Lake County, IL real estate blog

Real Estate Website Providers - world outside of P2

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 23:22:00 GMT

I have been with Point 2 since 2003, have had all the versions from Standard, through Professional to now Premium and while I did have another website at the very beginning, I never really worked it the way I try to work my P2 site. But about once a year, I check out what else is out there just to make sure I am still happy with what I have. And naturally, in the light of the recent P2 news, I thought to myself it's about time to do my annual website trial run.

I have spent the last two days testing other real estate website providers and I am not even going to name them here because that's not the point of this post. But I have to tell you one thing, So far, I have looked into 5 different systems that are in the most affordable price range and while each one had something that caught my attention, whether it was customizable lead generation forms, automatic listing upload (upon entering in the listing's MLS#), drop down and other types of menus ... you know, all the things that we've been crying about not having for so long now ... even though these website providers offered me these features that I'd love to have, I once again assured myself that P2 website in my mind ranks right next to sliced bread ... and believe me, I LOVE sliced bread!!! We take so many things for granted ... the ease of customizing the individual website pages, the simplicity of entering all data (and trust me, if you think that P2 is confusing or hard to get around, think again ... you've seen nothing yet!), the numerous features that don't exist elsewhere, the blog you can have, whether it's your personal or being here on Relib ...even such a simple, but for me as a broker a vital thing, like being able to assign leads to my agents ... and I could go on and on and on but I think you get the picture now.

I have to admit that I too have been a little bit nervous the last few days as to what changes if any will P2 undergo but I know one thing, with what P2 already has to offer and as long as they stay in business of developing real estate websites (and websites overall) there is no way I am going elsewhere! And rather than questioning their future, I'll just let all the folks at P2 concentrate on what they do best ... help us make a living!

PS: Carey, I hope you won't have to move this to the message board?

Ideas for Christmas / New Year's gifts for past clients?

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 23:16:00 GMT

Christmas and the New Year are almost here and just as every year, I've been thinking about what gift to send to my past clients. Knowing that some people may not celebrate Christmas, I don't usually send Christmas cards or anything like that but rather wait till just the very end of the year and send out something to wish everyone a happy 200?. Last two years, I sent out these nice large boxes of chocolates ... if you have any Polish (or other European ... not sure about other nations) stores in your area, stop by there. You'd be amazed what amazing variety you can get for vary reasonable price!

This year, I've been thinking about sending out books ... I bought a hole bunch of nice home improvement, home decorating, and gardening books that I want to mail to my past clients. It's something that will last them longer than chocolates and I can attach my business cards to the books as well.

What do you usually do, if anything? Any ideas that your clients enjoy?

They are not home buyers ... they are LOWBALLERS!!!

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 03:56:00 GMT

Are you seeing it too? Is every offer you get a low-ball offer? Not too long ago, I was thinking ... if only we got an offer ... even a low-ball offer ... at least we'd have something to work with! ... WHAT WAS I THINKING??? ... just imagine ...

3 different properties ... each getting its own low-ball offer within just a few weeks from each other ... AND ... not only are the lowballers (I can't call them buyers unless I start believing they actually want to buy) giving us unbelievably low offers but they actually expect the sellers to accept prices as close to these offer as possible? ... completely discounting the fact that the owners may have already come down some $30K - $60K throughout the listing time? ... AND the lowballers are doing as a favor! (so they say) ... they are helping us get rid of properties that are just sitting on the market and losing values anyway, so why wouldn't the sellers want to accept these?

... remember the picture of the house seen in the eyes of ... what was it ... the buyer, seller, realtor and appraiser??? ... how the property looked different depending on who looked was looking at it? ... seems to me that this is what's going on in my market right now ...

Agents ... they try to see the value of the property as if looking through the eyes of a bank appraiser

Appraiser ... arriving at the value by looking at the latest LOWEST comps (if there are any) ... perhaps even discounting for further depreciation

Sellers ... instead of pricing $20K - $150K over the price of the latest HIGHEST sold comps, they are willing to list at just above the latest HIGHEST sold comps ... they understand the market is "a little bit soft right now"

Buyers ... hmmm, lets pull up the comps from 2002 - 2004 and see what the "CURRENT" value of the home is ... oh, wait ... let's offer them 5% less than what the lowest comp was in 2003 and see what we can agree on.

... and I could go on and on and on ... are you seeing this too? Or is it just me and my bad luck???

... sorry ... had a big urge to vent my frustration! :-)

Drip campaign - targeting renters

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 20:59:00 GMT

Is anyone successfully using marketing campaigns (especially drip e-mail campaigns) with the primary focus being on renters? We have had a couple of rental listings lately and as a result had quite a lot of visitors on our website who registered with their e-mail addresses. Now, obviously, they are in many cases far from purchasing anything at this point but if nothing else, I would like them to keep our website in mind when they get tired of renting and are ready to buy. If you have a renter campaign, what do you have in there to keep them interested? Any secrets you can share?

website visits from Realtor.com

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Mon, 24 Sep 2007 03:12:00 GMT

I was SO READY not to renew my Showcase subscription with Realtor.com and once again, I gave in :-(. I have never had any good leads from Realtor and hardly any traffic from there to my website but since they cut my subscription rate from about $1300 to about $800/year, offered monthly payments rather than a onetime fee and with some of the improvements to the site they have done I decided to give it one more chance ... after all, we all know that our sellers expect their homes to be there in all their beauty.

I know there have been quite a few posts on Relib lately regarding Realtor.com but my question is not so much about leads from Realtor as it is website-related ... those of you, who have Showcase subscription .... are you tracking the number of visits to your website that come directly from Realtor.com? And if you do, what are your stats? I just looked at my numbers (using Ultrastats) and I get about 1 visitor per week ... number that I consider very SAD ... what's your experience? Are you doing anything special to bring Realtor.com visitors to your sites?

Yet another example of how a seller (or a relative) present at the showing can ruin the deal-to-be

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Sun, 23 Sep 2007 19:11:00 GMT

I came across a great example of why sellers and their relatives and friends should not be present during showings of their properties. I showed a home yesterday that seemed to be just PERFECT for my client. We spent about 40 minutes at the property (compared to our usual 5 minutes when he's not interested) and because we weren't quite sure as to the property lines, I asked the person inside (I believe it was a relative of the seller) where the boundaries were ... that's all I asked ... I try to avoid any conversation with the sellers when I'm representing the buyer other than "Hi" & "Bye" sort of talk. And while she did give me the answer, she went on and "volunteered" information regarding a neighboring lot and it's planned future use that for my client was a major deal-breaker! For myself and my client, I'm happy we found out ... but it sure was a great disservice to the seller. ... I kind of wonder that perhaps she doesn't want for the home to sell? As to me and my client, I guess we'll forget about this one and have to move on to something more suitable.

So, here's a reminder for all the listing agents out there ... get the sellers out for the showings!!!

Happy day in the life of a Broker Manager!

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 02:55:00 GMT

As some of you know by now, I run and own a very small office and it has been my goal to slowly grow and build a great team of agents. And as of today, there are now five of us! ... While hiring agents is nothing unusual for broker managers, today has been very special for me. The wonderful lady that joined us is one of two people who have influenced my real estate career the most. It was her and our former office manager who I learnt a great deal from and I will be always very appreciative of her being such a great mentor to me when I first started in real estate! .

Jan, thank you for being such a great person and welcome to Mipeco Realty!

PS: I just wanted to share my excitment ... :-)

Are service providers in the RE industry getting more aggressive?

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 00:05:00 GMT

Either I am getting overly sensitive, or the real estate industry service providers are getting more and more rude and can't take NO for an answer. ... What do I mean by all of this? ... It has been my experience of the last few weeks ...

First, I have been contacted by a website provider, who, while nice, has been trying to convince me quite strongly that the way I've been running my website is losing me business and that I am simply doing a lot of things WRONG. Oh, not to mention I found out what a "mess" P2 website office was ... not surprisingly when I asked what other websites' listings could I be showing on my site, I found out I could be pretty much handshaking with myself ... agent "network" seemed like a foreign word, that's for sure. I am nothing but PROUD of being a part of our worldwide mess :-)

Second, I have been contacted by one of my current service providers because it's time for me to renew my contract and when as much as simply suggested that I am considering not renewing because I am not getting the benefits and return on my investment that I would expect, this person let me have it! ... I found out that (the following is in my own words, not the original wording)... I am not doing enough and using the features to their full potential ... and I don't know how to use it. The last comment really got me fired up! ... Most of you who know me from Relib by now know that I am quite computer and internet literate ... took me about 5 minutes to run through all the great features that I supposedly don't know how to use and therefore am losing business ... I guess, it's my own damn fault ... how dumb of me thinking that it's due to the dinosaur-ish, consumer-unfriendly system they have.

While I understand that these people are salespeople and make a living selling their services, I don't believe it's a nice way to do business telling people what they "do wrong". ... Just imagine if someone came to you asking you to show them a nice two story home with a basement ... and you told them ... that's a bad decision ... you need a condo!

Are you experiencing the same aggressive sales force trend ... or am I just being too sensitive these days? I know one thing though ... if nothing else, this experience reminded me once again of how appreciative of P2 and all the members I am!

Microsoft Office 2007 vs. older versions of Office ... is the new one worth upgrading?

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 21:10:00 GMT

I'm thinking about getting Microsoft Office 2007, mainly what I want is the latest Publisher and most importantly new version of Outlook. Are any of you using the 2007 versions? Are they worth it? ... and by that I don't mean in terms of $$$ but are there any considerable improvements when comparing to the older in my case 2003 version? I haven't used Publisher in quite a few years and am thinking about switching back to it and hope to like the 2007 edition. I used to use Outlook on a daily basis up until couple months ago when my Outlook just went "crazy" and anytime I open it, it keeps on downloading my e-mails over and over and over ... until I close it and try to forget about it. Supposedly it has to do with the huge amount of old e-mails I keep in my mailbox ... I simply have it as a "backup" accessible from anywhere over the internet. I don't delete anything except for junk. I am hoping that Outlook 2007 may have this "little" downloading issue solved and will make me happy.

Those of you who use either Publisher or Outlook 2007, do you like it? Are there any major / minor improvements that can make our lives easier? ... I noticed that some of the versions include Contact Manager for Outlook ... is it something I can use?

Recruiting agents - OK to target certain P2 members?

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 03:34:00 GMT

I have mentioned it before that I would like for my company to grow ... however, not at the expense of mass recruiting but rather building a long lasting team. And, naturally, I have been playing with the idea of also recruiting from among the P2 members. What's stopping me right now is ... I know how much we all dislike when we get phone calls and e-mails from all kinds of service and lead providers who contact us because we are P2 members (I am sure we all have some level of experience with these unwelcome offers) ... I simply don't know how would my efforts be viewed.

What I have in mind ... and here is where I am hoping to get your honest opinion on things ... I spend a lot of time looking at other local agents' websites, see what they do, what they don't do ... and from time to time I just get this "feeling" that "this" is just the right agent for us ... the way they handle business, market themselves ... the whole nine yards. Most of us are used to "targeting" a certain real estate market segment ... and when it comes to hiring agents, I would like to "target" a certain type of agents ... new age - Internet savvy agents. Now, there are other agents out there with other than P2 website providers and I am of course planning on targeting them as well, but naturally P2 is the first network that comes to my mind ... not to mention I want all my agents to have at least a standard P2 site to market themselves so why not hire some who already know the system?

What do you think? Good idea? Bad idea? Would you personally mind if a broker wanted to recruit you because of how you market yourself and your business on the internet?

Free customer satisfaction survey - "powered by" NAR?

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 04:04:00 GMT

I just opened the latest Realtor magazine and came across a tiny note (page 33 bottom right corner if anyone wants to read it). This small mini-article talks about NAR offering brokers a free (well, it's NAR, so we pay for it in other ways) customizable web-based customer satisfaction survey. Once a brokerage registers, NAR automatically sends out e-mails to sellers and buyers, saves the responses and analyzes them for you.

When I was still with my old company, I had a QSC (Quality Service Certification) designation and our clients would receive surveys to fill out ... for the most part from what I know hardly any of my clients would ever do these. But I am thinking that this system that NAR is offering, if it really is customizable, there is a chance for better response ratio.

I am thinking about checking it out and would like to see if anyone is already using this particular service?

How do you track your SEO progress?

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 22:59:00 GMT

I am trying to focus more on my SEO goals once again and can't find any good way of keeping track of my progress day by day or week by week for my various keywords. How do you, if at all, track your results? Do you simply write down your positions for each keyword every time you check Yahoo, Google, and other sites? Or are you using some online service to do that? What is the best way to do this without spending too much time on it?

Funeral afterall! ... good bye to my pet friend.

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 17:09:00 GMT

So ... I thought it was going to be a happy day and didn't turn out that way! ... I woke up around 4:00 am hearing some really strange loud noise ... I know it wasn't my dog because he was in the garage plus I can recognize the sound of his collar if he got inside the house ... it sounded as if some larger animal was in or perhaps a burglar! Being home alone, I was scared to death ... so scared I actually got up, moved some furniture towards the door so that nobody could get in thinking that maybe the noise I was making would scare the "whatever"/"whoever" away! (I'm sort of laughing now but it wasn't funny at that time at all!) ... I put 911 on a speed dial on my cell just in case and didn't fall back asleep until around 6:00am when I couldn't hear any more noise.
So, I woke up, pushed the couple pieces of furniture away from the door and carefully came out of my bedroom to see what happened over night. No signs of burglars, wild animals ... simply nothing at all! If I didn't have the furniture up against the door, I would have thought it was just a real bad nightmare. And then it hit me! .... We have two big (55 gallon) fish tanks ... one with small fish and one with our "pet-fish" Paku ... and I saw no PAKU!!! And believe me, if he was in, I would see him ... he's almost 15 inches now! And that's when I realized what the sound was ... he jumped out of the tank (they are nicknamed "tankbusters" because of how strong they are and they can easily break big fish tanks), jumped inside our coffee table where I have all kinds of stuff from books to papers, etc ... and jumped out on the other side and ended up behind our TV. I found him as dead as can be :-(.
Now, I'm sure plenty of you are laughing right now thinking she's crazy crying over a fish! ... But, believe me ... this wasn't just a normal fish ... our Paku (officially Red-Bellied Pacu) was about 1.5 years old, almost 15 inches long (they grow up to 35 inches!) and was very friendly ... when we would clean the tank, he liked getting scratched on his sides ... he would swim towards your hand and "cuddle" ... he would watch tv with us ... Pacus tend to be real members of the family. We had two of these guys, lost one last winter when our furnace broke down while we were gone and the water got too cold and he didn't survive but the second one did make it and lived until this morning. They can actually live even up to 20 years! And you wouldn't believe the stories people have about these guys. While they are related to piranhas, they love fruits, vegetables, and in our case when they get bigger they like dog food too :-) Give him 4 blueberries and he'll in return give you a circus performance!
Honestly, if you have a large fish tank (and 55 gallons is not large enough to keep these guys for long), consider getting a Pacu ... they are the best petfish you can find! see picture right here ... this is one of our guys!

So, I guess there is a funeral in place today after all ... I don't think I can go a weekend without pacu in this house ... My mission for this weekend is getting a new one! Not to replace the old one but I've always wanted one more so what better time could there be than now!

Marketing high end luxury rehabs ... any good tips?

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 02:07:00 GMT

We might have a chance to tap into higher-end luxury rehabs in well established communities and I was wondering if anyone has any good tips on marketing these in a slower market. I am looking for advice for anything "special" in addition to doing regular marketing that we always do. Any tips will be greatly appreciated!

Duplicating my own blog ... should I? Or should I not?

Mipeco Realty, Inc - Michaela Krestenic, Broker-Owner — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 03:36:00 GMT

My question is probably directed more towards the experienced bloggers here but anyone else, please feel free to pitch in.

I like to post occasional market stats (for consumers) on my P2 website blog and would like to post something like that on AR as well. Is it ok to post the exact same thing on both or do I need to make them somewhat different? Would the search engines see it as duplicates and penalize me for that? Would consumers mind if I did that? I just find it too time consuming to write up pretty much the same thing twice. How do you go about it if you wish to post similar or same posts on different blog sites?