Wednesday, January 10, 2007

The Real Estate Conversation

A Real Estate Market is social. Buyers and Sellers communicate to discover information and negotiate to exchange goods or services. From this I understand the Real Estate Market as a Real Estate Conversation.

Internet transparency is letting home buyers view Residential and Commercial MLS, FSBO listings on their own. It has reduced home buyers search costs, and given them access to multiple new product options to choose from when going into a real estate transaction. Also sellers have found new tools and services to attract home buyers and sell their houses, they can now leverage Internet market tools that are intended to increase the efficacy of transactional requirements.

This "conversation" transparency has made it difficult for Real Estate Agents, Appraisers, Lenders, etc. to collect the fees - tipping the balance of power towards the consumers. By opening access to information outside of the Brokers/Lawyers control, buyers and sellers now gain economic benefits that would be otherwise be received by market intermediaries or inappropriately distributed among the smart and connected deal makers of the financial world.

update: I added this to Wikipedia - *Still in progress.

Related: The Real Estate King Takes A Gabby Queen
InmanTV Video

Monday, January 08, 2007

Elvis "The King" Presley's Birthday

Elvis Presley was born on January 8, 1935 in a two-room shotgun house in Tupelo, Mississippi. Vernon Presley, Elvis's father, built the house with the help of his father and his older brother in preparation for the birth. He took out what amounted to a mortgage of $180 from Orville Bean, on whose farm Vernan and his father occasionally worked. The birthplace has been designated a Mississippi landmark.


Elvis would have been 72 years old today.


Elvis was the KING of Rock N' Roll, is the King of Stamps, and its a bit of a s-t-r-e-t-c-h but unconsciously an icon of Internet culture with his understanding of Social Networking when he said, "We can't go on together - With suspicious minds.."

Think of trust as the currency of social capital.
PlaNetwork

Monday, January 01, 2007

Happy New Years Chicago

Jack White and the Raconteurs lead Chicago into 2007 with Auld Lang Syne - LIVE - at the Riviera Theatre. After the ballons drop the band jams into the "Steady As She Goes" single. The show was incredible.