What Makes a “Bad” Real Estate Agent?
What makes a "bad" real estate agent? Easy question to ask, but first we need to define what "bad" means. And "good." My first thoughts on what makes a "bad" agent real estate agent: Poor communication - with fellow professionals, and/or with their clients, potential…
You’re Going about It all Wrong – Or How to Search for Homes in Charlottesville (Without a Realtor)
How do you search for homes? In Charlottesville or anywhere else? I got a call recently from a buyer who was searching homes.com and found one of my listings. Unfortunately, the listing was actually under contract (and had been for a while). I first thanked…
Moving to Charlottesville?
I randomly and fortuitously met some potential clients last week. As I was finishing a showing, a couple drove by and asked if we were having an open house. My client assured me that we were finished, she introduced me to them, (as a "great…
Choosing the Right Buyer’s Agent in Charlottesville
Last week's article in the Daily Progress was good (edit: now-broken link), but as I told the journalist at the time - there is so much more I wanted to go into that article, and newspapers are so limited by what they can offer in print.…
Reader Question – What do you think about Fifeville?
"curious if you are familiar with the fifeville neighborhood in charlottesville. and if so what you think about the huge price tags on houses in a neighborhood that is clearly still in the early stages of gentrification" Thank you for the question. For starters, I…
If you could ask Lawrence Yun a question, what would it be?
I am intrigued by Lawrence Yun. He even has his own Lawrence Yun Watch site, following his predecessor's own "Watch" site. If only because watching him painstaking try to regain the credibility that was squandered by David Lereah is a monumental task. I have written…
How to market new construction
Question from a reader: Jim, I'm interested to hear the thoughts of Realtors on how best* to market lots in a new/proposed residential subdivision. The methods being employed in Fluvanna and Louisa at present are: (1) Make all lots available for sale to anyone (via…
Questions answered
A bit of a take-off of the "ask the agent" feature that some of the other real estate blogs have been doing of late - I have taken some of the more interesting or pertinent search phrases that have led visitors to this blog. Should…
What do you want to know?
I have been working in the real estate world for just over five years and have been around it since I was a wee child (both of my parents are Realtors). I have moved five or six times locally in seven years, but I have…
Website updates
Maintaining an efficient and profitable real estate website takes an awful lot of time; I worked for almost 90 minutes or so this morning. Two notable additions: - I have added a discoverable RSS feed for this blog to my real estate site's homepage. -…