BARBARA CORCORAN: Here’s How I Turned $1,000 Into $70 Million
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Daily Archives: April 28, 2011
Housing Market from The Alarmist Point of View | Armonk NY Homes
Has the U.S. housing market reached a “bottom” yet? Are home prices going to start recovering? Is the housing crisis going to end at some point? Today there are millions of American families that would like to buy homes but they are not sure what to do.
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After all, nobody wants to end up like all the suckers that bought at the top of the market and now owe far more on their mortgages then their homes are worth. A lot of people are really afraid to take out home loans right now. So should you buy a home in 2011? That is a very good question. The reality is that there are a lot of reasons why home prices could continue to fall.
Unemployment is still rampant, and American families simply cannot afford to buy homes without good jobs. Also, lending institutions have really, really tightened lending standards. That is really restricting the number of buyers in the marketplace.
The number of foreclosures set another record high last year so there are a ton of homes that need to be sold and not a lot of demand for them. So with all of these factors working against the real estate market, are there any reasons why anyone would actually want to buy a home in 2011?
Well, yes there are. The truth is that all of the reckless money printing that the Federal Reserve has been doing and all of the insane borrowing that the U.S. government has been doing have flooded our financial system with new dollars. At some point all of these new dollars are going to cause a tremendous amount of inflation.
Right now we are seeing the price of gas go up and the price of food go up, but eventually the price of everything (including housing) will go up.
When the U.S. economy totally collapses, you are going to want to have your housing expenses locked in. In a highly inflationary environment you may find that your wages do not keep up with inflation and at some point you may be unable to afford to buy any kind of a decent house at all. If you are renting, you may have to deal with rent increase after rent increase.
The best way to avoid housing inflation when it comes will be to own your own home and have a mortgage with a fixed interest rate. But the timing is key. You don’t want to buy that home too early and you don’t want to buy that home too late.
So when will the exact “right” time be?
That is very hard to say.
However, to give us all some numbers to think about, the following are 29 absolutely crazy statistics about the housing crisis that show just how nightmarish the U.S. housing market is right now….
During the first three months of this year, fewer new homes were sold in the U.S. than in any three month period ever
Source: GoldShark
Home prices just keep falling month after month — the Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller 20-city index has fallen for seven months in a row
Source: USA Today
U.S. home prices have now declined 32% from the peak of the housing bubble
Source: CNN Money
See the rest of the story at Business Insider
Be a Blogger In Pound Ridge NY | Pound Ridge NY Real Estate
The PR Pro’s Guide to Blogging
The Social PR Guide Series is supported by Mynewsdesk. Our online newsroom makes it easier to exchange news with key influencers, reach top of search engines and automatically update your social media channels.
Lots of companies benefit from having a blog. For some, it’s a friendly, accessible way to say hi to devoted fans, curious onlookers and likely a few haters and skeptics. For others, it’s simply the way they communicate important messages. The role of public relations professionals in this chatty puzzle is to help companies build, shape and fine-tune their public voice. In fact, many PR campaigns aren’t complete without a blog strategy. But building a client blog from the ground up can be daunting. So where do you begin?
Start, With Help
When it comes to picking out a blog platform, there are certainly plenty to choose from, but Jeff Davis, who runs the content services team at San Francisco-based PR firm LaunchSquad, generally points clients towards WordPress, a mostly-free, open-source platform. Davis also makes another point: When you’re just starting out, don’t go DIY. “If you’re building something strategic for a client, even if it’s small scale, hire a WordPress developer to handle set up, find the right plugins and design a nice UI. It can be fairly inexpensive and is critical to building a blog that will work the way you need it to quickly and effectively.”
With a bit of help, WordPress’ initial set up process is simple and fast, and yet it offers a huge range of customization and configuration options. And with thousands of plugins, there is one that will satisfy any need that you can think of, often for free. For those who are coordinating blogs for multiple clients, WordPress also offers admin features for easy management across the board.
Optimize, But Not Too Much
According to Rich Brooks, President and “Chief Blogging Officer” at Flyte New Media, your SEO practices should have a very simple goal: rank high in search results for the things that your client’s customers are looking for. He recommends starting with a keyword analysis service like Raventools, WordTracker or Google Adwords’ keyword tool.
You want to pick one keyword topic per post, mentioning it once in the post title and once in the body of the post. Be sure to link important words to past posts as well, but keep it to one or two internal links at most. Beyond that, make sure you’ve got the WordPress SEO plugin installed and place the rest of your focus on working with your client to create engaging content.
Make It Worth Sharing
The company and product news that grace the vast majority of corporate blogs can certainly be both useful and good, but it’s just a tiny snippet of what is possible and inspiring. Arik Hanson, principal at ACH Communications, recommends considering content that is less about your client’s product, and more about the “culture that surrounds” your client’s product.
Hubspot, a company that offers inbound Internet marketing software, is a prime example. Its blog offers up creatively packaged, practical information that appeals to its very own target audience. Readers will find witty, educational posts, videos, guest contributions and even cartoons that cover everything from SEO and lead generation to Charles Darwin and cupcakes.
As you work together with your client to determine the content and focus of the blog, you should ask two key questions:
- Who is going to read it?
- What kinds of topics and issues do they care the most about?
There are tons of ways to develop an ongoing flow of engaging blog content, especially if your client is willing to talk about something other than the company. Don’t be afraid to pull in experts for Q&As, give spots to guest authors, respond to news and timely topics, share the spotlight with partners and customers and provide educational how-tos. And of course, we all love lists.
Think Like a Media Property
Davis says that there are times when a company blog can fill a pretty significant informational void. In 2009, Boston-based PR agency March Communications launched a blog for client TuneUp, which makes PC utilities for consumers. After conducting some market research, the company learned that when faced with PC problems, many people turned to forums and blogs to end up finding unverified and even potentially harmful solutions. The goal of the TuneUp blog was to become a reliable source of information for PC users who want to improve performance. The team brought on an external, experienced editor-in-chief to ensure editorial quality, and it placed the majority of the blog’s focus on helping users solve real problems. Since launch, more than 170,000 people have visited the TuneUp company blog to find answers to their PC questions and concerns.
Build Your Own Newswire
Traditionally, when a company has news to share, the official statement comes in the form of a press release. However, a carefully-written, information-rich blog post can play a similar role. Andrew Sinkov, VP of marketing at Evernote, explains that “your blog can be your own newswire.” A pre-published draft of a blog post, shared with reporters under embargo, is a legitimate source for news. Last month, Evernote used a blog post as the “news announcement” for the launch of its redesigned web app, with an embargo set for the time the post was to be published. Instead of having the information live on a wire somewhere, the Evernote blog is the ultimate source for Evernote news. The announcement post has since been viewed over 17,000 times.
The benefit of incorporating blog posts into your news announcement strategy is that it’s an opportunity to share the news in the client’s voice. “You write a blog post like it’s coming from you. You’re telling a story, you’re talking to someone. If you’re excited about something, that personal excitement comes through,” says Sinkov. This doesn’t mean that blog posts should replace press releases, it simply means that they should not be overlooked. So if you’ve got a press announcement and a blog post all drafted up and set for a big launch, make sure the reporters who cover your news get to see them both.
Turn Your Readers Into Viewers
Some of us and/or our clients might have the luxury of a video-savvy person on staff — but many do not yet. Not having a dedicated video pro doesn’t mean you can’t post videos, which are a great way to engage an audience. Whether it’s a user offering her own how-to, a customer waxing poetic about how great your client’s product is, an employee explaining why people should want to work there, or the CEO talking about his favorite kind of ice cream (or his company vision, for that matter), video tells a story in a way that text often cannot match.
Steve Garfield, author of Get Seen: Online Video Secrets and the first-ever video blogger, explains that video is easier than ever to capture. Any smartphone will do as a start. For example, capture a video on an iPhone, pull it into the iMovie app to trim the clips and layer in photos and sound, upload it to YouTube directly from the app and embed it in a blog post. Keep it short and sweet — 30 to 60 seconds at most. Garfield also recommends the Kodak Playfull, a simple camera with built-in editing and sharing features.
The best advice here is to be ready to experiment. Blogs can be casual, and captured video can be real, authentic and less-than-perfect. Companies are made of people, after all, and all of these same characteristics apply. Pick your device and take it with you when your client is speaking, out at an event, or excited about a new product, and encourage your client to capture video around the office, too.
Some Parting Advice
- Create an editorial calendar that outlines both the types of posts that you would like to see on your client’s blog (video, text, photo), and the post topics. Make sure you’ve got at least two months of blogging covered at any given time, and that there is clear delineation of responsibilities, including someone who is actively maintaining the calendar. And don’t be surprised when the topic pipeline changes, because it inevitably does.
- Come up with a realistic posting schedule. One post per week is a good starting point, and it can go up from there based on time and resources. It is good to be consistent, and it is okay to for some posts to be relatively brief in order to keep things going.
- Determine who your writers are and what amount of time and resources you’ll have at your disposal. Get them to commit to a certain number of posts per month or quarter — and start conservatively.
- Make it as easy as possible for readers to spread your content around and be sure your blog is decked out with all the key sharing plugins.
- Make a list of the top 10 or 15 most influential bloggers in your client’s space. Then, make a habit of sending them a friendly note when a great, relevant post goes up. And be sure to give back to your blogger community by setting up a blogroll and offering “link love” and retweets of great posts that you come across.
- Think like a reporter. Whether you are the main writer of your client’s blog or are working with a handful of people on the client side who do the posting, pay attention to timely topics that come through and share your ideas.
What do you think of blogging for PR? Let us know in the comments below. Share your blogs, as well as your advice for PR professionals who use blogs.
Disclosure: The author works for Launchsquad, and Evernote is one of her clients. Hubspot is a Mashable sponsor.
from Mashable | The Social Media Guide » Business Feed
Seth’s Blog: The paperback choice and my video dilemma
Linchpin is the bestselling and (judging from my inbox) biggest impact book I've ever written. Given the extraordinary feedback I've gotten from readers, it encouraged me to figure out ways to spread the idea to more people.
To that end, the paperback comes out today. It's four dollars cheaper, which in the scheme of things isn't a lot, but paperbacks have proven to make a huge difference in widespread adoption (Eat, Pray, Love sold more than 1000% as many copies after they made the shift). I think a new format sends a message about sharability.
For impact, I still prefer the hardcover, but I really like that this new edition means that the Kindle edition will finally be fairly priced by my publisher–less than half the price it used to be.
To celebrate the paperback launch, I took the audio from a speech I did on the road trip last year and decided to make it into a video, adding the latest in snazzy motion graphics.
Things got out of hand. Way out of hand.
Paul, the creator of the graphics, ended up spending four months of his life on the animation, creating perhaps the most elaborate video of its kind. I gave him free rein to do what he liked, and he took it… 700 hours of creation, 1,000 pieces of art… the rendering alone took 27 hours. This project took on a life of its own, and it took blood, sweat, tears and money to finish it. What to do next?
My original thought was to create a DVD of the presentation and offer it for sale for $300. Shipping worldwide included. Each copy comes with live performance rights, so you can present it to groups (but not online).
That's fine for corporations, coaches and organizations, but I wanted to share it with more people. One way is to create a complex system that would require you to submit a receipt for buying the paperback and getting some sort of passkey, etc.
I decided that this was too complex and not trusting enough.
Hence the honor system. The Road Trip video has been broken into four pieces for manageability and we inserted a tiny blurb for the paperback in each one. You can watch the entire video right now, at no extra cost, online. All you have to do is truthfully type in a password (The password is: iboughtthebook) when you watch each part of the video. Here's the link to the first part.
Have fun. And thanks for your attention, your leadership and for doing the work.
Contractor’s sneaky strategy for limiting liability | Inman News in Lewisboro NY
Q: I have a single-family house that I use as a rental. I’m about to do some major renovation work, and was given a contract by the contractor. It’s got a clause in it that I’ve never seen before, which reads, “For any claims related to this contract or the work that are not covered by contractor’s insurance, contractor’s total liability is limited to and may not exceed three times the amount owner pays to contractor under this contract.” Is this legal? –Debra L.A: That’s a new one on me, too. Perhaps the reason neither of us has seen a contract clause like this before is that it’s almost certainly unenforceable.
The clause attempts to limit the liability of the contractor for almost anything that could go wrong on the job or after it’s completed, including problems that are solely due to the contractor’s shoddy work or carelessness. As it reads, if any such claim exceeds the contractor’s insurance coverage, the contractor will be limited to three times the contract price, and that’s all.
For example, suppose you hire a contractor to remodel the kitchen; he removes a load-bearing wall, and the house falls down. If you have a claim against the contractor that settles for $700,000, but the contractor’s insurance policy has a limit of $500,000, normally the contractor would have to make up the balance out of pocket. But this clause changes that rule by limiting his obligation to no more than three times the amount you paid under the contract. If you paid the contractor $50,000, he’d be obligated to pay you only $150,000, leaving you $50,000 short.
As if the above scenario isn’t bad enough, there’s an even more worrisome one. Though it’s unlikely, it’s possible that you might experience a loss, injury or damage that isn’t even covered by the contractor’s insurance policy.
For instance, deliberate actions or extremely reckless behavior is typically not covered by commercial general liability insurance. If you were to suffer harm because the contractor intentionally sabotaged the job or acted recklessly, your claim would supposedly be limited to three times the money you spent on the contract, and no more. In this situation, without any insurance proceeds, you could end up even more limited in your ability to cover your losses.
Fortunately for you, the unsavoriness of these results will strike most judges as unacceptable, too. I don’t think most courts would enforce such a clause, because it attempts to limit in advance the liability of someone who negligently, carelessly or even deliberately causes another person harm. In a consumer transaction especially, such efforts are routinely struck down as against public policy, particularly in states that carefully protect consumer rights.
Q: We have a lease in a rent control city that expires in a couple of months. The landlord gave us a renewal lease, but we don’t want to sign it, because we’re house-hunting and want to be able to leave on 30 days’ notice. We want to go month-to-month, but if we refuse to sign a year’s lease, can we be evicted? We have been excellent, on-time tenants, and this is a nice place. –Catherine and Eric
A: You’d need to study the rent control ordinance to see whether, first, it has eviction protection; and second, if so, whether refusal to sign a lease is a “just cause” for eviction.
Most, but not all, cities with rent control also restrict a landlord’s ability to evict. Known as “just cause” eviction protection, the idea is to prevent landlords from terminating and evicting in order to create vacancies (and seize the opportunity to raise the rent to market levels). Under eviction protection laws, only bad behavior (such as not paying the rent, or causing damage or a nuisance), or the landlord’s legitimate business reasons (such as the need to renovate or move in a family member) will justify a termination and, if necessary, an eviction.
If your ordinance provides just cause eviction protection, you’ll need to take a look at the law to see whether refusing to sign another lease is grounds, or just cause, to evict.
In San Francisco, for example, it is: The ordinance provides that the landlord may terminate if “(the) tenant, who had an oral or written agreement with the landlord which has terminated, has refused after written request or demand by the landlord to execute a written extension or renewal thereof for a further term of like duration and under such terms which are materially the same as in the previous agreement; provided, that such terms do not conflict with any of the provisions of this Chapter.” (Chapter 37, San Francisco Administrative Code, Section 37.9, emphasis added.)
If you are asked only to sign another lease with the same terms (even if the landlord is imposing the allowable rent increase), your refusal to sign would probably bring you within this just cause for termination. But at this point, everyone should step back from the law and look at the practical side of things. If you refuse to sign, and your landlord files to evict you, she will incur some time and expense, and will need to find new tenants fairly soon (tenants who might not be as good as you).
On the other hand, if she lets you go month-to-month, and you give her the required amount of notice, cooperate with her in advertising and showing the apartment, and leave it without damage, she will have the benefit of continued months of good renting from you, after which she’ll have to find a new tenant.
Savvy landlords will choose the second option, especially if the unit is attractive and not hard to rent. Why spend time and money on a termination and eviction rather than enjoy the good tenants in place now? In either scenario, the landlord will eventually have to find new tenants; she might as well delay that risky moment as long as possible.
You might consider sending the landlord a letter in which you tell her candidly that you are looking for a house and would like the flexibility of a month-to-month agreement. Assure the landlord that you will give at least the required amount of notice and will assist in her efforts to find replacement residents.
A shortsighted refusal by your landlord will be disappointing. If you sign a lease but have to break it, your state, like many, will likely require the landlord to make reasonable efforts to re-rent, after which your responsibility for rent will end. But if the unit is attractive, it shouldn’t take the landlord long to fill the vacancy. If you buy a house and need to break the lease, be sure to keep tabs on her re-rental efforts (check the ads to see if it’s listed and ask neighbors to report any showings).
If the landlord drags her feet, thinking she can retain your security deposit at least to make up for lost rent, you’ll want evidence of her refusal to market the unit when you go to small claims court, suing for its return.
Janet Portman is an attorney and managing editor at Nolo. She specializes in landlord/tenant law and is co-author of “Every Landlord’s Legal Guide” and “Every Tenant’s Legal Guide.” She can be reached at janet@inman.com
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GDP Growrth, Pending Home Sales and Jobless Claims in Bedford Corners NY | Bedford Corners Real Estate
Each day the Research staff takes a look at recently released economic indicators, addressing what these indicators mean for REALTORS® and their clients. Today’s update highlights the GDP, Pending Home Sales, and jobless claims.
The initial estimate of GDP growth in the 1st quarter was released this morning and revealed an annualized increase of 1.8% from the 4th quarter, well below the 3.1% growth rate between the 3rd and the 4th quarters. Personal consumption and exports were both positive, but eased from the 4th quarter. Non-residential fixed investment eased from 7.7% to 1.8% between the 4th and 1st quarters, while residential fixed investment fell 4.1% after rising 3.3% in the 4th quarter.- Pending home sales rose 5.1% in March. The index is 11.4% below the same period in 2010 when the Federal tax credit was in place. This increase is the 6th in the last 9 months and reflects the change in the number of homes that went under contract in March and are likely to close in April or May. Pending home sales have been choppy over the last 9 months, but they are pointed in a decadently positive direction.
- Jobless claims for the week ending April 23rd revealed a 25,000 increase to 429,000. The 4-week average of 408,500 was 15,000 higher than a month earlier. Florida reported an increase of 2,753 claims, but there was also a nationwide increase of 8,308 newly discharged veterans claiming benefits this week versus the prior week. Claims are above the critical 400,000 mark, the level at which more jobs are being created than cut, placing upward pressure on the unemployment rate.
- GDP growth fell sharply in the 1st quarter of 2011 after a strong finish to 2010. The decline in construction and exports will likely impact employment, which is already reflected in the upward trend in unemployment insurance claims. Rising fuel and food prices as well as concerns about supply-chains that run from the tsunami and nuclear impacted areas of Japan to the United States likely took a toll on both consumer and business spending in the 1st quarter. However, demand for housing has been on the rise as investors snap up bargain priced properties. Investor purchases are important during this economic soft patch as they will help to reduce the supply of housing, which will move the market to move a price floor.
How to create great videos without a camera | Bedford NY Homes
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Two Email Marketing Strategies that Work in Chappaqua NY | Chappaqua NY Real Estate
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10 Simple Living Tips from the Amish for Pound Ridge NY | Pound Ridge NY Homes
When I was growing up in Iowa, simple black Amish buggies pulled by one or two horses were a common sight along rural roads. As a kid, I was intrigued. As an adult, I’m most impressed. While I’m too partial to modern conveniences to adapt the Amish lifestyle, I’ve learned a lot about living well from this simple, community-oriented culture.
Wanda Brunstetter , an award-winning novelist, offers a satisfying glimpse into the Amish way of life through her books. Her simple living suggestions, based on what she’s learned from the Amish community, are the basis of any good life. I’ll paraphrase a few of my favorites here.
1. Turn off the TV and sit quietly or go outside and enjoy the sounds of nature.
2. Hang laundry outside to dry.
3. Eat out less and fix more home-cooked meals.
4. Make handmade gift items for friends and family members.
5. Grow a garden. (The Mother Earth News Vegetable Garden Planner is a great way to get started.)
6. Turn off the lights and eat a meal by candlelight.
7. Get together with friends or family to do yard or household chores.
8. Devote more time to volunteer activities that involve helping people in need.
9. Buy fewer clothes and unnecessary material things.
10. Set aside time every day for devotions–even just a few minutes of prayer or meditation. (This doesn’t have to be religious.)
Business Emails In Armonk NY | Armonk NY Homes
An Easy Way to Search for Someone’s Business Email Address
Even in today’s social world of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, text messaging and blogs – one of the best ways to still reach someone is through email. Have you ever had an open house and couldn’t find a business card a potential buyer handed handed you or couldn’t read the handwriting of the person who signed in? Sure you could search them out via Google or even on social media, but sometimes actually finding someone’s email can be challenging at best.
I just discovered Peepmail, the brainchild of Samy Kamkar (@samykamkar)
Peepmail is a search engine that delivers someone’s business e-mail, even if that e-mail address is not published publicly. Peepmail has a super simple interface. To use it, just enter the person’s name and the business domain where they work.
It doesn’t work 100% of the time – when I plugged in a few Inman News team members it didn’t pull us up but other domains worked just fine. I will definitely bookmark this site next time I need to try to reach someone and can’t quite figure out where there business card went or where their contact info is.
Have you tried this? I’d love your feedback, leave me a comment below!