Lynnwood Undressed

Thank You Uncle Sam

Thank You Uncle Sam, originally uploaded by Jim Warner, Realtor.

Look, there is an upside to all this bail out hoopla! You can go out and buy a house because the banks have money again.

I’d say that if you have been thinking about doing something, now is the time while the money is still cheap and home prices are still low.

Chances are that neither will be the case in about six months. If you buy now, when prices go back up you’ll have the equity to pay for the tax bill you’re going to get for bailing out the banks and freeing up the money. Let’s just call it your little middle class piece of the pie. So let’s get busy doing the happy dance!

Pennies from heaven

Pennies from heaven, originally uploaded by Jim Warner, Realtor.

$4,000 - that’s the first tally of the bill each and every American is going to receive for the ten year long brain fart that we now lovingly refer to as the Sub Prime Meltdown. It will go higher, it always does and the so called leadership that brought you this mess is extemely adept at metering bad news in such a way as to make even really bad news seem more palatable. You will have a chance to vote your future in November. Do your duty and pay attention to what is being said and who you think you can depend on to make some changes. Then get out and vote. We have once again passed along the expense of our mistakes to our children. I’m not sure they have a future that I would look forward to if we keep passing on the bill.
We can do better as a nation and we should expect more of ourselves. Take responsibility for what comes next.  Get out, get informed and Vote.

Bailout

Bailout, originally uploaded by Jim Warner, Realtor.

And now for today’s good news… All those shareholders who were afraid they might lose their investment in the banking stocks that have paid them so handsomely over the past ten years of irresponsible lending, can rest easy knowing that the leadership that was supposed to be overseeing the banking industry just decided that the people who just lost their home and their job will now be obliged to cover the loss through higher taxes needed to cover a government bailout. Just a little parting gift from the same leadership that got you into this mess as they and their friends get ready to administer the money being used to float this boat. There’s a reason why the candidates for the Presidency spend a billion dollars trying to get control of the White House and it is not because it’s a dream job. The real prize continues to be the keys to the Treasury and who gets to hold them.

As Barry Goldwater once said… “A government big enough to give you all you want is big enough to take it all away.”

Ronald Reagan later said… “government exists to protect us from each other, where government has gone beyond it’s limits is when it moves to protect us from ourselves.”

And of course… the ten most feared words in the english language are ‘I am from the government and I’m here to help.’ RR

The only way I see being able to pay for this fiasco is to eliminate the Home Mortgage Interest Deduction… You heard it here first!

Thoughts and cartoon courtesy of Steve Manning at rendezvouswithdestiny.blogspot.com

The Waltons 1972-1982

The Waltons 1972-1982, originally uploaded by Jim Warner, Realtor.

I don’t know why, but I woke up this morning with the Waltons on my mind. The Waltons?! I have been thinking a lot lately about the economy and where we may be headed as a country. It’s just random thoughts, like this one, but they do come and go. What struck me, and I really can’t fathom as to why, is that the Waltons began it’s run in 1972 and was set in 1934 (a difference of 38 years) and ended in 1981. It occured to me that whereas the period of the Depression, which was the backdrop of the Waltons seemed like ancient history at the time, it has now been almost just as long (36 years) between the start of the show and our current looming economic crisis. I just wonder sometimes if we are still at a place as a society where we would conduct ourselves with as much dignity in the face of adversity as was portayed by the characters in this iconic american story. Just something to think about…. Good night John Boy, Good night Jim Warner, Realtor

The Tides, They Are A’Changing

The Tides, They Are A’Changing, originally uploaded by StarrGazr.

There’s a cold wind blowin’ and many things we ought speak of are being left unsaid. I love this country and all that it stands for. I do however, have a growing concern that our leadership, such as it is, has left us ill prepared and uninformed of the brewing economic storm we must all face together. If people who cannot afford their house payments are living on the credit cards in their wallets, what happens when the cards run out and the banks come knocking.

There is much more going on in the banking system and the economy than the people in charge are letting on. We all know it, we can sense it. The concern is palpable in and among the populace. On this election day, think long and hard about your decision and vote your conscience, not your wallet, difficult as that may be.

It is time for every American to take stock of their situation and to take a measure of personal responsibility for contributing to the solution. Small changes can make a big difference. Tough times have always brought out the best in America. It’s time we all pull together and try to make the most of what is sure to be a long hard climb. Don’t look to the government to fix this, that’ll only make it worse.

I’m Jim Warner, Realtor and I take responsibility for this post and the opinion expressed

Blogging for Google and fame

I still remember being at the Washington Realtor Ed Con three years ago and listening to Dustin Luther of Rain City Guide go on and on about the wonders of blogging and how it could really change your world, yadda, yadda yadda. If any of you have had the pleasure of listening to Dustin speak, you ‘ll understand why it took me almost three years to catch up with him. He is a force of nature to be sure. I met Larry Cragun by chance  about five months ago. Larry is the founder of the Undressed Network of Community Blogs and has been in Mortgage and Real Estate for many years. I stumbled upon Larry while scratching my head trying to figure out why people would blog on Active Rain. 102,000 self professed Real Estate Gurus trading cheap shots and meaningless platitudes with each other and not really doing much real estate.  It was to become a defining moment for me as I pressed on in my effort to create the ROCS Alliance. Larry understood that blogging on a network such as AR does a lot for AR, not so much for the blogger. When they created the Undressed Network, they engineered it completely backwards, promoting the blogger first and giving the community blog the googlejuice leverage of the network. People blog for many reasons, to be sure. But for the majority of those blogging regularly it is done specifically to catch the eye of the google gods and get some free advertising in hopes of snagging a weery traveler on the internet highway. There was a period of time when culling anonymous leads from the internet was an exercise that paid handsomely. Kind of like trading beanie babies and Pokemon cards on Ebay back in the late 90’s. As a practicing Realtor, I needed a method of promoting myself and my business of course, but I have always sought to do that by promoting others first. It just seems infinitely more interesting. As it turns out, the Undressed Network gave me a forum and a track to run on. Blogs are for the moment the mechanism by which we are all attempting to reconnect after a ten year run of trying to conduct commerce anonymously on the internet. I don’t know about you, but I am getting more and more leery of giving away my e-mail and personal information while plugging my credit card number into the computer in exchange for whatever it is I want. I understand the convenience and I do it quite often, but I am more and more looking to actually connect with someone who can give me just a little more assistance and reassure me about what I am going to get when the box arrives. Maybe it’s just me, but more and more, what was once considered a pesky salesperson, is now a welcome face who can answer a question or two if need be. This whole thing got so crazy, it seemed for awhile that people were actually heading in the direction of buying and selling real estate on the internet. Find a home here, press the button, find a mortgage here, press the button, turn in all your financials (real or imagined) press the button and voila! You are a proud homeowner. As I survey the carnage that is the current real estate market, I have to think that for many people that model didn’t work out so well. In the process the real estate industry has managed to marginalize itself somewhat by more or less buying into the trend. Now we have a lot of work to do to repair the damage. Blogging, the way it is being done in some circles, is a form of overcompensation. An attempt to regain relevance on the cheap by professing all sorts of expertise in matters that don’t really matter to the consumer. When done properly, real estate blogging can provide a window into the heart and soul of a person and the  community they interact with, making the author much more relevant in the context of providing helpful information upon which to make a buying or selling decision. At the ROCS Alliance we have embraced blogging, not merely as an attempt to cheat the search engines and get free advertising, although admitedly that provides some incentive to keep posting, but as a means of becoming relevant within small communities that we interact with. Hopefully this gives the consumer something to hang their hat on when choosing professional representation. A chance to engage with someone who is actively involved and knowledgeable about the community one is considering becoming a part of. It takes a little work, but blogging makes you smarter. It reconnects you to the community and it once again positions you as a dependable resource. It can make you famous, but more importantly, it makes you relevant once again.

Come see what we’re doing at ROCS - and the Undressed Network - we can help you find yourself and the community you speak for through meaningful blogging.

ROCS - Realty Operating and Control Services - offers Tech Support, Marketing Solutions and Business Development Services to Real Estate Agents and Micro Businesses.

Contact Jim Warner, Realtor - for more information 425-939-1010

Home Sellers Need Options - ROCS Delivers

Lynnwood undressed is generally more about community than commerce. When I post and invite comment here it is about trying to become a place where people can find out about our community and the people who live, work and play here. But I am a real estate agent, a Realtor by trade and these days real estate is a hot topic. After 23 years in the business, I have earned the right to occasionally weigh in authoritatively on things I think might help the conversation along. Realty Operating and Control Services, ROCS, is a professional marketing and support services company I founded in Lynnwood to help agents from all companies provide better service to their clients  with more efficiency and accountability in the process. We do that sometimes by simply providing a good vendor referral or knowledgeable human interface to all the professional marketing and support services available in the real world and on the internet. Most often we do the organizing, technical, production and administrative tasks that confound entreprenurial types on a regular basis. We also do continuing education and business development workshops designed to reduce errors, aggravation and waste. These efficiencies translate into savings that in many cases can be passed along.

The Options 1.2.3 program, available through any real estate agent that knows of ROCS, begins with an open discussion about what a good agent can and will do for a homeseller, and what the expectations of both parties should be.

The gist of the Options 1.2.3 program is that if one believes a good marketing plan is helpful in gettng a home sold in this market, perhaps it should be handled by a professional marketing company. The reasons for marketing are varied, but good marketing makes your home stand out from the crowd and expands potential buyer pools. That is accomplished by reaching every possible audience by way of many types of media once your home is properly priced and staged. This can all be very expensive and time consuming when done correctly. It is however, an investment that usually pays off handsomely.

When an agent takes a listing, that agent is making a large investment of time and money in the project. 

I think it is safe to say that in this market, taking marginal listings falls into the category of high risk investment; and as with any investment, high risk often demands a high rate of return for the investor. In this case, the investor would be the Agent on the hook for the expenses.

But what if the seller picked up some the risk and/or expense? Might not the seller then be entitled to a return on that investment? Shouldn’t the seller reasonably expect the cost of using an agent to go down somewhat if the risk/expense to the agent is lowered? 

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