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Should Every Realtor Have an iPad ?

Sylvia and I have two children. We didn’t want three, only two. So after the second daughter, I visited Dr. Chopp (really his name) and that was that. Although I admire and love my friends with bigger families of 3, 4 and 5 kids, I like having just two offspring. We didn’t want a third, for many reasons.

What’s this got to do with iPads? Well, I don’t want a 3rd digital device to haul around either. I have a laptop and an iPhone. I don’t want a 3rd electronic thing, simple as that. Enough is enough. I have enough digital overload, I don’t need something else to plug in and care for. I refuse to add a third device, period.

That said, the geeky side of me really, really wants an iPad, but I can’t match the emotional desire to have one with any relevant productivity benefits. To me, it would have to prove itself as a productivity tool, first and foremost. I don’t need a toy. Until a tablet can function like a laptop replacement, I have no use for one.

Does this hurt our productivity as Realtors? If you believe all the hype, yes. But as I’ll explain in this article, no, there is nothing that Sylvia and I need to do as Realtors that would get done better, faster or easier with an iPad.

Let’s look at some of the benefits of iPad for Realtors that I see and hear about most often.

Listing Presentations Tool
In the old days, Realtors used notebooks and flipped the pages while sitting with a seller. Later, PowerPoint came along, which required a laptop. And now, agents can dazzle prospective clients with presentations on the iPad.

If People Bought Houses The Way We Buy Cars

by Steve Crossland

I’ve been buying and selling stuff lately other than real estate. Mainly with Craigslist ads. Washer/Dryer left over from a sale. A Fridge too. Bought a used car for my daughter, and we’re selling our minivan. It’s funny how the non-real estate inquiries differ so much from real estate inquiries.

First up, I’m selling our trusty 2007 Honda Odyssey. It has 107,000 miles now, and we no longer need it. Our oldest daughter is in college and youngest in high school. We just don’t haul around gaggles of kids to parties, playdates, etc. anymore. Plus, the van is a 16 mpg gas hog. As a replacement, we bought Sylvia a 2012 Hyundai Sonata Limited, which achieved 38 miles per gallon driving our daughter up to TCU in Ft Worth last week! It’s a neat little car. GPS just like the Honda, and built in blue tooth connectivity for the phone. So, when driving and the cell rings, Sylvia just taps a button on the steering wheel to answer and start talking hands free. It’s roomy inside and nice enough for taking clients around, but more economical and easier to drive and park than the minivan.

Anyway, if real estate buyers were like auto buyers from Craigslist, and you were selling a home, let’s say, for $285,000, you might receive a text message saying “wil u take 235 I buy today“, and similar gibberish. What sort of dummy thinks this method of engagement is an effective initial communication for a purchase discussion? After enough of these pings, all of which I ignored, I altered my ad to say “Calls only. DO NOT TEXT. Text messages will not receive a response“.

So now I just get calls, thankfully, from intelligent people . For the Odyssey, the buyers all ask the the same opening question: “Has the timing belt been replaced?” Huh? No it hasn’t. But after enough of those calls I took it down to Howdy Honda to get the timing belt replaced. It’s just an $800 preventative maintenance thing that’s recommended at 7 years or $100,000 miles. I just figured a new owner would get it done, but that’s not working. These Honda buyers are tough! Way tougher than house buyers.

Austin Real Estate Staging – Colors in Interior and Exterior Design

by Steve Crossland

One thing I have noticed lately while showing and listing houses is Buyers like COLOR!

No longer are the neutral tones the best advice for someone putting their house on the market. My last buyer clients went under contract on a home with colors they fell in love with. This home was painted a soft yellow in most of the living areas and a pale blue in the master bedroom. They absolutely loved it.

Another home I recently listed which received multiple offers within a week had a vivid red/orange chair rail in the entry hallway! No longer am I telling sellers when I list the house to paint everything neutral. Neutral is OUT!

The Front Door is Very Important
Another interesting observation I have made is the importance of the front door color. I used to recommend red, always. Now with the hot weather, I am recommending painting the front door a soft shade of teal (greenish/blue).

Austin Real Estate Market Breakdown by MLS Area – Midyear 2012

by Steve Crossland

Below is the breakout of the Austin real estate market year to date, through June 2012 compared to the same period 2011. The format is as follows, which shows the entire market.

MLS Area	Year	# Sold	Avg Sold	Med Sold	Avg SQFT	Avg PSF	Avg Days	Med Days
All Areas	2012	10,855	$268,257	$207,000	2,244	$119.54	67	35
	2011	9,232	$261,724	$195,323	2,242	$116.74	82	52
	Change	17.58%	2.50%	5.98%	0.09%	2.40%	-18.29%	-32.69%

The color coding at the bottom of each MLS Area summary indicates whether that measure improved or slid back. In the “All Areas” example above, all of the measures improved. That is, # Sold, Avg and Median sales prices, and Avg price per sqft all increased on a market-wide basis, while days on market decreased. Average sqft size is not color coded because I don’t see how a slight change in average size up or down is either good or bad.

A quick summary of some stats results:

Fastest selling: The fastest selling area in the Austin MLS market area is Southwest Austin (MLS Area SWW) which has an average days on market of 29, and a median of 10. Yes, half the homes in SW Austin have sold in 10 days or less so far in 2012. There are a lot of other MLS areas with median days below 20, which you’ll see in the full chart below, but no area is as hot as SW Austin in terms of demand. MLS area SWW includes subdivisions such as Circle C, Legend Oaks, and Villages at Western Oaks.

Highest Price Increases: There are 44 MLS areas shown in the chart below. 12 of those have avg price increases of over 10%. 12 areas (though not the same 12) have median sold price increases over 10% from last year. Most of the highest increases are in closer in areas of Austin proper, though Cedar Park/Leander North (CLN) and Georgetown West (GTW) are in that group, as well as dark horses Manor and Elgin, which have been perennial low performers in the market.

The full chart is below. As usual, questions and comments are welcome.

Austin Real Estate Market Update – Stats thru June 2012

by Steve Crossland

The Austin real estate market has found its traction this selling season. Good for sellers, frustrating for buyers. And there hasn’t been any let up. Sylvia and I personally had a record June. July has been extremely busy as well. We’re encountering multiple offers, backups offers, and several listings we’ve sold from “Coming Soon” signs that never made it into the Austin MLS.

That said, we still see that this good market isn’t yet showing up for every home or in every neighboirhood. So, for now, the rising tide is floating most boats, but not all. I’ll have a neighborhood breakdown in a following post.

I have several charts and graphs below that give visual representation to the market. The first is my recurring 1999 look-back graph. I like this one because it puts into context our market for the past 13 years.

Next is June 2012 compared to June 2011. The left column shows the previous month, for reference. The right colum is color coded, red for downward movement, green for upward movement in the particular market measure. As you can see, everything is green.

Austin Real Estate Market Snapshop March 2012

by Steve Crossland

This isn’t a full-blown market update, but I wanted to post a few graphs real quick to show current market activity and movement. Let’s start with the graph below showing Average and Median Sold values for homes in Austin for the past 49 months.

So, what looked like a pretty bleak December/January (lowest of lows for past 49 months. See the previous bottoms) quickly turned into an upswing. This isn’t necessarily unusual. In fact, if you look back at every May in the chart, that’s when the price peaks normally occur, and we’re heading that direction again this year. What is unusual is the fast and sudden absorption rate of homes combined with shrinking inventory. This is a sudden “spike”, at minimum, and may develop into a sustained upswing. I’ve been monitoring this and don’t see any let-up yet.

Let’s look at the Active/Pending chart below.

Above, we see the aftermath of the Tech Bust in 2000/2001, and what happened to the Austin sales market in 2003. For 2003 there was an inverted Sold/Not Sold ratio. More listings failed to sell than actually sold. That’s a really weak, sour market when that happens. Dismal in fact. But then it happened again in 2010 in Austin. More sellers gave up (Expired or Withdrew) than successfully sold their homes in Austin. 2010 was the 4th year in a row of declining sales volume.

Then in 2011, we see these lines achieving separation again as the number of failed sales drops and the number of closed sales increases. And the separation is sudden and pronounced, indicating very strong buyer demand.

Now let’s see what that graph would look like for just the first 3 months of 2012.

Should Every Realtor Have an iPad ?

If People Bought Houses The Way We Buy Cars

Austin Real Estate Staging – Colors in Interior and Exterior Design

Austin Real Estate Market Breakdown by MLS Area – Midyear 2012

Austin Real Estate Market Update – Stats thru June 2012

Austin Real Estate Market Snapshop March 2012

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