Heath's Blog

I spent all day in a class yesterday waiting for a golden gem.  This class was all about a "new" system for building web sites that is "guaranteed" to get results.  Most of the room was older people with limited knowledge of the Internet.  They got me to sit all day, because they had a "guaranteed method" they would dislose if you attended the whole party.

The package was $3000 for the basic system and $6000 for the nuclear one.  As I sat and listened, they expained about their system parts and enhancements, and how sliced bread had nothing on their program.  But, knowing a little about the Net, I found that many of their proprietary enhancements can be found on the Net, and in some cases, similar productive items are free.

I had two lengthy conversations with their closers who really only knew their closes, not computers, not the Internet, and not how this would help my real estate businesses.  In fact, they only really knew enough about their system to close it.

I looked around the room at the listeners and realized that this type of operation is polluting the Internet.  The buyers of the system are not real business people trying to get their business new publicity, or providing a service that is not already available from a true industry professional.  The buyers of that system will only be other site owners in the billions of sites cluttering the already littered Internet.

The closers were like the sales office of a new subdivision on Mars, selling what will be a great waterfront community in a few years if everything goes according to plan.  I left there with the understanding that search engine optimization is going to get a lot worse before it gets any better.

I realized that my work on REindex.com, The Site Engine(sm), now is even more important, because it links only to sites we have visited and reviewed for relevant real estate content.  Search is going to get more and more polluted which will make the REindex "Site Engine" concept even more useful.

PS. I did get one good golden nugget - for free.

Sometimes poor ranking is not because of competition for your search term, but because you have a few more serious problems. Test your site for basic search engine problems.

1. Enter your domain name, minus the www., into the search box.  If your site shows up in the results when you hit the search button, you are not banned.  This is good.  If you don't see your domain in the results, this is bad. Very basic.  You may need to contact the search engine to see if they will tell you if you are actually banned and maybe they'll tell you why, too.

2. Next test: enter the domain name without the .com/.net/.biz or whichever your ending is.  This should also show your site, but it will probably show more sites that link to yours or reference yours.  These results can be good or bad also.  "Good" results are numerous numbers of results found, and "bad" is when there are few results in that search.  You can check this list to see when and where your site is referenced and how it is referenced.  More references can be a good thing, but check to se how and where your site is referenced.

3. Next search your "Title Tag".  If you aren't sure what this is, google the term "title tag".  When you run a search for the title tag, you should be higher in the list than you are in number two.  The reason is that this tag is what the spiders are being told is most relevant about your site.  Don't be misled by ONE page from your site showing up in the results, you want the page that has the title tag your search is for to show in the results - and preferably high on the list.  A page from your site may be in the results page, but you want the page you did your search for to be in the results, not just any page.

4. If you find youself referenced on many pages but dont find yourself high in the search terms you have designed your site for, you may need to send a note to all the sites that have you on a "links" page and request to be remomved.  The reason is that some search engines look at links pages that are not the home page of any site with a "black hat" eye.  Black Hat is a term used  to describe programming efforts specifically designed to fool spiders.  The spiders have adjusted to see pages that are only full of miscellaneous links, links that aren't really relevant to content, as black hat.  Often this type of link page is so deeply burried in a site that it only negatively affects your efforts.  So if you can remove yourself from those types of pages, the spiders will like your site more.  The spiders have learned to like truth as much as people do.

To review,
If you find you are banned, definately contact the search engine for instructions about how to correct the issue(s).  Most will also have a forum where you can ask questions.
If your "title tag" search isn't returning the page of your site that you want, ask your webmaster if they can/will correct the problem (which shouldn't be a problem).
Be patient after you correct the problem(s).  It can take months to get re-included, but that is because there are so many sites competing and so many new ones being added.

Research, study, clean or correct, and be patient.  And then do it again in a few months because the search engines change their spidering criteria.

Happy Listing and Selling!  And don't forget to see if you are linked from REindex.com, The Site Engine(sm) yet!

Taking a good picture of a listing is an imperative in this business.  Most homes can be made attrative with a camera and others - well, there are others.  One thing to keep in mind when taking the pictures, is that the angle you shoot from can actually put a bad feeling in a viewers head uncontiously.

When you line up your picture, try to keep the lines verticle and horizontal.  If you are taking the picture from below or from above, the picture can have what is called "parallax" lines.   This is where vertical lines tilt inward at the top or at the bottom.  This can happen for interior shots as well as exterior views.

When our eyes see parallax lines, your brain registers an "uncomfortable input."  This is like having your computer screen out of adjustment.  If you avoid taking pictures with parallax lines, you will avoid turning off customers before they even get to the front of the house.

Also, if your customer says they don't like the look of a house you think is a good fit for them, take a good look at the picture and see if the listing agent is a bad photographer.  You may be able to explain why they are turned off by the picture.  Customers that trust your expertise will appreciate the question and the explaination.

If a picture is worth a thousand words, good listing pictures are worth a lot more.

After many years of building web pages by hand in html, I found a system that is "soup to nuts" easy.  It has everything from how to choose the right name, domain registration, easy template construction, or it will allow you to add your own html.  I even use it to "proof-read" my own html programming.  It will help you optimize your pages, submit them to the search engines, track their ranking, help you build backlinks, and on and on.

I have many domains, my real estate company site, and another to help listing agents get found free, and then a few built by this system I mention, because the system is so functional.  I even got one for my 75 year old Dad for his real estate business.  He read the (legthy) instructions, and only had to call me a couple of times.  Their help tools are great, but I think he also wanted me to know how good he was doing.

It is not that expensive when I compare it to what I used to spend on the multiple programs that do all the things this one program does.  If you can type and use a mouse, you can make a page and a web site.  I even saw this system endorsed by Robert Allen in the last chapters of his "Multiple Streams of Internet Income."

My only problem with this great system is that they are VERY verbose in their explainations.  They explain everything extensively and completely leaving no stone unturned and leaving nothing out.  While they are not redundantly repatitively saying the same things over and over more than once, I think what they say could be done much more briefly.  And, you can skip a lot of the "brainstorming" if you have a site name and concept already.  (Much of their "extra" explaination is for someone who wants to have a website, but doesn't know what will be on it.)

Once you have the system down, it takes no time at all to build a new page.  So, if you are looking for a way to build a site, step by step with written instructions, and with a great internal forum of members and techies that can answer any problem or question, then this is your tool.  I quickly built almost a hundred pages once I had completed the home page. 

There are other real estate site building companies for hire that I see all the time as we link to listing agent pages on REindex.com, The Site Engine(sm), but for the agent that wants to do it themselves, this is a good system that you can master easily, and it isn't a budget breaker.  It is less than $300 per year for everything I used to spend over $5000 a year for.  (Also, they have a 2 for one deal every so often where you can get two websites for one for the first year.)

I am reminded of the ad that used to be on in Dallas when I was growing up that had a Cowboy Cheerleader cutely smiling and saying, "If you don't have have and oil well.....Get one!"   Well, "If you don't have have and website.....Get one!"   ***Grin***

Happy Selling and Listing!

If a buyer agent has the buyer's interest in mind, does the buyer agent become liable if the buyer gets foreclosed on because of a declining market?  As everyone points fingers in every direction but their own, clients of exclusive buyer agents are starting to consider the role their agent played in current real estate market problems.  Did the buyer agent advise the client adequately enough about possible market turns?

One of the new topics now circulating is how much agents knew about their "client" when they watched the closing occur on a property that the buyer could marginally afford.  If the agent knew the market had a probability of turning down, and they said nothing to the buyer, did the agent have the buyer's interest in their mind at the closing - or just the paycheck?  And, is a verbal warning of a possible market change enough care and/or notice?

"Everyone" knows that real estate operates in cycles.  In the past it was at a ten year rate more or less.  But with the unusual 2000-2005 record years of appreciation, people in the real estate profession were as caught up in the appreciating market as buyers and sellers were.  It became sort of humorous when the NAR economists would preface their statistical reports with disclaimers of unusual data, only because there seemed to be no end in sight.

Buyers, sellers, brokers, agents, economists, builders, lenders, originators, investors, specuators, inspectors, title companies, and on and on, all wanted the market to rise endlessly.  However, who was in the best position to advise buyers about their particular transaction?  Buyer agents had become the latest, greatest advisors for real estate enthusiasts.  Buyers were (and still are) told they need a buyer agent to "protect" them.  But do buyer agents provide any more protection when it comes to changes in the market than another type of agents does?  And, how much of the advice a buyer agent gives has to do with market conditions, and how much has to do with a specific property and the purchase process?

One of the preliminary roles of any agent is to qualify customers.  Why spend time looking at million dollar homes when the buyer can only borrow a hundred thousand?  It is more efficient to say, "Here is a list of properties that you can buy," rather than the opposite.  So if buyer agents had pre-qualified their cients, why are there so many foreclosures?  Did so many of the lenders miss the qualifying step of the lending process?  Probably not.  But the buyer agents were at least as philanthropic with their qualifying criteria as lenders were.  And if a lender qualified the client, who is the agent to say no to a deal?   Except for the idea that the buyer agent is supposed to be thinking of their customer - not the deal.

This is a new conundrum for buyer brokers and their agents.  It will only take one lawyer (start the Jaws Music) to start a new feeding frenzy on buyer agents.  Maybe it will become a movie, "The buyer agent who knew too much."  And is it really the responsibility of a buyer agent to caution a buyer about market changes?  Hmmm, sounds like a new disclosure coming.  Of course, all agents really do for their "huge" income is show houses and cash checks.  LOL!!

The Real Estate market is near it's bottom, and global warming has started cooling.  But, both truths are inconvenient for mainstream US media.  Real Estate prices have moved into ranges that many investors see as "the bottom", or at least close enough to start buying.  And home owners are still moving from one house to another. 

In many areas where appreciation drove prices to historic highs, sale prices have returned to levels where rents will carry the debt on a property.  Investors from every state are poised with cash, credit, and confidence that their next purchase will be a great, longer term investment.  Even without tax incentives, there are many markets making cents and dollars. (Pardon the pun.)  Home owners are disappointed at their loss of paper equity, but they are excited about "moving up" into a house that was out of their financial reach a year or two ago.  Home owners still have growing families, and with the economy growing more than the "news" reports, many families are moving into larger homes.  Couple that with the "boomer" inherited estates and there is an unreported housing economy that includes people with good credit and stable incomes. 

In other areas of the real estate market, when rent payments are adequate to carry the debt on property, investors buy.  The Internet has made finding rentable properties much, much easier.  Markets with affordable values attract corporations that are looking to operate less expensively and also looking to help their employees find reasonable housing.  As areas attract jobs (and some are), the housing markets in those areas will grow again.  Investors are finding those areas using the Internet. The instructors used to say stay within one hour of your home because that was where most people can gather the best information.  But investors are using the Internet to find good investment markets without regard to the "one hour rule."

As areas lose jobs, investors move in to buy bargains.  In the last REindex report of the "Top Ten States Surfed" (adjusted version), areas like Michigan and Louisiana appeared in the list.  Both of those areas are not being reported as strong investment areas by mainstream media.  But investors who appreciate the availability of economic information on the Internet, are using it to research their own buying decisions.  Low purchase prices or high foreclosure rates in a given area can be indicators of opportunity.

Mainstream media prefers to report the current real estate market negatively because it creates copy.  When the economy is good, people don't need to listen to the news to see how bad things will be tomorrow.  If there isn't any reason to watch the bad news, there isn't ad revenue, and there certainly isn't a need for opinionated reporters. 

As for "global warming", the founder of "The Weather Channel" is considering a legal challenge to Al Gore's eco-vangelizing.  According to one news agency, "The founder of the Weather Channel wants to sue Al Gore for fraud, hoping a legal debate will settle the global-warming debate once and for all."  John Coleman says his side of the global-warming debate is being buried by mainstream media.  Since the facts are not open for discussion, Coleman has suggested that the courts might be needed to provide full disclosure.  For example, if farms are being found as glaciers recede, doesn't that mean the earth was that warm once before?  Of course, it is less empowering to just report news than it is to tell the listener how to hear it and what the news means.

What makes these "real inconvenient truths"?  Positive news is not as lucrative as negative news is.  As the line in "Pretty Woman" goes, "...it's easier to believe the negative stuff."  But most people want to hear the good stuff, and even more are happy that "their neighborhood" isn't that bad.  For now, the investors I am working with are content to have the media limiting their competition for good purchases.   They know that after the election, rates will increase, rentals will be more necessary, anyone who owns rental property could benefit.  (And, the skiers I know are not worried about their season passes.) 

The current reporting is like a new agent doing a CMA for a seller to get the price the seller wants rather than showing the facts.  Reporters are now more correctly called opinion-ators.  But the Internet has given each of us our own encyclopedic reference for all kinds of information.  Smart investors are using true real estate professionals and the Internet to find truly good investments.

Convenient and true information cannot be dismissed for long.

The tax numbers below are interesting to me.  In this business of real estate we play with numbers all the time.  While the media says life under the current political leaders is terrible, the numbers make me look back in time, and scan the future for what to expect.

The data comes from The Tax Foundation.  There are quoted endorsements from prominent people, dare I say testimonials in webspeak, on the foundation's home page.  There is an interesting menu link on its homepage that is for Presidential Candidate Tax Plan Comparison. 

Taxes under Clinton 1999                   Taxes under Bush 2008
Single making 30K - tax $8,400             Single making 30K - tax $4,500
Single making 50K - tax $14,000          Single making 50K - tax $12,500
Single making 75K - tax $23,250           Single making 75K - tax $18,750
Married making 60K - tax $16,800       Married making 60K- tax $9,000
Married making 75K - tax $21,000       Married making 75K - tax $18,750
Married making 125K - tax $38,750     Married making 125K - tax $31,250

(from taxfoundation.org )

Once again, those who control the reporting, control the minds of those who don't want to, can't, won't, are afraid to, look for real data.  Real estate isn't the only place that you find the 5 Monkey Principle at work.

Here's a link to a map that shows foreclosure data by state.  It is from the FED in New York.  I used it for my area in MA.  My particular town doesn't deserve as much bad press as some areas.  (The map is one more example of something we can add to our own sites for free!)

I saw on one tv channel today, that a guy had researched all the headlines from the Clinton era when we had 5.2% unemplyment and a no growth economy.  He compared those with today's headlines for our current 5.2% unemployment and a positively growing economy.

He found that todays headlines are much more negative even though the economic facts are actually much more positive.  Maybe this is another example of the "5 Monkeys" method of publicity.

Oh well.  I have to go show some more houses to some buyers.  It seems that there are a lot of people who still have good credit and money to buy.  Haven't they heard the news?  - Blacks hate whites, Iraqis are too stubborn to work toward a stable government, the world is melting, and every property in america is being foreclosed on.

But, It's a beautiful day on Cape Cod!

Happy Selling and Listing!