Introduction

A global research company, Comscore, recently stated that in a typical month 35% of everyone who goes online worldwide visit YouTube (Source: Stompernet.com). Social media sites are growing exponentially – almost doubling every six months. So the trend is up … and video consumers are at the core of this new growth.

There are a number of software developers who have recently developed scripts to enable anyone to build their own niche video site with free videos drawn from YouTube. These scripts enable you to build as many niche video sites as you want. The scripts are easy-to-use, designed for the average internet marketer and allow you to build a site in minutes.

The niche video sites draw on YouTube’s vast video library on the basis of a tag (keyword) that you determine as your site focus. The script also provides a search facility to enable visitors to search YouTube on any other tag/keyword they desire. The script can be easily edited to add AdSense advertising, affiliate product ads (such as for ClickBank) and links to other websites, Squidoo lenses or blogs.

There are six basic steps involved in the creation of a niche video site:

1. Identify a competitive keyword

The video sites draw on YouTube videos that are tagged with the identified keyword. So the first step is to identify a high search/low competition keyword in the area of your interest (the “Bum Marketing” method).

2. Locate an affiliate program or product

The niche video site scripts enable you to add your own affiliate products or programs through banners, text links or block ads such as those provided by BetterTextAds or FavAds. You need to identify programs or products that fit into the theme of the video site you are creating. Of course, sometimes you will start with the product or program and then determine the desired keywords.

3. Purchase a domain name to match your tag/keyword

Video sites that have a domain name that matches their core keyword tend to receive higher rankings in Google (all things being equal). A matching domain name also helps to orientate the visitor to the focus and content of the video site.

4. Purchase hosting for your new domain

You need to obtain a reliable host that provides you with ample capacity to store the files and manage the volume of visitors.

5. Edit the files in the script

This is a lot simpler than first appears. Usually there are only two or three files you need to edit via Notepad to change the information to your own. For example, you need to replace the existing AdSense ID with your own. You may want to add an affiliate product banner at the top of the site or insert block ads in the sidebar (to replace the AdSense ads), and this can be done by inserting the html code provided by the relevant affiliate program owner. Some scripts come with videos so this aspect is made even easier.

6. FTP the edited files to your website host

This can be done very easily and quickly by FTP programs such as FileZilla.com which are readily available at no cost.

Summary

Video sites and video watching are exploding on the Internet and now is the time to get ahead of the unprecedented growth that is occurring at an accelerating rate. Scripts are now available that let you quickly and easily build multiple video sites for one relatively small outlay.

As federal regulators have proposed a 20 percent down payment requirement for many borrowers to secure a home loan, let me be positive. This is a great idea — in fact it might be low — for speculators and investors purchasing residential real estate. Those in this market segment are sophisticated, willing and able to take risks. They can weather the unexpected.

Even at 20 percent down, speculators may consider walking if they purchase preconstruction homes or condominiums and cannot close before interest rates climb so high they cannot cover their monthly cash flow. The difference between them and everybody else is that they can handle the losses. They are the first in to purchase presales in a good market, and the first out when the market goes south.

But the first-time homebuyer is the bread and butter, the base, the market segment that needs the help. Nothing down is not the answer. Neither is 20 percent. And for too long they have been set to fail if things did not go as planned. Mortgage to the max, then refinance to the max, so the lender keeps making money on those fees and points.

Regulatory proposals aside, what is truly needed is an understanding of the market — especially the first-time homebuyer. First-time homebuyers, as they start moving back into the market, need a program that makes sense. They will not be able to depend on refinancing every few years. They need a sound program now.

Flickr image courtesy of lavenderstreak.

Q: I have a bathroom vanity I no longer use. It has a glass top and two glass shelves. The glass is tempered. The top is 6 millimeters thick and the shelves are slightly less than 5 millimeters thick.

Can I safely use the glass as shelving on my deck? I’ve found stainless steel cable devices with which to hang the shelving from the house wall. The devices will support up to 150 pounds. I’d like to put some plants in pots and some decorative items on the shelves.

A: Your tempered-glass shelving project is totally doable — providing you don’t want to change the size of the glass.

Tempered glass is one of two kinds of safety glass used in places where standard glass could be dangerous. The other type of safety glass is laminated glass. Laminated glass is a sheet of clear plastic sandwiched between two pieces of glass. It’s most commonly used in car windshields.

Tempered glass is manufactured using a thermal process, where ordinary glass is superheated and then cooled. The curing process strengthens the glass and makes it heat resistant. It’s required for use in windows close to the floor, skylights, door windows, shower doors — in short, wherever breaking glass might cause injury.

Tempered glass is four to five times stronger than standard glass. It does not break into sharp shards like ordinary glass. Rather, it shatters into small oval-shaped pebble-like pellets if it fails.

Tempered glass must be cut to size or pressed to shape before the curing process. It cannot be reworked once cured. (It is possible to “uncure” tempered glass, but the process requires special lasers or a 900-degree oven, tools we’re willing to bet you don’t have.

Kevin learned the hard way that tempered glass couldn’t be cut many years ago. He was working on a kitchen with floor-to-ceiling windows. He needed to replace one of the panels with a smaller one, and being a rookie, he decided to cut the panel. He scored the glass with a glasscutter and tried to break it along the line.

When that didn’t work, he placed a broom handle under the line and pressed down with his hands. Nothing. Finally, he stomped on the edge. It broke into a million tiny pieces.

The edges of a typical piece of tempered glass are very weak. This is caused, in part, by the rapid release of heat during the cooling phase of the tempering process. To help compensate for this weaker area, the glass is ground and polished on the edges.

The stainless steel cable system you mention sounds as if it will work just fine. Another option is to screw a couple of 1-by-2 boards, cut to the length of the shelves, into the wall. Leave a groove that’s the thickness of the glass between the wood in which to slide the glass.

Support the outside edge of the shelves by metal cables clamped to the edge of the glass and anchored into the walls with stout hooks.

Make sure the shelves are level, both side to side and front to back. Also, be sure the cable hangers are solidly attached to the house as well as the glass. Spread the load over as much of the surface as you can. Use several smaller plants and knickknacks rather than placing one large container in the center.

A final word of warning: Be very careful not to give the edge of the glass a serious rap. If you do, you’ll be sweeping up thousands of little glass pebbles.

An old friend not only was a victim of credit fraud this past year but his family’s passports also were stolen just two weeks before a long-awaited vacation.

Stuart, 60, took all the right steps to report the fraud and notified the police, credit card companies, his local bank and the postmaster. Just when he felt he was back on track, he discovered some incorrect information on his credit report, dating back more than three years. He also had some repair work to do.

Credit fraud and credit repair, although not on the same level of loss and anxiety, are two separate challenges: report and repair. Don’t wait until you need a clean credit report to check it. Credit blemishes could delay your home loan or refinance.

If you are trying to repair your credit report and if have protested incorrect information on your credit report, check with your state’s consumer protection division or the state’s attorney general’s office if you are having difficulty.

In Washington State, a credit bureau has 30 business days to investigate any contested blemish on your credit report and then contact you with the findings. If the credit bureau cannot verify the delinquency in question, the delinquency must be removed.

The laws are in place to get creditors and reporting agencies to clean up their files and speed up processing. Many laws also require that the credit-reporting agency contact the creditor within five days to verify the debt.

Problems with credit reporting occur most frequently to consumers with extremely common last names — like Smith. For example, when a reader (“Miss Smith”) applied for a mortgage several years ago, she received a credit report showing two delinquent payments to department stores.

The “30-day lates” were more than a decade earlier, and she determined that they occurred when she was moving into a new home. Smith wrote to the stores, explained what happened, and both companies told her they would remove the delinquent notices.

However, the letter from one store was never received by the credit bureau. Three years later, it happened again: The same delinquent notice showed up on her report when she was considering a refinance. Smith dug out the original letter, called the company and demanded the flaw be removed.

Credit reports are powerful vehicles. Jobs, homes, reputation and future credit often depend on them. When a lender obtains a credit score for a basic transaction, it usually contains information from three major bureaus.

There’s a difference between a credit agency and a credit bureau. Bureaus collect data from banks, court records, department stores, etc. Agencies research what is in the bureau and report the findings.

Here are phone numbers for the three major national bureaus: Trans Union, 800-888-4213; Equifax, 800-685-1111; and Experian, 800-682-7654.

The Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) allows consumers to obtain all information in their file from each credit bureau. Requests must be made separately to each bureau.

If an incorrect item appears on a credit report, it’s up to the consumer to see that it is corrected. For example, I once had two mortgages with the same lender. Both payments were credited to one account, and I got a delinquency notice on the other. It took two letters and numerous phone calls to get the 30-day delinquency removed from my credit report.

Merely telling the agency is not enough. You should submit the explanation or proof in writing. Consumers sometimes don’t understand that a credit agency cannot remove anything from a credit report without the authorization of the company filing the delinquency.

So the consumer must contact the company that filed the delinquency. Delinquencies include tax liens, judgments and repossessions.

A company’s willingness to delete a past mistake or delinquency often depends on who answers your letter or call. Many credit reps have heard a variety of excuses and explanations (because people try to say their bad credit isn’t their fault) and are uncooperative. An innocent person can be looked on as a guilty party. The attitude seems to come with the territory.

If you have not been given a fair shake on your credit report, ask a real estate broker, local banker or an attorney about creative suggestions for a next step.

Tom Kelly’s book “Cashing In on a Second Home in Mexico: How to Buy, Rent and Profit from Property South of the Border” was written with Mitch Creekmore, senior vice president of Stewart International. The book is available in retail stores, on Amazon.com and on tomkell

CoStar Group Inc. is acquiring the most heavily trafficked online commercial real estate marketplace, LoopNet.com, in an $860 million deal that will create a single database of 2 million active listings.

The merger, which has been approved by the boards of directors of both companies and is expected to close by the end of the year, will double the size of CoStar’s subscriber base to 160,000, and create a company with more than $300 million in annual revenue.

“CoStar and LoopNet have been at the cutting edge of innovation in their respective businesses and we believe the two companies will be even stronger together,” said Richard Boyle, chairman and CEO of LoopNet Inc., in a statement.  “This transaction combines the capabilities and best practices of two successful and very complementary companies.”

LoopNet shareholders will receive $16.50 in cash for each share of LoopNet common stock — nearly 15 percent more than Wednesday’s closing price — plus 0.03702 shares of CoStar Group common stock, representing a total equity value of approximately $860 million, the companies said.

CoStar, which has a commitment letter from J.P. Morgan for a $415 million term loan and a $50 million revolving credit facility to fund the acquisition, expects to cut the combined companies’ annual costs by $20 million over two years through “cost synergies.”

In a separate regulatory filing, LoopNet reported $1.8 million in first quarter net income on $20.7 million in revenue. The company said it had 4.8 million registered members at the end of March, including 91,147 paying subscribers. Active listing totalled 816,471, and profile views of listings totaled 76.5 million during the quarter.

LoopNet customers include Apartment Realty Advisors, Cassidy Turley, CB Richard Ellis, Coldwell Banker Commercial, Colliers International, Cushman & Wakefield, Grubb & Ellis, Jones Lang LaSalle, Lincoln Property Company, NAI Global, Newmark Knight Frank, ProLogis, The Shopping Center Group and Sperry Van Ness.

In March, LoopNet announced it would offer access to detailed property information and closed sales as stand-alone products: “Property Facts” and “Property Comps.”

The National Association of Realtors, local Realtor boards, and NAR subsidiaries ePropertyData and Realtors Property Resource are also competitors in the commercial real estate listings space.

NAR subsidiary Realtors Property Resource, a parcel-based database that will be available at no charge to all Realtors, is licensing commercial property listings data from cooperating multiple listing services and Realtor Controlled Commercial Information Exchanges (CIEs), and is developing tools for commercial applications.

EPropertyData operates CommercialSource.com, which receives commercial listings from sources including California Real Estate Technology Services (CARETS), the Seattle-based Commercial Brokers Association, the Houston Association of Realtors, the Dayton Area Board of Realtors, and the Oklahoma City Metropolitan Association of Realtors.