Many of you are a lot like me.  Entrepreneurial.  We’re constantly looking for opportunity, and when we see it, we often just naturally go for it.  Some of us more than others, depending on our place in life, our risk tolerance, financial ability, and the other things on our plate, but all of us, to some degree, learn to spot opportunity and react.  Such is the life of an entrepreneur.
I thought that some of you might find it enjoyable or even possibly instructive, if I were to walk you through …

This post is in response to a great post by Mary Supinger regarding short sales and credit ramifications.  I felt inclined to follow up with a post that may help agents and brokers reduce their risk in these types of transactions.  Many of my agents recently attended a risk management credit course on short sales, foreclosures and refinancing which has now scared them to death regarding the representation of a seller who is in a position for a possible short sale.  The issue isn

Big Time Mortgage Industry History

Wow! What a week, this past one, the third week of September 2008! So much has gone on, and frankly, it is very difficult for me to understand a lot of it.

One article that I have read used the phrase, “the credit market has seized up and has made it impossible for anyone to get mortgage loans, etc. (sic).” That pretty much summed it up for me and my business.

The world has changed dramatically in the last 50 years.  There has been more innovation and more technological progress in the last 80 years than there were in the previous years added together since the beginning of time.

…or can they?  It was hillarious reading the thread on real estate webmasters initiated by Mr. Ron Park.  Mr. Park was miffed about the results of his $10,500 outlay to try and clone Redfin. 
He hired a low-cost provider to do it for him.  Then, when he didn’t get the results he hoped for, he proceeded to dispute the charges on his credit card and asked for help on a  public discussion forum at realestatewebmasters on how to get unstuck.  He was kind enough to conveniently provide full reference about his …

After only two hours of deliberation yesterday, the jury unanimously vindicated a buyer’s agent accused by his clients of failing to disclose that two other homes in the neighborhood sold for less than what they paid. As a trial court case, this decision in Ummel v. Little is binding on the parties to the case, but has no binding authority for other cases. Moreover, the buyers may file an appeal.

On Friday, Real Estate Radio USA talked to Stefan Swanepoel about the changes shaping the real estate industry. Billed as probably the most informative interview they have done to date the 45 minute interview is a lively, fast-flowing exchange of ideas and commentary about the state of the market, agents in general, knowledge and recommendations for productivity, real estate trends and the future. You can listen to an archived version of the talk here.

New real estate wiki for real estate industry is launched. 
History of wikis in real estate
BiggerPockets (launched in 2006) claims to be the first real estate wiki but it unfortunately closed down in May 2007 due to lack of sufficient content.  Introduced shortly therafter, and still going strong, is InmanWiki (part of InmanNews, InmanTV and InmanBlog).  
Origins of wikisWikiWikiWeb was the first site to be called a wiki. It was started by Ward Cunningham in 1994 and was based on the name of the Honolulu International Airport shuttle called “Wiki-Wiki” … in Hawaiian that …

America’s Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) announced today that they are investigating 14 financial and mortgage companies for insider dealing and fraud as part of a criminal inquiry into the sub-prime crisis. The FBI suspects that the house price boom, once seemingly endless, encouraged mortgage lenders to take increasingly large risks, making loans to people with weaker and weaker credit histories as they sought new customers. 

Read the complete article here.

Interesting New York Times article sent to me by a friend.
By DAVID STREITFELD
Published: January 22, 2008
CARLSBAD, Calif. — Marty Ummel feels she paid too much for her house. So do millions of other people who bought at the peak of the housing boom.
What makes Ms. Ummel different is that she is suing her agent, saying it was all his fault.
Ms. Ummel claims that the agent hid the information that similar homes in the neighborhood were selling for less because he feared she would back out and he would lose his …