Video is becoming ever more prevalent in the marketing of properties in the real estate industry.  For most property owners the addition of a high quality video about their home has been a great listing tool, but to date there has been no way to measure its effectiveness in marketing a home.    A.C. Nielsen, worldwide leaders of media and advertising tracking, has recently announced the launch of a new service that may change all that. NetRatings, a division of A.C. Nielsen has announced a new syndicated measuremenet service called VideoCensus, which measures audience size, demographics and even competitive activity [...]

The popular press would like each of us to think that our suburban neighborhoods will soon be abandoned because of a flurry of foreclosures.  While foreclosure rates are up versus last year, the actual rate of foreclosures remains very low.  According to RealtyTrac, approximately 1 in 961 homes will go into foreclosure. That means that less than .1% of home owners will default on their loans.  In Texas and California, two large states with the largeset number of foreclosures the rate is only .2%.  While none of us like to see people lose their homes, this low percentage clearly shows [...]

In October, The CALIFORNIA ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS ® (C.A.R.) released its

Studies have shown that only about 1 in 3 new products launched become successful ventures.  The real estate industry is no different.  There have been many products and services that have not made it. In my experience launching consumer products, software and technologies in a variety of industries, I have observed a few common mistakes that start-ups and even established firms make when launching new products. […]

Ken Jenny is a frequent blogger on the Inman Blog, and is considerd to be one of the real estate industry’s top broker consultants. Last week at the National Association of Real Estate Publishers annual meeting (NAREP), he addressed the publishing group with his vision for tomorrow. According to Ken, “big brokers are going to bury the MLS becasue it is the conduit  that feeds their growing competiton of unqualified brokers who misrepresent the consumer.” Case in point – if Coldwell Banker, Pacific Union, Alain Pinel, Prudential and RE/Max pulled out of the Bay Area MLSs (of which there are [...]