The Good Life in Austin Texas

I came across this real estate brokerage in other video and they looked very interesting. It seems that they are moving to save the environment by going to near 100% ipad use to sell homes in Austin.

This was a short video clip outlining their program for becoming an paperless agent. I'm happy to see somebody is putting the ipad to use as a business tool. Up to now I've always felt it was an expensive but very cool toy. I wonder how long it will be before we see an agent using one on House Hunters, Property Virgins or 1 of the "Selling" shows.

Do you have an tablet that your able to make use of in your business?

Selling NY back for a 2nd Season

With the launch of Selling LA, I had expect that we had seen the end of Selling New York. I had expect that the series would go the way of the "Real House Wives" series and just keep moving from city to city.

But that doesn't seem to be the case at all, as I just saw an add for Selling New York Season 2. Looks like it is going to start next week.

I hope that they have adjusted the format and improved the show for the 2nd season.

Selling LA

A new real estate TV show started last week called Selling LA. I appears to be a spin off of Selling New York, except that it's in LA. Common to both shows is that it focuses on buying high end homes for the rich.

As I said before I wasn't a big fan of Selling New York since all of the real estate appeared to be very simliar apartment. With the LA spin off the homes are a lot more varied.

Hopefully we will be getting a lot of seasons of Selling LA!

Selling New York - Back Again

It's been a few weeks since I watched or blogged about Selling New York and I must say that I found this show a lot more interesting. It may be that my expectations have been lowered or that the show is growing on me. In either case I enjoyed last nights show.

What was most interesting about it was the the REALTOR when home shopping for a client that was moving to NY from Los Angeles. The real estate agent found the perfect home for the buyers to rent ... good sized with a nice back yard .... so the client told the realtor to get it for them ... sight unseen ... now that is a lot of trust.

http://kathymm.freerealestateadvice.com/

Selling New York - Better This Week

I couldn't help myself and ended up watching Selling New York again this week. For some reason I found it to be a lot better. It maybe because I'm learning some of the REALTOR characters now or perhaps it is because they didn't focus so much on the individual condos or co-ops for sale.

Interesting things that happened in this weeks shows were:

1. A couple looking to buy a home near the WTC site had concerns about all of the construction in the area. They ended up getting a tour of development via construction models, video and the viewing deck of a building. I don't think that would have happened for them if the REALTOR didn't have the tv cameras going.

2. Big drama as they had to find a building that would allow a turtle pet.

3. A REALTOR was working with her daughters boyfriend to buy a 3 million dollar home when he decided that he was going to rent, so a $200,000 commission cheque turned into a $7,500 cheque which she declined.

Selling New York - Same Show

Well this Wednesday came and went and I confirmed my worst fears that Selling New York has replaced Million Dollar Listings in HGTV time slot. Hopefully Selling New York will improve but I'm just not feeling it.

I watched both 30 minute shows tonight and it felt a lot like the shows I saw from last week. Yes some of the NY real estate was amazing, some of these condos (or co-ops) looked like the could be local townhouses inside of buildings. But something is just not there for me with this show.

The most interesting point of this week was the a couple selling their home wasn't going to follow their realtors advice to lower there price. In the end they made a slight price reduction and to the amazement of everybody it was enough to trigger an offer to buy there home.

It just goes to show you that sometimes you will just run into the right buyer at the right time.

Selling New York - First 2 Shows

After giving a general over view of Selling New York I figured that I had best comment on the two 30 minutes shows that I watched.

In the first show we had 2 agents and their clients profiled. One with 2 days to rent singers wife an apartment. Now what was amazing about this was the rental rates of $10,000 to $14,000 a month that the apartment owners where asking.

Wow that is some impressive rent. The units where a nice size but that is a lot of coin for that location.

The other REALTOR was working with some clients who where looking to sell there $3 million dollar home (another apartment) to "free up some cash". They explain the "free up some cash" idea is needing it to send the kids to camp for $8,000 / week but I just didn't buy it. It felt like else was going on but the show didn't feel like it could tell us the truth.

In any event they looked at a few homes they could buy for a cheaper price or rent for less than there currently monthly costs. But in the end they didn't buy or rent either and we didn't get to see the sale of there home. It was kind of a let down.

The second show I watched was a bit more interesting in that we got to see some NY real estate actually being sold. Both of these home where impressive but in both cases the REALTOR defaulted to the same idea to sell these houses, which was to host a party for REALTORS, real estate brokers, agents and their current buying clients to see the home.

Good technic but I didn't need to see it twice in the same show.

Selling New York - New Real Estate Show

So I caught a New real estate show this week on HGTV called Selling New York. It is a half hour show and seem similiar to Million Dollar Listings in the same way that The City was similiar to The Hills. But like The City something seemed to be missing in Selling New York. However it is early yet so as we learn some of the REALTORS it has the possibility to improve.

However, I think that Selling New York may be a tough sell, since one of the things about Million Dollar Listing was the size and impressiveness of the homes in LA. In New York however, there is only so much you can do with apartments and I think that 1 view of NY City is going to start looking like any other very soon.

What are your thoughts?