| | | October 2008 | Vol 3, Issue 10 | | | | | | | Greetings! | | Trick or treat? Me personally I prefer the treats! Unfortunately many people in the real estate industry are worrying that this may be the true time of haunted houses.... homes that are scarily sitting on the market without anyone coming to see them. The truth is that homes are still selling - they are just typically the best homes! If you have listings sitting on the market that aren't selling, maybe its time to see if you can give them an edge. | | What Clients Are Saying About Us |  "Thanks again for your staging advice. We had our first showing today, and we did everything exactly as you suggested. They made an offer! This could potentially be a quick sale. You and Michele [Reneau] make a great team!" Greg Larsen - Homeowner - 7461 Painted Bunting Way, Tanner Plantation
Listed 10/14/08 Under Contract 10/20/08 | |  | | | | | Creating Interest Creates More Potential Buyers |  Are you getting the number of showings you want? Do you find that it is more and more difficult to just get potential buyers to the door? The time is now to make a significant First Impression and utilize all of your resources. The easiest is simply making MLS work for you. MLS now allows over 20 photos to be added, creating more and more opportunity to make your listing interesting to potential buyers. Rather than showing photos like the one above, create interest and drama with professional home staging! As you can tell, the home feels larger, warmer and provides some interest for potential buyers. Rather than wondering what to do with this bowling alley like home, show off its real assets! National statistics show that staged homes sell in half the time and for 3-9% more than unstaged. Here at First Impressions we've actually shown a slightly better return on investment. Be sure to check out our statistics above by clicking on the links. Congratulations Melissa Marro for winning the 2008 Best Vacant Staged Home contest presented by the Interior Redesign Industry Specialists (IRIS). The photos above are of 3005 Hidden Oak, Drive in Seabrook Island, SC which were the award winning shots. | | What the NAR has to say about the Financial Crisis |  This month, Jed Smith, Chief Economist & Managing Director for Quantitative Research for NAR gave a speach to the Massachusetts Association of Realtors. While he did give some specific information in regard to MA, most of his information was national information. There is a lot of great information in this video including statistics that many of you may want to use in presentations to your clients. It includes data on past market trends, number of homes sold nationwide and what the market is really doing right now. His recommendations for adding Value? (quotes from his slides & presentation) - Marketing - Realistic Pricing, Targeting, Segmentation, Demographics, Defining Needs
- Staging - How many times do you make a first impression?
The importance of having your homes/listings professionally staged was discussed for 14 minutes in this presentation. As a professional realtor, this is advice you should be listening to! Watch Jed's Smith's NAR Economic Update | | Putting Technology to Use |  Websites. It's not enough that you just have one. Last week I attended the Interior Redesign Industry Specialists national conference and learned something really interesting! Many of our websites are actually keeping us from getting business! Let me ask you the question that I have been asking fellow stagers all week. It sounds crazy, but bare with me.... "How old is your cell phone?" Does this sound completely irrelevant? In fact, it's not! We change our cell phones not just because the next gen is way cool (yes, I LOVE my iphone!) but because the technology keeps getting better! This is true of website technology also.... Now I'm talking about code. The way the site is written. Are you aware that the code, you know, the language, your site is written in, can help Google find you, or keep it from finding you! My suggestion? Check with your webmaster if your site is older than your cell phone (or older than 2 years) and see if maybe it is time to trade in your cell phone (website) for a new one and come up in the rankings!! | | | | | The holiday season is rapidly approaching and there will likely be a little bit of a slow down. Now is when you need to make sure to plant the seeds for next year and do a little internal housekeeping. Update your marketing, literature, and website. Begin thinking of other ways you can be of maximum value for your potential clients. Thank you again Charleston for all of your continued support! We enjoyed meeting many of you at the Branching out 2008 SC Realtors Conference! Thanks for stopping by our booth. We'll see you again next month..... Sincerely, | | Melissa Marro, Bevin Googer and the entire First Impressions Team
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