When to take a walk

Your agent calls to say he's bringing prospective buyers to see your home at 2:00 p.m. You quickly straighten up the house and run the dishwasher. What should you do then? If you have to let them into the house--then take a drive or walk the dog. Many owners think they should linger close by while their home is being shown. They are afraid that the real estate agent might miss the storage shelves in the basement or forget to point out the beautiful new floor in the kitchen. It is better for the agent to miss something than for you to be ushering the buyers around, so resist the temptation to stay while your house is being shown. Buyers usually base their decision to buy on an attraction that often has more to do with emotions than pure logic, and a lot goes on between buyer and agent during a showing. The buyer needs to evaluate the home's pluses and minuses, and the agent needs the opportunity to work with the buyer's objections. This process cannot take place comfortably if the seller is on the scene. That's my tip for the day.

80/20 rule in sales

80-20 rule is also known at the law of the vital few, states that, for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes. Also, it's a common role of thumb in business: e.g., "80% of your sales come from 20% of your clients", and also 80% of the wealth in America is held by 20% of the population. Funny thing is that historically 20% of real estate agents closed 80% of all sales. The gap has really widened int he past 10 years. According to reports I'm reading, it's closer to 90/10. I certainly see this in my new office, as well as my old office. For the most part the difference between a successful agent and not-so-successful agent is a proper skill set. I'm sure you're nodding your head as you read this.

My new company continues to amaze.

The longer the downturn lasts, the stronger Keller Williams emerges. Year to date, NAR’s membership has dropped by about 10 percent, while Keller Williams agent count has incresed by 2 percent. We're the only company gaining market share and agents, while the other big franchises, ALL the other big franchises, are losing. Hey, one of those huge franchises lost me last month.

Local iTech market stats for this past quarter

Our local MLS is called iTech, and an agent (thank you Nancy Morris) in our office extrapolated data to find trends. Average listing price and average selling price are not as significant in predicting trends as is the average price per square foot. This is because the average listing and selling prices can vary depending on the mix of houses that are sold in any one period. Trends noticed:

1. Prices for most of our areas are very close to flat or slightly increasing with just a few exceptions. For example it appears that La Canada prices are continuing to slide and NW Pasadena may have turned the corner.

2. The number of houses sold increased over last quarter except for one area in Glendale where volume was the same as last quarter.

3. All areas except SW Pasadena have flipped over to a seller's market with less than six months of inventory. Several areas have 3 or less months of inventory. The amount of inventory dropped sharply in a couple of areas.