Is your City Hot or Not, Real Estate Market over priced?

As some of you would already know that, the name of this Blog is Seattle Houses, so would you guess that the Seattle Real Estate market is a hot or not? I saw a report yesterday on CNN Money real estate section, and it listed all the major cities in the US. It went on to mention, if the real estate prices in those major areas were over priced or not. It quoted an analyst I can't remember, and the numbers seem to make sense to me. You can view the article on http://money.cnn.com/realestate

Seattle was listed right in the middle as fairly priced real estate market. The report mentioned that Santa Barbara was the most over priced market? How the study was done, and how the analyst can make such a decision is based on economic factors or jobs, etc.

Even though I am just a real estate agent in Seattle, I do read a lot about economic indicators. Economics and local real estate economics are based on supply and demand. If a city or local market is short on land, you can assume that it's going to be pricey. If a city is located on a coast, as most major cities in the US are, you would assume land is short. So real estate prices tend to be higher on the coast.

Now about demand, demand is based population growth, job growth, quality of life etc. We will talk more about that next time, but would you guess, that demand is high in places such as Seattle, Santa Barbara, and San Francisco, Minneapolis, Chicago, New York City, Boston? Why, Let's see why quickly than off to dinner and the Sprout Let's grow with the kids:-) Do all of those areas have great universities, research centers, and jobs? Yes, and they also have culture based on the educated class of people who go to universities, and hence they also have good quality of life! Notice that most of the cities I picked are in the North, why? To show you that a real estate market follows, quality of life, and quality of life follows jobs, and universities.

As always do visit our website for Seattle WA Real Estate at UrbanTango.com, Our website is growing, and so is our team!

Hot Shot Tech Guys get reality check on Real Estate

Have any of you have been watching the entree of Zillow etc, from Seattle in to the real estate industry? I had a conversation with a Seattle real estate agent who was a little more than perturbed by the technology claims of a local Seattle real estate technology company. That company, a real estate broker with a high tech exec running a cool website, only had 1 sale up to February of 2006. I was surprised, this same real estate agent who told me this, told me that she tired of these real estate internet companies, lieing to consumers. Well my friend from Seattle old world real estate company, I couldn't agree with you more. I love your energy, you do work for an old guard real estate company, but I love the ethics that you operate with. I am a real estate agent, but I was a high tech Millionaire before I became a real estate agent in Seattle, so I am more of a tech and tend to side with them more than real estate agents. I think most high tech companies and employees want no rules, and no structure in my opinion, they are more right than wrong, though I don't think they should get a bad name as most of people I associate with are super nice.

So how do hot shot techies get a reality check, get real? They must walk in the shoes of a real estate agent, a real estate broker. I believe that to have empathy for a profession, to solve an industries problem, you have to know it really well. If you don't you are lien's to your self, your investors, and are simply a hot shot, with no sense of reality.

Technology industry is my favorite, and so is the real estate industry. I am finally agreeing, and appreciating the fact that I love real estate. I am tired of techies, who think they know it all. I am an acclaimed technologist by anyone's standards, I co-founded a search engine type technology company. We sold it after the bust, I have a degree in MIS, but it is in the application of technology to solve real estate and other real world problems that I am passionate about. So hot shots will come and go, the true success to anyone will always be based on solving real world problems, by knowing the industry, and having empathy for others. Two things that are not in the dictionary of Hot Shots!

Real Estate agents add value because real estate purchase and sales are very complicated. I do believe that technology applications are going to change the real estate industry dramatically in the upcoming years. They already have for most of us real estate agents in Seattle.

A quick success leads to a snatch of Seattle Real Estate blog

For those of you who have not heard, Seattle Real Estate Blog success of RainCityGuide.com's Dustin Luther got hired away by HomeStore.com. He announced it yesterday on his Blog. Dustin started out blogging on Seattle real estate news for his wife Anna. And, about a year after they started, Google ranked them high a few months ago, and now they are a huge success. Such a huge Success in fact, that Dustin landed himself a Director position at HomeStore.

What most of you don't know is that I met Dustin, Anna and their twin daughters at a wedding in the summer of 2004. Anna had just gotten in to real estate in Seattle, with a company called Keller Williams. She was struggeling, like all of us new agents did. What was going against her as she mentioned to me was that she had a russian back ground. Well, being a person of a foreign background I could relate. I mentioned that a fellow real estate agent with my than real estate broker had a russian women and she starting to do really well. I spent some time explaining to Anna and Dustin that I had started to get a lot of real estate leads from my real estate website UrbanTango.com.
And, I told them how easy it was to setup a blog, with Blogger etc.

Well this amazing couple took my advice to heart and went to town. I am so happy for them, and their family. Who would have guessed that giving someone a few minutes of advice would lead to them becoming a huge success in a real estate website, blog, and now to the towers of real estate empire at HomeStore. Way to go Dustin, Anna, the twin daughters, and their now little son.

For those of you real estate agents, who have adversity to overcome and become a success, Dustin and Anna are an example. There are so many examples of successful people in Real estate. All one has to do is, read about the real estate industry and look at any big names in their local estate market, they will find at least one example out of 2, of success who overcame adversity. Success in real estate as with anything is pretty simple, focus on your goals, work hard, work smart, and most importantly be a Nice Person.

Believe it or not real estate agents who are nice, tend to be smart, and they tend to also succeed the most. Thanks for all of you who continue to support UrbanTango.com and all of our real estate and internet paradigm. Carpe Diem!

Sent from my BlackBerry wireless handheld.

Real Estate Professionals or just simply real estate agents?

I was in my neighborhood of Queen Anne in Seattle having coffee the other day, and I noticed a business card of a fellow real estate agent. I was surprised by the title on her card as real estate professional. Does the real estate profession have such a bad name that that real estate agents have to use the word “Professional” to describe themselves?

Does any other profession use that word to descibe them selves. Let's see, Insurance agents calling themsleves, I am Insurance Professional. How about investment advisors, calling themselves, investment professionals? Don't laugh, I went through training by an old world conservative corporate type, and told all trainee's to think of themselves as professionals. Wow, I want to laugh now, thinking about that. The guy must be training real estate agents for at least 20 years. And, maybe, just maybe, he was saying so because real estate agents had low self esteem? Do you think, he was training real estate agents to be more professional, instead of being too casual? I am going to write on this track of being a real estate agent, and being professional or not. I am also going to write more regulary on Seattle real estate agents perspective of low self esteem of real estate agents. I also had decided that for our new business plans, that real estate agents need more help in marketing themselves without the hype. So that is what I am going to include too!
Sent from my BlackBerry wireless handheld.