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Bedford Hills NY Realtor

‘We Buy Ugly Houses’ franchisor wins domain name dispute | Bedford Hills Homes

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The company behind the slogan “We Buy Ugly Houses” has prevailed in an arbitration proceeding against the previous owner of a domain name that allegedly used the company’s trademark to offer links to competing services.

Dallas-based HomeVestors of America Inc., which claims to be the “No. 1 buyer of houses in the U.S.,” has been franchising since 1996 and has about 276 franchises in 37 states. The company claims its franchisees, who are authorized to use the “We Buy Ugly Houses” trademark, have spent more than $100 million advertising the brand.

In August, HomeVestors filed a complaint against the registered owner of the buy-ugly-houses.biz domain with the National Arbitration Forum, which helps resolve domain name disputes in accordance with the policies of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) .

HomeVestors alleged the domain name was “confusingly similar” to the “We Buy Ugly Houses” mark, and that the owner didn’t have any rights or “legitimate interests” in the domain name. The owner of the domain name registered and used it bad faith, HomeVestors claimed, offering links to services that compete with those of HomeVestors.

The owner, Stewart Taylor, never responded to the complaint. A panel assigned to the case therefore accepted HomeVestors’ allegations as true and granted the company’s request to transfer the domain name to HomeVestors.

“The frequent infringement of HomeVestors’ trademarks — including both of the ‘We Buy Ugly Houses’ and ‘HomeVestors’ marks — is evidence of the vast goodwill that HomeVestors has built in those marks,” said HomeVestors litigation attorney Darin Klemchuk of Klemchuk Kubasta LLP, in a statement.

“In order to protect that goodwill, HomeVestors can and will pursue every infringement of which it becomes aware.”

The company said it has submitted another filing for domain name dispute resolution it expects will be decided in the next few weeks.

via inman.com

6 Lessons From the Social Media World Forum | Bedford Hills NY Real Estate

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If you go to as many social media conferences as I do, sometimes it is difficult to separate the wheat from the chaff. At least that’s the excuse I’m going to give for having my associate at Renegade, Merlin Ward share the six unique lessons he gleaned from the recent Social Media World Forum (SMWF) conference in New York City.

1. Pair Your Social with Ads

Chris Thorne, Vice President of Social Media & Media at EA, the sports game developer, found that content was more effective when coupled with Facebook advertising. They put extra care into creating content that users could “play” with, essentially gamifying their Timeline; then they made the monetary spend to promote it to as many users as possible. The result was more than just extended reach—they increased virality and sales.

2. Your Content Doesn’t Work Everywhere

Morgan Baden, Director of Social Media and Internal Communications for the book publisher Scholastic, shared their failures and successes with Pinterest. Pinterest is a natural social network for this brand, but they found that not all content is created equal. While female users enjoyed sharing book covers and special quote memes from books, photographs for events and other physical spaces didn’t attract the same interest. It seems that content made for collecting does the best on Pinterest, while amateur point-of-view photography is better left on the shelf.

3. Branch Out Beyond Your Brand

Felicia Yukich, Manager of Social Media Worldwide for Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, discovered the secret to using social media in the hospitality industry. The fundamentals of hospitality – thinking about your guests’ stay in and outside of the hotel – translates well into social media. Therefore, Four Seasons curates content far beyond the hotel brand, such as wedding planning ideas, sight seeing destinations and recreational activities. They get into the minds of their audience and focus on their interests, just like a good concierge would do.

4. Build Social Into Your Product

In keeping with one of the conference themes, Jesse Redniss, Senoir Vice President of Digital at USA Network, noted that social works best when it’s anticipated in the product creation phase. Brands should leverage natural user behavior by building social sharing into products and providing seamless social activity around their brands online. The consensus was that users are going to be social anyway, so why not enable them?

5. There is NO Crisis Plan

Morgan Johnston, Manager of Corporate Communications at Jet Blue, and Paul Fox, Director of Corporate Communications at P&G, talked about addressing crisis as a brand. The short of it is that there is no cure for crisis, but brand openness speaks volumes. P&G invited bloggers to their shop to talk about anything they wanted and write anything they wanted—good or bad—after negative news surfaced around a certain product line. After a dramatic employee exit, Jet Blue posted on their website that they didn’t know any more than anyone else about the situation but were trying to find the answers. These clear and open lines of communication helped bring the correct information to light in the end.

6. Brands Can Talk to Other Brands

Shane Steele, Director of Sales Marketing at Twitter, shared examples of brands talking with each other, which, in turn, created viral content and brand adoration by users. Oreo and AMC had a Twitter exchange about sneaking snacks into theaters, and Taco Bell and Old Spice had an exchange about their “spicy” ingredients. These conversations were both genuine and humorous and left the door open for consumers play along.

via socialmediatoday.com

Falling REO inventory dries up foreclosure discounts | Bedford Hills NY Real Estate

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Some metro areas across the U.S. are experiencing steep discounts on foreclosed properties – upwards of 27% in some cases – but the overall mark-down is not as deep as it seems, Zillow said in a new report.

The online real estate listing firm said the national-foreclosure discount on distressed properties is about 7.7%, a paltry amount considering how much lower REOs sell for in certain locales.

Truth is, there are fewer foreclosures out there. Last month, RealtyTrac the online marketplace for foreclosures, reported a yearly decrease in 131 out of the nation’s 212 metropolitan areas.

“Two-thirds of the nation’s largest metros posted decreases in foreclosure activity in the third quarter, indicating that most of the nation’s housing markets are past the worst of the foreclosure problem” said Daren Blomquist, vice president at RealtyTrac.

Zillow uses a different methodology, of course, and compares the sales price of a foreclosure to the estimated-non-distressed sale level of the exact same property.

Metros like Pittsburgh and Cleveland experience foreclosure discounts as steep as 27.4% and 25.8%, respectively.

“The smallest foreclosure discount is found in places where competition for homes is so high, people there are willing to pay the same amount for a foreclosure re-sale that they would for a non-distressed home simply to take advantage of historic affordability,” said Zillow chief economist Stan Humphries. “Additionally, in areas such as Phoenix and Las Vegas, where not long ago one out of every two homes sold was a foreclosure re-sale, buying a foreclosure is no longer just for investors.”

Sacramento is a market where the foreclosure discount is a small 0.7% difference from an average property price.  In the high-priced Los Angeles and New York markets, foreclosure discounts are now running at 4.2% and 15.5%, respectively.

Denver is another market where housing demand is keeping up, and it’s foreclosure discount hovers around 6.4%, which is under the 7% national average.

via housingwire.com

Video Advertising Sees Massive Growth in UK, Agencies Need Guidance | Bedford Hills NY Real Estate

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Brightroll did some research over in the UK to see how video advertising is getting on there and it seems that stiff upper lip mentality is working for them as things are really picking up. The second annual survey and report, the 2012 UK Video Advertising Report, gathers insight from more than 100 top decision makers and media buyers at leading UK advertising agencies and shares their unique perspective of the UK video advertising landscape.

As with all Brightroll surveys, things should be weighed carefully before making any decisions. After all, it’s a survey and included a small fraction of the industry as a whole. With that said, let’s get onto the numbers.

Video Advertising Reach Rises in the UK

Around 63% of the UK population watches a video online each month. That’s a pretty good reach. Meanwhile, about 65% of that audience sees video ads monthly which is around 28.6 million people who are seeing a billion ads a month (comScore).

Part of why those numbers are all on the rise is because more advertisers and agencies believe in its efficacy. 87% surveyed believe it more effective than display and 52% believe it better than TV. Brightroll attributes some lower numbers to a confusion as to what digital video is. Maybe more ReelSEO reading is necessary?

Some of these beliefs could be attributed to the often made assumption that VOD (video on demand) and digital video are one in the same. However, digital video encompasses more than just VOD and includes in-app, user-generated content, gaming, or anywhere video can run.

UK effectiveness trend e1352397015777 Digital Video Advertising Sees Massive Growth in UK, But Ad Agencies Need More Guidance [Study]

When it comes to digital video advertising, many UK advertisers may spend their budgets specifically on VOD, working directly with broadcasters. In fact, when asked who they are most inclined to buy video inventory from, 41 percent of respondents indicate they are most likely to buy video inventory from a broadcaster with 22 percent who are most likely to buy from an ad network.

Where Are UK Video Advertisers Placing Inventory?

A lot of those UK companies are advertising outside of the country. A good amount of ad networks are placing ads in the US and Canada, while publishers are looking to Germany and the US for their main purchasing areas. Broadcasters are the ones doing the most buying in the UK itself followed by ad networks.

UK ad placement 606x173 Digital Video Advertising Sees Massive Growth in UK, But Ad Agencies Need More Guidance [Study]

Click for larger image.

Considering that a lot in the UK think of digital video in terms of VOD it’s not all that surprising that the broadcasters are leading the ad buys there right now. It must be them trying to lure the online video viewers away from the short-form online content they’re watching because the average time spent with a video is 5 minutes and only 5% of videos online are from the UK broadcasters. Clearly they might feel threatened.

What Matters to UK Video Advertisers?

When looking at the how and why of ad placement, targeting tops the requirements with over 50% saying that’s most valuable. Reach was just around 37% and then everything else was minimal, including price versus TV.

Meanwhile, ad spend is usually based on cost-per-view (CPV) with CPM (cost-per-impression) second and engagement third.

UK ad spending Digital Video Advertising Sees Massive Growth in UK, But Ad Agencies Need More Guidance [Study]

It seems that if you’re offering video ad placement and hoping to reach UK advertisers you’ve now got a pretty clear picture of what to offer them and pique their interest. CPV with excellent targeting would be the ideal one-two punch of features for them.

In fact, demographic targeting is the most often desired form of targeting at 35% while behavior is used by 25% and contextual is around 20%. Data and geographic were lower at 15% and 5% roughly.

Measuring the Success of Video Advertising

Determining the success of an online video advertising campaign is usually campaign or company specific. In the survey they found that for the most part it’s views (30%) that are the measurement. Hovering near the 15% point are conversion, brand uplift and CTR with Sales impact at about 10%.

GRP isn’t all that popular there which is telling since most of the ads seem to be placed by TV broadcasters. I suppose that goes hand-in-hand with that targeting over reach from the previous graph.

UK Taking Shots in the Dark? Need Guidance

The odd thing is that it seems like the UK online video ad industry is groping blindly to figure out what works best. 90% of respondents said research is vital to success, but 70% stated they had done no research. To me it almost seems like throwing money down a hole and are simply following the trend without bothering to figure out how to do it right.

The crazy thing is that when talking about barriers to online video advertising, the cost of video is the largest one for them. Just over a third cited that as the most limiting factor. Clearly, they didn’t do any research because they would have found great video ad creation platforms like ViddyAd (in beta) and places like PopTent for crowdsourced video creation, just to name a few alternative options to production company made video content.

There are far more insights in the full 2012 UK Video Advertising Report which you can pull from the Brightroll Industry Report page.

via reelseo.com

NAR economist Lawrence Yun’s forecast: Higher inflation, higher home prices now | Real Estate in Bedford Hills NY

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ORLANDO — NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun is speaking at the National Association of Realtors convention here right now.

He is taking about inflation, which has been relatively low for two decades. He says it will stay at about 2 percent next year.

But he says we should anticpiate higher inflation by 2015. “No threatening inflation next year, 2 percent. Eventually we may reach something much higher, 4, 5, 6 percent by 2013. Well above the Federal Reserve’s preferred rate of 2 percent.” The pressure on inflation will come from the large budget deficit.

“Rents are rising. Inflation pressure will be building in the rental market. Vacancies are falling and rents are rising.

The Fed has an “ultra-loose monetary policy, 0 percent, an unprecedented low rate. You cannot borrow at this rate but Mark Vinter and Wells Fargo can.”

The mortgage interest deduction will be discussed as a way to increase revenue and decrease the public debt. But Yun says it will not happen because of the efforts of his audience, the Realtors, to pressure the government to keep it in place.

Higher inflation means that the home mortgage interest rates will trend up.

Yun is forecasting “meaningfully higher home prices, which went up 4 to 5 percent in 2012.

“Home price growht ckoud slow or accelerate depending on housing starts.” Yun ecpects a 15 percent cumulative growth in home prices over the next three years. The rise in prices are not showing any signs of slowing down.” Arizona has already seen a 30 percent increase since the bust.

“Rises in prices will bring more underwater homeowners above water and then they can participate in the market.”

Her prdicts the price will rise from $176,000 to $195,ooo. “The train has left the station, but it is still a great time to buy, because if you wait, the train will be farther from the station and you will miss the chance for wealth creation.”

Realtors are seeing more traffic, and showings are consistently strong. Pending home sales are trending up.

Home sales will be 4.6 million units this year and 5.05 million units in 2013, says Yun.

Employment is a key to home purchasing. While the unemployment rate is falling, Yun looks at the “employment rate.” About 62 percent of adults have jobs. This number is not increasing. Only enough jobs are being created to soak up the new graduates. But there is plenty of room for improvement, he says. “We need 250,000 new jobs every month for the next eight years to get back to a normal job market. It is trending up, but it could trend up faster.”

Builder inventory is at a 50-year low. Builder activity is rising, but only from a very low level and housing starts are at less than half of the 50-year average of 1.5 million units per year.

Good new for all segments of housing, he said, is that the “shadow inventory” of distressed properties is shrinking. Foreclosures are clogged in judicial states and flowing freely in non-judicial states such as Arizona. Whiel home prices are up 7 percent in Miami, they are up 19 percent in Arizona.

Yun forecasts a more unqual distribution of wealth. “That is something we need to monitor.”

He is putting a lot of pressure on the builders: If they don’t build enough new homes, it will rise prices, which would be good for existing homeowners but will cut into home affordability for all those renters who want to become homeowners. What we are seeing now is that wealthy investors play a strong role in the market and are keeping some “end-user” buyers out. This is evident in Sarasota, where all-cash investors are outbidding buyers who would live in a house they would buy with a mortgage.

Renting is up strongly and homeownership is off a bit. Normally, homeowners are 66 percent of the market. And the household formation increase has been more in the rental market rather than home purchases.

Hurricane Sandy’s property destruction will provide building permit impetus in New Jersey, boosting the market there in a few months.

Florida: Yun points out that Florida’s job growth, weak or falling recently, since 1939 has boomed, and if that overall growth trend resumes, the state could run out of prime real estate development land, particularly as Chinese and Brazilian buyers come to the state.

His applause line: “The financial institutions are flush with cash. Why are they not lending?”

He closes with this: Keep the mortgage interest deduction. Taking it away will be a huge hit to the housing industry.

Wells Fargo economist Mark Vinter comes back on stage and says, “Our bank is lending. It is that other bank.”

Chase? Bank of America? I will have to ask him that later.

In case you did not know: Yun is pronounced Yoon.

via realestatetoday.blogs.heraldtribune.com