Jeff Rickard

Happy New Year!  Are you ready?  One of the number one gifts this holiday season was portable GPS devices.  One of the most used websites is Mapquest.  So what?  So, we are constantly looking for ways to see where we are going, how to get to the place we want to be as efficiently as possible.  How about your career?  Have you set your goals, got a game plan, reviewed last year? 

     This is a very important time of year to get excited about your business.  We get to start all over, re-energize and forget about the challenging year that just passed.  One of the most successful real estate teams that I work with is the Eskanos Team and they take a week a year to go on the road in their camper and brain storm, review and plan their business.  Does it work?  Last year, which was a challenging year for most in real estate, was a great year for them.  Coincidence?  No chance, they will tell you that having a plan and knowing their business statistics fires them up and focuses them on the future.  A profitable future.

     I have taken their advice this year and “gotten out of town”  to game plan for next year.  It is nice to know that on January 2nd I have a plan.  Things to do and get done.  I know what I want to do to improve my blog, website and House$mart.  How I can bring more value to my Realtor and referral partners and my past clients.  I also am expanding my commercial lending business and have a very specific marketing game plan for that area.

     Take my advice, take Mark and Gayle Eskanos advice, plan your business and have the best year ever!     

  Merry Christmas!  Happy Holidays!  Today, all the motivation you need is spending time with your family and friends.  Say a prayer for our troops and peace on earth.

I have come across a fun web site.  It is the Street Advisor and it is a place that you can type in your address and see how your street ranks as far as vibe, wired, health, value and essentials.  You can also blog on their site about your neighbors - good or bad.  I have added it to the link section so you can keep up on your street and what the neighbors think of you!  You can see above that my street, Garfield St in Denver, rated an 87.57. 

Pinging - All the Time

     If 80 percent of success is, as Woody Allen once said, just showing up, then 80 percent of building relationships is just staying in touch.

     I call it “pinging.”  It’s a quick, casual greeting, and it can be done in any number of creative ways.  Once you develop your own style, you’ll find it easier to stay in touch with more people than you ever dreamed of in less time than you ever imagined.

     Yes, there’s grunt work involved.  Pinging takes effort.  That’s the tough part.  You have to keep pinging and pinging and pinging and never stop.  You have to feed the fire of your network or it will wither or die.

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Two announcements this week are going to make it a little harder to get loans done for awhile. 

     The first is that Denver has been slated as a “declining market”.  What does that mean?  That means that because property values are on a decline that lenders are not going to lend to their maximum ability, they will require an extra 5% down payment.  In other words, if their standard program required 5% down, in certain parts of Denver they will require an additional 5% or 10% total.  The hard part of this is they do not give a list of “places”, some parts of Denver are fine and some are not.  You will not know for sure until appraisal.  

     The second new challenge we are facing is that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are instituting a “risk based” pricing model.  The lower your credit score the more it will “cost” you to get a loan.  680 FICO score and above will be fine, everything below that will incur more cost in getting a loan.  Less than 620 will require as much as 2 points in cost.  What is the bottom line?  At today’s rates you would be at 6.375% with 1 discount point,  if you had a sub 620 FICO score it would either be 6.375% with 3 discount points or 7.375% with 1 discount.  WOW!   

Today’s Denver area real estate market is what I call a “Buyers Up” market. You, the real estate home or condominium buyer are for the most part in the driver’s seat. You need a savvy, experienced Realtor® to make certain you get that best price along with the best terms.

So…how do you find the right real estate broker to represent YOU and your best interests?

First, ask your family and friends for referrals to a Realtor® they have used or know well. Ask around, get a few referrals.

Do a little homework. Go online and look at their websites. Read their blogs. Look at their listings online. Google their names for good and bad news.

Next, select and call 2 or 3 agents. Introduce yourself. Let them know you are looking for an agent to represent you, in a future real estate transaction. When you call, if you leave a voice mail message, pay attention to how long it takes for their returned call.

Here are a dozen questions to ask each agent. Continue Reading »

Your Message Must be as Compelling as Your Product to Engage Anyone - Especially Your Customer.

The key to any communication rests in how well you engage the other person or the audience.

Your preparation, the questions you ask, the ideas you bring, your communication and presentation skills, and your positive attitude and enthusiasm are the keys to intelligent engagement.

The old adage is, “it’s not what you say - it’s how you say it.”  Wrong.  In business it’s both.  Making a great presentation is a marriage of “what you say” and “how you say it.” 

Your ability to present a compelling, believable, enthusiastic, value driven message is the difference between yes and no, understanding and confusion, acceptance or rejection, and even approval or denial.

This is an excerpt from Jeffrey Gitomer’s Little Platinum Book of Cha-Ching!

     This is very true today and it has been ignored by many in the real estate - mortgage industry for some time.  The business was booming for so long we stopped presenting ourselves and our services.  In this new slower market we need to get back to basics and get good at selling again.

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I was at a meeting for the Builder Realtor Council (BRC) in Denver today and they had a presentation on market data. One of the questions was rating the “trust factor” in the marketplace. The most trusted in order were title people, Realtor, real estate attorney, builder and last - mortgage lender. Not really surprised by that news, the truth is, in Colorado we probably deserved to be on the bottom. Until very recently we were an unregistered, unlicensed group. That has all changed and you can read about that in my post on new mortgage laws.

So, the good news is we are cleaning up our act but where are the bad guys going? Two answers: they are staying and just going to do the business illegally or they are heading into the commercial market. Continue Reading »

Transform Your Inner Critic into Your Inner Coach

Research indicates that the average person - that means you! - talks to himself or herself about 50,000 times a day.  And most of that self talk is about yourself, and according to the psychological researchers, it is 80% negative - things such as  I shouldn’t have said that…. They don’t like me…. I’m never going to be able to pull this off…. I don’t like the way my hair looks today…. That other team is going to kill us …. I can’t dance…. I’ll never be a good skater…. I’m not a speaker…. I’ll never lose weight…. I can’t ever seem to get organized…. I’m always late.

We know from the research that these thoughts have a powerful effect on us.  They affect our attitude,our physiology and our motivation to act.  Our negative thoughts actually control our behavior.  They make us stutter, spill things, forget our lines, break out in a sweat, breathe shallowly, feel scared and taken to the extreme, they can even paralyze or kill us.    This was taken from Jack Canfield’s book “The Success Principle”

     I had this “self talk” concept told to me about a year ago.  Since then I am amazed how much I beat myself up or complained internally about work and personal issues.  When I was in the car driving to work I would have conversations with myself  complaining about or reliving frustrating moments at work.  There was no one there, just me getting all wound up.  After hearing about “self talk” I began to realize what I was doing; it was crazy.  The truth is I love my job and where I work so it was just me making the everyday challenges, that are at all jobs, into my own personal drama.  What a waste of time!  I have stopped that behaviour, for the most part, and I arrive each day with a better attitude.

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