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A Confession

Links forgive the sins of your website. Time to go to confession?

Engines and Websites

I was just reminded of an SEO rule today that I am not sure if most people understand. That is that search engines rank pages not websites.

Each page that you own is an opportunity at traffic. That is one reason a blog does well if it is updated. The main page changes and you are creating new pages with each new post.

Are You Number One in Google in Your Own Mind?

Is checking your Google positions your favorite time killer?

Come on be honest, doncha love just typing in "Your City" real estate and reveling in your ultra high position? Well, if that is true then make sure you sign out of your Google account because you are going to probably show higher than when you sign out of Google.

The reason is that Google is tracking your visits to your own site, and as part of its personalized search algo is positioning your site (that you visit all the time), a higher position than the regular results (which is where your prospects will come from). It does this by tracking your hits or clicks.

Prices are Going Up?

I guess it is all in whose stats you read.

This from Coaching Clues Newsletter: The Sky Is Not Falling!

They point out that despite the media darling Case-Shiller index, the better indicator of the indices is provided by OFHEO (the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight), Realogy and NAR. These three organizations seem to validate one another's results.

They all have come to the same conclusion: 

"Overall U.S. prices were UP 0.6 percent....In other words, a whopping 77 percent of the areas in the U.S. reported a price increase in January 08 - February 08! The Case-Shiller Index, in contrast, concludes that 95 percent of the MSA's reported negative returns. "

Bernice has been at the forefront on preaching the positivity as we have at positiveonrealestate.com.

I believe that this economic situation is way overblown and so is the housing crisis. It cannot be a meltdown when you continually hear of multiple offers occurring across the country.

By blogging and posting great real estate news you can help counter the negative impressions that get published daily in the traditional media. You can be a leader and can help form the public impression on housing.

More Info:

Dave Lakhani Ends the Recession

Another reason

I recently wrote on the housing crisis. But what I failed to mention was the Realtor Bubble. Like in the State of California where I can literally walk to two blocks and chances are that one of those homes I pass will house a licensee.

The current stats in California is 1 in 53 adults in California has a real estate license. Mike Ferry used to joke they hand 'em out at the DMV with your drivers license.

The stats are only a bit better across the country. When there is less deals and more agents, well you do the math and maybe that will help you figure out why there are less deals on the board.

When the industry treats their licensing like an MLM invitation it can only cause a worsening image for the agent, and mean less deals per agent.

The Biggest Dollar Demographic in Your Future

This in from the Wall Street Journal:

• Hispanics now account for more than 15% of the U.S. population
• Hispanics control more disposable income than any other minority group. The figure stands at $860 billion a year and is expected to hit $1.3 trillion by 2012.
• Between 2000 and 2007, 16 states -- among them West Virginia, Illinois and New Jersey -- saw their white population decline, according to the new Census data. Over the same period, whites accounted for a majority of population growth in only 11 states.
• According to the Pew Research Center, whites are projected to make up only 45% of the working-age population in 2050, down from 68% in 2005.
• The center projects that the share of Hispanics in the working-age population will double rising from 14% to 31%.

FROM WSJ

If this is not a wake up call to take the Hispanic Demographic more, seriously I do not know what is.

The Three Prong Spear to Housing

I visited a friend over the weekend and he asked me what is up with real estate? In fact he posited that, "aren't we at the bottom?" That was interesting that he would think that.

I told him that my unscientific reasoning is that:

• The real estate market got way past rent value
• There are way too many agents
• And most importantly credit is too tight

My ear out there tells me that the buyers are wanting to buy. I know this from my client traffic, and lead counts that are showing the highest numbers in a long time. And in some cases they are higher than ever.

Either the lending will loosen up, or you must learn how to get creative.

Realtor or Blogger

Are your a wannabe blogger, or do you write to find leads?

ProBlogger is a blogger now selling something (books). CopyBlogger, Dave Taylor, Life Hacker. These are professional bloggers. It seems the advice that most take for blogging has been from guys and gals that blog professionally.

That is terrific resource  when you want to be a professional blogger, selling to one specific community. The word "Blogging" itself has taken on a damaging aura. Writing or creating is a much more useful term.

And as a Realtor you must ask yourself what are you doing to serve your readership?

Here are some more questions to help break away from blogging, and transition back into Realtor the publisher.

What Can Be More Important Than The Housing Crisis?

David Walker, Comptroller General, (THe U.S. tops Accountant), says that our Country is broke. I know that this is not really about real estate or marketing, but it is in a way as it affects markets, and that affects mortgages. This is an important topic that noone from either side of the aile is talking about this election year. Make them!

The Big Daddies of real estate

RISMedia’s announced its 20th Annual Power Broker Survey.

Interestingly, the total number of transactions down from 2,754,618 in 2006 to 2,322,210 in 2007. On average, real estate firms did over 1,100 less transactions in 2007 compared to 2006. Total sales volume in 2007 was down more than $100 billion, from $855,755,959,352 in ‘06 to $749,201,552,294 in ‘07.