BeaumontBlogs.com

I get the craziest ideas between the hours of 1am and 3am. Sometimes they are sheer brilliance. Sometimes they are absolutely ridiculous. This latest one might inspire an office to blog united.

A few agents in the office have expressed interest about blogging. And since I've been blogging steadily for about five years, I am a huge blog advocate. So I am more than happy to help promote blog-awareness in my immediate environment. It's such a great and easy way to get your thoughts and concerns out there. I doubt that people are anticipating your every word, but they will skim through and pick out what they want.

Thus it's not surprising that between 1-3am in the morning, I decided to set up a team blog for my coworkers. I bought and registered the domain name BeaumontBlogs.com, I thought it would be appropriate since our office is located here. I forwarded it to WordPress which allows teamblogging without having to get a Gmail account (doh, Blogger, why did you make me stray from you!) I figured it would be easier if I didn't have to get everyone to sign up for both Gmail accounts and Blogger accounts.

I already have 5 people who are definitely interested. Then at the office meeting we'll see who else would like to join.

The thing about blogging (and most successful aspects of your life )that many people don't understand is consistency. You don't have to have the best product or the cheapest product or be perfect, you just have to be CONSISTENT. Being there for your clients day in and day out is consistency. Returning missed calls as quickly as possible is consistency. You can probably see where I'm going with all this. Basically, it takes a dedicated blogger who is willing to open up personally and post about work-relevant topics or at least about personal/interesting topics.

I think the new team blog will be great. The various points of views will keep the conversation lively. The fact that we're all real estate agents will keep the theme going.

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Best Places to Live

Yay! Claremont, CA was voted 5th Best Place to Live by CNNMoney. Thirty miles east of Los Angeles, Claremont came into its own in the early 20th century after the founding of Pomona College. Streets were named after prestigious East Coast schools, and residents were encouraged to plant trees. Today, Claremont is called the City of Trees and Ph.D.s. The city has won the National Arbor Day Foundation's Tree City USA award for 19 straight years, and Pomona is part of a prestigious consortium known as the Claremont Colleges. The downtown is a mix of hip boutiques and old-school businesses. And the historic College Heights Lemon Packing House is now home to the Claremont Art Museum, restaurants, a jazz bar and artists' lofts. And relative to much of California, it's affordable (emphasis on "relative"). Click here to read more.

CNNMoney also made a Top 25 Hottest Places list. Rancho Mirage topped the list at 108.2 degrees F! Bermuda Dunes, La Quinta, and Palm Desert tied at 11th Place. Click here to read more.

~Tina Jan~
Coldwell Banker Kivett-Teeters
1655 E. Sixth St.
Beaumont, CA 92223
Work: 951-845-5520 Ext. 105
Fax: 951-845-4916
Cell: 909-446-2666
Toll-Free: 1-877-TINAJAN
tina.jan@coldwellbanker.com
www.tinajan.com

Who Needs Time Management...

... when you don't have any time?! Below is very brief, day by day, list of my "typical" week. On any given day I could be doing ALL of the listed events, or just a few of them.

Monday: floortime, return weekend phone calls, groceries & chores, redbox, modeling invoices, tutoring reports, tutoring class
Tuesday: floortime, showing property, tutoring invoices, craft meeting
Wednesday: real estate meetings, property tours, floortime, tutoring class
Thursday: board meetings, floortime, tutoring, free art events
Friday: floortime, promotions, showing property
Saturday: floortime, tutoring, showing property, open house, promotions
Sunday: floortime, tutoring, showing property, open house

Oh and my guilty pleasure is Britney's Blackout album. Despite her trainwreck lifestyle, her songs still get me pumped, especially "Piece of Me." Sometimes, I have days where I'm just not as confident as I'd like. Please tell me that we all have those days and I'm not the only one! ;) Well, I'm a firm believer that music changes our attitudes and energy levels.

~Tina Jan~
Coldwell Banker Kivett-Teeters
1655 E. Sixth St.
Beaumont, CA 92223
Work: 951-845-5520 Ext. 105
Fax: 951-845-4916
Cell: 909-446-2666
Toll-Free: 1-877-TINAJAN
tina.jan@coldwellbanker.com
www.tinajan.com

Canadians are Buying Up the U.S.

Canadians are Scooping Up U.S. Real Estate. Canadians account for more than half of all new home purchases in California, Texas and Florida. The strong Canadian dollar, (the looney) a declining U.S. dollar and weak housing prices due to the subprime mortgage mess have increased the appetite for Canadians to cross the border and buy real estate. What is adding to their appetite? An explosive local housing market in Canada where Canadians are seeing double-digit appreciation in their own home values. They have cash and they’re spending it! Local real estate brokers in California, Arizona, Florida and other sun belt states are seeing a ton of Canadian buyers. One broker interviewed in Sarasota said in the past six months 20% of his calls are from Canadians. Click here to read more.

~Tina Jan~
Coldwell Banker Kivett-Teeters
1655 E. Sixth St.
Beaumont, CA 92223
Work: 951-845-5520 Ext. 105
Fax: 951-845-4916
Cell: 909-446-2666
Toll-Free: 1-877-TINAJAN
tina.jan@coldwellbanker.com
www.tinajan.com

Real Estate News for Wednesday, March 12th, 2008

California not in Recession, According to Survey. California economy is slowing but should avoid slipping into a recession, according to a widely followed quarterly economic forecast Tuesday. But if it does, the nation will almost surely follow, according to the economists who publish the Anderson Forecast at the University of California at Los Angeles. That's because the state contributes 13 percent of the country's gross domestic product and has never gone into a recession without the rest of the country doing the same. Click here to read more.

Luxury homes buck the trend. The overall housing market might be in bad shape, but mansions still selling. The top 5% of the market is strong not just because the rich in the U.S. are getting richer. Wealthy foreign buyers are also coming in to take advantage of the weak dollar and relatively bargain prices, said Laurie Moore-Moore, founder of the Institute for Luxury Home Marketing in Dallas, which trains agents to work in the high-end international property market. The ubër-wealthy are also less concerned about interest-rate fluctuations and other mortgage issues; about a third of buyers of $1 million-plus homes pay cash, Moore-Moore said. Click here to read more.

New Online Real Estate Wiki Encyclopedia. Looks like there's a new wiki out there and it's about Real Estate! According to RealEstateWiki.com, "the first goal of Real Estate Wiki is to create the most exhaustive compendium of real estate information anywhere. Secondly, to make every attempt to ensure that all real estate information is objective, neutral, balanced and without any prejudice. Our third goal is to make the encyclopedia available to everyone - real estate brokers, real estate agents, real estate service providers, real estate educators, etc. and of course the home owners as well as potential home buyers and home sellers - this at no cost and without the distraction of advertising or bias." Sounds good, hope it has as much success as Wikipedia.

Looking to Buy a House? Some Tips. The Wall Street Journal has some great tips for buyers in this new market. First, buyers need to research their market, focusing on school districts, crime stats and any impending construction. Look for a home that is lower than its 2004 price. Buyers should haggle a little bit. Lending standards are changing, so buyers should get prequalified for a mortgage early on. Click here to read more.

Mastodon for Sale, Harder to Sell than a House? Family puts its 3 million year old fossilized mastodon up for auction on Ebay, but market proves tricky. According to the seller, Nancy Fiddler, "the trouble with selling a mastodon is there's no comps." Click here to read more.

More homeowners are just walking away from their mortgages. SacBee.com has a sad but realistic view of the effects of the current housing market. Owing more on properties than they're worth, some local homeowners are voluntarily walking away from their house notes. "They don't need to be foreclosed on. They're just turning in the keys," said Martha Lucey, president and chief executive officer of Fresno-based nonprofit credit counselors, By Design Financial Solutions. "The problem we're seeing is that (these residents') equity position is compromised. They're upside-down." They are also willing to accept the disadvantages of foreclosure – the damage to their credit, their ability to re-enter the housing market and even their capacity to find a job in the future. Although homeowners often try to renegotiate the terms of their mortgages, lenders are often reluctant or unable to do so. One mortgage may be held by dozens of investors, and not all of those investors will accede to changes. Click here to read more.

YouWalkAway.com Shows How to Avoid the Pitfalls of Foreclosure. Stressed about making hefty mortgage payments? Turned down for refinancing? Your lender won’t agree to a short sale? You are not alone, says You Walk Away LLC. The Carlsbad-based foreclosure counselor, which opened its doors in January, says lenders have foreclosed on 2.9 million homes in the last three years, so given the trend, it offers guidance to homeowners. You Walk Away is not a real estate broker. The counselor only provides services and information to help minimize the long-term financial impact of foreclosure. The consultant says it has assisted 200 financially stressed homeowners. Formed by attorney Chad Ruyle and Jon Maddux, You Walk Away helps homeowners through the entire foreclosure process when there are no other options. Click here to read more.

~Tina Jan~
Coldwell Banker Kivett-Teeters
1655 E. Sixth St.
Beaumont, CA 92223
Work: 951-845-5520 Ext. 105
Fax: 951-845-4916
Cell: 909-446-2666
Toll-Free: 1-877-TINAJAN
tina.jan@coldwellbanker.com
www.tinajan.com

Unemployment in California, Recession?

New Data about Joblessness is Raising Fears of a Recession in California. In January, California lost more than 20,000 jobs, keeping the unemployment rate at nearly 6 percent, according to data released yesterday by the state Employment Development Department. The data show that Orange County and the Inland Empire have been losing jobs for the past two quarters – fitting a commonly used definition of a regional recession. The culprit continues to be the bursting of the real estate bubble. In January, 13,000 workers throughout the state lost their jobs in the construction, real estate and mortgage industries. But the weakness has spread into other areas as well. Statewide in January, there were 1,500 job losses in leisure and hospitality services; 1,300 at educational and health services; and 25,100 job losses at information companies, mostly related to the recently settled screenwriters' strike in Hollywood. “California is going to have a recession,” said Esmael Adibi, an economist at Chapman University in Orange. “By our definition, Orange County and the Inland Empire – San Bernardino and Riverside counties – entered a recession in the third quarter of last year.” Click here to read more from the San Diego Union-Tribune.

~Tina Jan~
Coldwell Banker Kivett-Teeters
1655 E. Sixth St.
Beaumont, CA 92223
Work: 951-845-5520 Ext. 105
Fax: 951-845-4916
Cell: 909-446-2666
Toll-Free: 1-877-TINAJAN
tina.jan@coldwellbanker.com
www.tinajan.com

Flock, Flickr, Blogger, TinaJan.com

My new favorite browser is Flock. Normally, I use Mozilla Firefox. But the other day I was using Netscape Navigator (I like to switch it up and keep things interesting) and that browser completely crashed. I uninstalled it and wanted to download a newer version but I found out that as of March 2008, AOL will no longer be supporting the Netscape Navigator browser. They recommended trying Mozilla Firefox (which I already have) and Flock. I always take good advice, so I downloaded Flock and it is awesome! It syncs well with all sorts of popular internet services, like Blogger, YouTube, Flickr, Twitter, and more. I have a Pro account with Flickr, but I never really use it to post my photos, probably because it doesn't work very well. I tried to post a new pic to this blog, but it never went through. I don't know why it does that. I don't think I'll renew my yearly subscription after this year is over.
This weekend was just like every other weekend for me. It was a combination of real estate appointments and tutoring appointments. I'm a busy girl, but I like it that way. My mother raised me to be productive all the time. In fact, I have to confess that I feel somewhat guilty when I take a break. I'm trying to learn how to say no to people and relax and leave some time for myself.
Normally, my property showings are nothing special. As an agent, you tend to see the same things over and over after a while. But last night, I showed a property in Corona that practically had a Playboy Grotto rock pool and spa in the backyard. It was *pretty sweet* (in my best Napolean Dynamite voice). Not surprisingly, because it was a $259,900 bank-owned property, it already had 15 offers, despite only being on the market 5 days. This is proof positive that there are awesome deals out there, and buyers too!
Ah Mondays, my new favorite day of the week. Not to worry, I will post some real estate news very soon.

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