fact as a good thing because there are a lot of opportunities available. Are you still interested in seeing vacant REO properties? What procedures do you use when viewing vacant REO properties to stay safe while still making a profit?

These views are my own views. I may or may not be correct in my views and opinions.

Well, I just met a prospective Buyer last weekend and, sad to say, she had LOW expectations of me and my profession. Or, maybe I should say that I'm HAPPY to say that she had LOW expectations of real estate agents?!

Okay--here's the story:

Prospective Buyer contacts real estate agent. Agent has good phone conversation with Buyer, asks some questions about what Buyer is looking for, says, "I'll get right on it and CALL YOU BACK." Then, NOTHING HAPPENS. Agent does not call. Buyer waits for a week or two; also does nothing, doesn't call that agent, really b/c it's very early in the buying process but Buyer has a poor outlook on real estate agents in general due to non-communication with her by the agent. LOW, LOW expectation about real estate agents is now set. :(

Buyer gets up the nerve to contact real estate company #2, which is GREAT b/c it's MY company. Speaks with a Relocation Specialist, THEN is told that an agent (ME!) will contact her--AND I DO contact her. I e-mailed with my contact info and hours of operation. I then called but she was at work, so asked me to call back later that night, which I also do. No answer, so I leave a message. I get an e-mail from the Buyer and call back the next day and we have an awesome, LONG-ish conversation. I get a little more info from the prospective Buyer. She gets some info from me. Everything is cool. Then, I ask "HOW AM I DOING SO FAR?" Buyer responds: "Well, you're doing great--YOU CALLED ME BACK." I ask what she means by that and the Buyer relates the (above) story of the previous agent not ever calling back!

I am sorry to say that, in this Buyer's estimation that "Great" is merely contacting her back and has nothing to do with what a terrific job I can do for her. I think it's sad that returning a phone call is considered wonderful for me as an agent, without even discussing all the cool things I can do in terms of consulting, negotiating, or organizing on the customer's behalf. I guess I'll really WOW her when the time comes for me to actually BE a real estate agent. :)

WHY do real estate agents NOT call back? There are a variety of reasons (too busy, afraid to talk to people, wrong contact information given, just don't want to call, property called on wasn't in a good price range, wrote down the info on a small piece of paper and lost/misplaced it, didn't get the "warm, fuzzies" on the phone with the customer, don't want to pursue a business relationship with customer, unsure if customer is a "real" customer, etc.) but I don't think that's the right question to be asking, really. The main fact is, when advertising works and people contact you and you are not able to answer the phone when they call, you MUST contact them back! Or, have your assistant call them. Or, just give the contact information to another agent in your office and have THEM call the prospective customer back.

In the (true) story above, if the initial agent had gotten the Buyer's snail mail address even and sent something in the mail, then he probably would have been able to help the customer. Or if he had e-mailed her, he may have helped himself out. The Buyer waited a week or so before contacting my company, so the initial agent had all the time in the world to make a move but for some reason didn't.

Unfortunately, non-communication is a complaint that many customers have about agents in general. I don't really see how some agents stay in business. If you say you're going to DO something, then DO IT. Under-Promise and Over-Deliver. It's Business 101. When you follow-through with doing what you said you would do, that typically makes customers/the public happy. When you don't follow-through, that sends a very bad message. You can't please all people, all the time. But, you CAN at least contact them back and see if you and they are a good fit to maybe work together or to see if they would be better served in working with someone else.

If now is the time for you to look for help from a real estate agent that will communicate with you regularly, whether you are buying or selling, check out my websites, look at my customer testimonials, call for my customer references, and contact me for an interview. We'll see if you and I are a good fit to maybe work together.

--Lisa Spalding, Watson Realty Corp.

www.WinterParkHomeFinder.com

My family and I were visiting a family member in the hospital today (she's okay and due to be released, too--no worry there!). The hospital is in Seminole County and is very neat and clean. I jumped in the car without grabbing my camera, so I don't have photographic proof of it but--

The sign on the exterior of the hospital read: "SAME DAY SURGERIES." Seriously. Now, I know they probably meant something to the effect of "Same-day OUTPATIENT surgeries" or something but leaving that one slightly important word out means that they may be sending a message to the public that is not the intended message.

As it reads now, it seems as if they want to get people IN, then get people OUT FAST, FAST, FAST after surgery. Yikes! While the sign certainly says they do things FAST, do YOU as a patient really WANT them to be so QUICK at all times? Hmm.

Do YOU have some marketing out and about that may be reflecting on you in a way or manner that you did not intend? I know that I'm taking another look at my marketing ads and having more friends/family members look, too, and give me some feedback.