Gary Woltal's Blog

Curiosity got the better of me today. I was reviewing some Expireds around the area I serve, primarily those listings that had sat on the market 180 days or longer. I always wonder about all the myriad of reasons of why something doesn't sell like price, condition, location, poor marketing, lack of staging, bad curb appeal, the water tower in the backyard, etc. But today my brain wandered to the for sale sign out front that had the name of Mr. or Ms. Smug real estate agent on it.

What I mean by that has to do with steering. Real estate is a people business and Realtors know other Realtors(and their work habits, ethics, and reputations). Steering for fair housing purposes is illegal. But I have heard if buyers commissions are below 3%, or FSBO's don't work with agents, buyers reps drive by the house.

But what about slimey salesmen (or women)? Someone in the past that left a bad taste in your mouth. The "superstar" who is full of gimmicks. Who has more tricks up their sleeve than Houdini. If you've had to go to arbitration to get your fair share of a commission from them how likely are you to want to work with them again? I think in many markets there are a handful of these, what shall we call them, charlatans?

So do you as a high integrity Realtor steer clear of those listings (if possible), because of the "likeability factor" or ethics of these representatives? I would think it might only be human nature to deal with only agents that are worthy of working with.

So maybe when picking up an expired listing, you can subtly say to the home seller, the problem was with your former agent. But that's off the record!

It always amazes me with buyers. In looking for houses time does not often seem to be a problem. They have all day. They have months. They can be picky. They don't have to buy today. The fact their lease runs out or the new job is starting next week still doesn't always prompt them to make a decision and buy.

In today's economy we have cautious buyers. Buyers who won't get off the fence and prioritize what they want and "move forward" despite negative media headlines.

They "think" they are Masters Of Time.

Time waits for no one in our lives. Time moves along whether we are ready or not. No amount of time is truly guaranteed. I have observed time along the way and understand it is a great equalizer. We are born, we live in the dash between that date, and the end date, our expiration date, death. No one knows how long that dash will be.

There is an expression, time flies. Or sometimes you hear time flies when you are having fun.

Time can move apparently fast in our lives from January to December or from age 50 to 60. This "illusion" I think is based on two factors.

One I call the denominator theory. This means at age ten one year moves by slower because it represents 10% of your life. At age 60 one year represents a little less than 2% of your life.

The other factor in time moving slow or fast is your activity level. Being engaged and heavily scheduled makes a day go by fast. Being bored and sitting in the doctors office waiting for an appointment can make time "seem" to go by very slow.

In all this discussion, we need to know that time is valuable. Sure, we will be stupid in life and waste time and abuse what we do with it now and then.

So what? STOP today and reflect. Look at that watch with the second hand moving round and round and realize all of us can work to be so much more "effective"with our time. Do things that have "meaning" to us in our life.

You would be amazed when you talk to people who are near end of life and KNOW IT how focused they become.

Some have the thought that if you lived every day like it was your last how much more beautiful a person you would be.

So even back to real estate I hope buyers would want to "get on with their life."

Live life to the fullest and do not be afraid of death. Do not be a clock watcher. Be more afraid that when you do come to the end that you haven't lived. Living full lives is what it is all about. Life is for the living. Be kind, love, be thoughtful.

Be your best! Be the best YOU!

None of us can truly master time. We just live life. The time we are given is unknown. All we know is we have today to make the best of it.

I'll leave you with what some dying cancer patients said about time to put it all in perspective.

To a normal person, the sound of a clock goes:

TICK, TICK, TICK.

But to a dying person it goes:

PRECIOUS, PRECIOUS, PRECIOUS.

Let us all not wait till the end to learn that simple lesson, but take it to heart today and use one of our most valuable resources wisely each and every day!

When it comes to today's modern REALTOR, be sure you as a home seller are working with one that is tech savvy. Not only are more buyers coming from the younger generation, but the exposure your house needs is on the Internet. That is where up to 90% of buyers now are starting their search. Feeds of the description of your house need to go to many places in the Internet world including high traffic web sites and blogs.

So ask the question, "Does your REALTOR Yahoo?" It's obviously important as even Microsoft is eyeing Yahoo now.

And just not to go overboard with technology here is a fun video in this area.

Here comes another bubble.