Академический Документы
Профессиональный Документы
Культура Документы
July 2011
Even in Tough Times, Some Agents Just Seem to do BetterWhy? ...continued from cover
one of our offices in Central New York, two of our newer agents (Chip Hodgkins and Gaetano Belmontenew to HUNT, but very experienced) and I had a most interesting chat. The point was that they wanted to know more as fast as they could about all the tools uniquely available here. One of them even questioned why any agent would remain anywhere else. The answer is simple: We havent done a good enough job reinforcing the value and the tools, training and systems that exist only here for the benefit of our agents and our customers. This goes to the first reason why some agents just seem to do better than others: They are learners and are constantly seeking to improve their knowledge and skills. Agents that make the commitment to continuous professional development produce more and grow their business. Your Company has for many years had as one of its signatures that we are The Training Companyfor very good reasons. Our investment in education and training reduces agent failure and attrition. It has also attracted more career-minded individuals. Having a significant educational infrastructure available at all times (through HUNT University and HUNTUniversity.com supported by live, highly skilled trainers) improves the overall environment in the offices by creating mutual confidence among our agents. Having a significant educational infrastructure available to our agents at all times also reduces our risk profile. Better trained and educated agents simply have fewer problem deals. As a follow up to my discussion with Chip and Gaetano in Syracuse, we have renewed our commitment to make sure we bring our training and educational systems to you. Those that take advantage will do better even in these challenging times. Just ask one of our recent graduates of Top Gun, or one of our growing numbers of agents that take a daily refresher through HUNTUniversity.com and our exclusive David Knox videos. Use these times to get better faster than the competition. Your personal gains today will be leveraged up as the majority of agents simply wait for the market to improve.
Youre Invited to the 2011 United Way Golf Outing & Wine Tour
cluded. The wine tour is limited to 31 people and we expect to fill up quickly so reserve your spot as soon as possible.
Check your branch for registration forms or download one now! For more information, contact Charlie Hunt at 716.633.9400 or e-mail charlie@huntrealestate.com. Hope to see you there! Dont forget to RSVP to our event on Facebook!
On behalf of Peter Hunt, we invite you to join us on Monday, August 22nd as HUNT Real Estate Corporation, HUNT Mortgage, and Network Title Agency of New York sponsor our annual United Way Golf Outing. This years event is again taking place at Arrowhead Golf Club with registration beginning at 11:00AM. Want to try something new this year? Join us for a 5-hour limo bus guided tour of the Niagara Wine Trail as we visit 4 award-winning local wineries. All tasting fees are in-
On a scheduling a recent showing with ProShow, Donna Cretella from our Williamsville Village branch expressed her delight with the prompt service she received, Wow that was quick! Thank you so much... did I mention how much I love this service? Thank you, to our entire team for your hard work and dedicationkeep it up!
While exploring my future in real estate, I realized I needed to join a company that functioned as a true
100 Year Anniversary Celebration Your Company in Real Estate History: The Sunday Showcase of Homes
By Peter Hunt, Chairman & CEO
first approached a local Rochester company, who became the first such show in the nation sometime in the fall of 1985. After the first show aired, Mr. Satterwhite made a cold call to me. His suggestion that we could have our own TV show seemed absurd if only because of the cost. He volunteered to send me a VHS tape (remember those?) of the first (and at that time ONLY) show to air. Curious, when I received the tape in the mail, I immediately drove home and plugged it into the VCR. In 30 seconds I knew this was something we were going to do. Just a few weeks later we had completed our pilot and were scheduled to air in January, 1986. At that time we became only the second real estate infomercial to air in the country. The show began with a video tour of the exterior of our offices. We taped this segment in December 1985. Nature was taking a somewhat unusual course even for our region of the country. It snowed EVERY day that month and the temperature never rose above 32 degrees. As a result, the views of our branches were through five-foot high walls of snow. The show received enormous attention in the media and the public. Because of its success and value as a listing tool, I felt compelled to share this new vehicle with my associates in a national real estate idea-sharing group, the first of its kind founded in 1972, humbly known as The Masterminds. At a special meeting held in Chicago, I presented our new concept and then showed the opening segment to the group on a big TV (48!) on a metal rackstate of the art at the time. When the show began with the mountains of snow in the images, the group went into hysterics. I begged them to look beyond the weather and see the concept. In short order, sixteen of the twenty companies were clients of Bristol Valley Communications. The show was a powerful listing tooland recruiting tool, even though almost immediately there were copycats. Two competitors announced but only one actually produced a short-lived imitation. Following the introduction of our show began our most rapid period of growth in our then 75year history. Our inventory grew as the company grew and soon getting a home on the show was a real problem. Our agents started to down-play the show on listing presentations because it was difficult to commit to when a new listing would be aired due to the growing back-log. By 1990, it was apparent that the show in its then form had out lived its effectiveness. We substituted regular TV commercials and began a cable version of the show in a continuous loop which allowed for many more homes to air. But this form of media had become eclipsed for our industry by something called The World-Wide Web. This began our exploration of the new media as our media vehicle of choice for continuous distribution of our product and service information to a new and growing audience.
Those of you that have only known the internet, smart phones, texting, tweeting, facebook, and even that stone-age system known as email, not to mention a host of other means of digital communication may be surprised to know that until the mid1980s just about ALL real estate advertising was done in print. While there were various means (newspapers, direct mail, etc.), there was little beyond this traditional mechanism to get our message and product information out to the public-at-large. That all changed with the deregulation of television. Sometime in 1984 or 1985 the Federal Trade Commission, in this deregulation process, inadvertently created the program length commercial what we now call the infomercial. A young man in Victor, New York (near Rochester), Steve Satterwhite, was then directing the local Bowling for Dollars show and recognized that real estate might be the perfect subject matter for this new media vehicle. In 1985, under his new company, Bristol Valley Communications, Mr. Satterwhite created The Sunday Showcase of Homes. He
Recognizing our The Age of Mobility and the Cloud Top Sales Agents of the Month
By Carlos Pegado, Vice President and Chief Technology Officer
Which brings us to the million dollar question - WHAT IS THE CLOUD? The cloud is as old as the Internet itself; it is simply a way to access storage remotely from a computer via the Internet. It is a modern twist on an old concept of time sharing on giant mainframes back in the early 1960s. Consumers have already been using the cloud for a very long time, they just did not know it, as they uploaded photos to share through online photo galleries. When we use Google's Gmail and Google Docs - that is a type of cloud service. It is very different from using dedicated e-mail client software such as Microsoft Outlook which is installed on your PC or Microsoft Word which then saves the files to your computer's hard drive. The difference here as you can see, is that with Google you use their software and store your documents in the search giant's secure cloud! Another cloud company we are all familiar with is Facebook. All those photos and comments that are uploaded via smartphone or computers are nestled in their private cloud. To a user it's just a visit to a popular Web site; behind the scenes, the Internet activities are shuttled to massive data centers, allowing you, the user, to access that information at anytime from anywhere. Nothing is stored or lives on a person's PC or smartphone. The cloud trend will continue to drive the price of hardware down as fewer components will be needed on our devices. Cheaper devices will mean that it will be easier for everyone to own a laptop, tablet or smartphone. Next month we will explore who the main players are in this brand new world, and how our agents will be able to capitalize on the coming Age of Mobility. So, stay tuned!
May 2011
Buffalo/Niagara
Amherst / Kim Jerzewski Hamburg / Lou Ann Spaulding KenTon / Marsha McCarthy Lancaster / Sandra Hockwater Lewiston / Cyndi Vandusen Roemer Lockport / Kathryn Kozakowski Metropolitan / Kate Takats Orchard Park / Renee Paul-Hess West Seneca / Jan Doktor Wheatfield / Kelly Ryan Williamsville-Clarence / Amy Mayfield Williamsville Village / Bonnie Clement
Every other decade, there's a new wave of technology that reaches critical mass - then this technology becomes commercially viable and defines what the IT industry does for the next couple of decades. In the first reign of modern computing, the dominant technology was the mainframe, which became widespread in the 1950s. Next came minicomputers, which gained popularity following Digital Equipment's launch of the PDP-8 in 1965 and the popular WANG 2200 series. These two distinct eras were followed by the advent of the personal computer, which started getting commercial traction by 1980. And then, in the early 1990s, Internet computing exploded. We are now ready for the next erathe age of the cloud, the age of mobilitywhere all things mobile will define us. What does this mean for our industry in specific? For starters, the next-generation of agents, as well as some agents in the current workforce, want access to data and applications from anywhere; they want to collaborate with colleagues and customers easily, and want to use smartphones, tablets and laptops to do it. This is where the cloud comes in. The stakes are very high for technology companies to define this so-called consumer cloud, because the winner gets the keys to the digital media kingdom. According to Forrester Research Corporation, the US market for personal cloud services will hit $12 billion and 196 million consumers within the next four years.
Rochester
Brighton-Pittsford / Pete Palermo Canandaigua / Sandi VanCamp Greece / Kay Carpenter Perinton / John Denniston Webster / Jeff Pastorella
Syracuse / Carthage-Watertown
Cazenovia / Chary Griffin Chittenango / Sandy Leibl Cicero / Mari Rae Dopke DeWitt / Kathy Leonard Fayetteville / Manning/Litz Team Liverpool / Starr Nicholas Team Manlius / Nancy Watt Oneida / Sue Rosendale West Regional / The Crocker Team Carthage-Watertown / Suzanne Krouse
Capital District
Saratoga Springs / Bonnie Weiler South Glens Falls / Marie Marion
Arizona
Tempe / Joseph Ayatta
The federal government is proposing a new group of regulations that would only offer prime interest rates to borrowers who meet the criteria of a Qualified Residential Mortgage (QRM). Under these potential regulations, a majority of borrowers would not be eligible to receive the best interest rate available because they do not fit the requirements. The difference in interest rates could range from 0.75% to 3% higher than the rate available to those who fit the terms of a QRM. If passed, these regulations could have a tremendous impact on the housing industry, and deserve to be watched closely. The standards for a QRM are quite strict, and would eliminate a majority of borrowers from being eligible to receive the best interest rate on the market. Only borrowers who are able to provide a 20% downpayment and have a total debt to income ratio of lower than 36% would qualify. These stringent guidelines would also require applicants to have no 60-day late payments on any line of credit in the past two years. These suggested new regulations are a result of pressure on several housing related agencies to set forth guidelines for home mortgages that are considered to be a minimal risk for investors. The stipulations of a QRM would be firm, and would not allow the consideration of other factors in order to provide the best rate to a consumer. These regulations are not expected to be finalized until the middle of next year, but to quote the CEO of the National Association of Home Builders, Jerry Howard, I think were in for a hell of a fight.
Bob Nowak summed up his experience, Having worked elsewhere, I was overwhelmed with the opportunity to take such a powerful program at HUNT ERA. Since I entered the program, I have doubled my business in just 8 weeks. Special thanks also goes to Bob Scholz, Laurie Omans and the branch leadership who assisted with the program. According to Mr. Manzano, My Broker Consultant, Susan Smith, [saw] the value even before I did! More Dan Elzer training is being planned; we encourage all agents to invest in their future by taking advantage of all training offered through HUNT University and be sure to check out the Top Gun Testimonial video on YouTube!
Pictured from left to right: Jennifer Auther, Melissa Weidner, Michael Manzella, Christina Whipple, Mark Bostaph, and Timothy Domanski.
Randy Bolam, CRI NYS Lic. #16000006228 Radon Technician Pest Technician
Cell: (716) 417-7503 randy.bolam@pillartopost.com niagara-newyork.pillartopost.com
Authorized Independent Franchisee Operated by Ardane Properties, Inc.
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