WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. home prices jumped in February by the
largest amount in seven years, evidence that the housing recovery
strengthened ahead of the all-important spring-buying season.
Home
prices rose 10.2% in February compared with a year earlier, CoreLogic, a
real estate data provider, said Wednesday. The annual gain was the
biggest since March 2006. Prices have now increased on an annual basis
for 12 straight months, underscoring the recovery's steady momentum.
The
gains were broad-based. Prices rose in 47 of 50 states and in all but
four of the nation's 100 largest metro areas. Delaware, Alabama and
Illinois were the only states to report price declines.
CoreLogic's
measure of national prices also rose 0.5% in February from January.
That's a solid increase during the winter months, when sales typically
slow.
An increase in home sales has helped lift prices. In
February, sales of previously owned homes reached the highest level in
more than three years. Still, much of the demand has come from
investors. Sales to first-time buyers remain below healthy levels.
Another
reason prices are rising is the supply of available homes for sale
remains extremely low. In January, it reached a 13-year low.
The
supply of homes for sale did rise in February for the first time in 10
months. That suggests more people are gaining confidence in the housing
recovery, which could help ease supply concerns and drive sales higher
in the coming months.
The price gains were concentrated in the
West, according to CoreLogic. The states with the biggest price gains
were Nevada, where prices rose 19.3%, followed by Arizona, with 18.6%,
and California, with 15.3%.
Hawaii and Idaho rose 14.6% and 13.5%, respectively.
The cities with the biggest gains were Phoenix, Los Angeles, Riverside, Calif., Atlanta and New York.
Nationwide, home values were still down more than 26% from their peak in April 2006 through February, CoreLogic said.
Steady
increases in prices help fuel the housing recovery. They encourage some
homeowners to sell homes and entice some would-be buyers to purchase
homes before prices rise further.
Higher prices can also make
homeowners feel wealthier. That can encourage more consumer spending,
which drives 70% of economic activity.
Article courtesy of USA Today
Web design can be a complicated beast, but all real estate agents
should cut through the fat and ensure that these three features are on
their sites.
Web design, next to fascism and peas, is one of those eternally
frightful terms, the kind that can turn even the most rigid, determined
individual into mush; and admittedly, as a company that manages its own
website, we do not entirely disagree with Web design’s reputation! Web
design is complicated, frustrating and ridiculously nuanced, with a new
scare always waiting around the corner.
However, the complexities of Web design often overwhelm what should
be the main objective of any great website – delivering a service to a
specific group of people in as simple and pleasurable a manner as
possible. Therefore, for this story, we’re going to highlight three
straightforward features that all agents sites should have – and no, a
plug-in featuring funny cat videos is not one of them.
Real Estate Agent Websites – The 3 Must-Haves
1. Make your Site Image-Based – Nobody loves data
more than us, but text- and number-heavy websites are disastrous for
attracting customers; after all, who wants to visit a site where the
information they are looking for is akin to a needle in a haystack?
Therefore, make sure that your website is primarily image-based, where
the photos of your listings take the center stage; of course, we’re not
saying to completely eliminate words and numbers from your site (at
least mention the address and price of the listings!). But still, real
estate is a visual business, and your site should reflect that fact.
2. Provide Your Visitors with a Map – We’ve all been
on the unfortunate real estate websites that offer no map, and every
single time it’s infuriating! Why, as the visitor to your site, should
we have to open Google Maps in a separate browser window to see where
your listing is located in its particular neighborhood? See to it that
your site features a map with your listings, or even better, that the
specific pages for your listings feature their own map with the listing
pinpointed (think of what Zillow/Trulia do in that regard).
3. Relevant Real Estate Statistics – Yes, this is
the part where you get to incorporate data! Though we did mention
earlier that your site should be a mainly pictorial entity, you should
also reserve a page (or, again, a section of the listing’s page) for key
market stats, such as mortgage interest rates, average for-sale price
in the area, nearby schools, etc. Not only is that information helpful,
but it will show you off as an expert of your area, something that, as
we’ve covered before, cannot be understated.
Twitter incorporation, videos, news feeds from awesome sites like Chicago Agent
– we feel ya, those are all great things to have in a website; save
those things, though, for when you have an established online presence
and a site that works by using the three aforementioned features.
Article courtesy of Chicago Agent Magazine
Many home shopper use the Internet, but which of them actually take action on the real estate brand sites that they visit?
As we’re reported on numerous occasions, the Internet is one
widely-used resource, with 90 percent of homebuyers beginning their home
search online.
However, all homebuyers behave differently when home shopping, and
how they response to that online experience is no exception, as the
National Association of Realtors found in a recent survey it conducted with Google.
The Age of the Internet Home Shopper
In short, NAR and Google found that the home shoppers who took action
on a major real estate brand site were an altogether younger group:
- In 2011, 31 percent of home shoppers who took action on a real estate site were between the ages of 25 and 34.
- That’s an increase from 24 percent in 2010; interestingly, for home
shoppers aged 18-24, the portion declined from 15 percent in 2010 to
just 8 percent in 2011.
- But what of the older folks? Home shoppers in the two oldest age
brackets, NAR/Google found, increased their online action; both home
shoppers in the 45-54 and 55-64 brackets were a more active bunch, with
their shares increasing from 18 to 19 percent and 10 to 14 percent,
respectively.
- So with so many age groups increasing their share, which age groups
decreased? Well, along with the 18-24 group, the 35-44 age bracket saw
their share fall, from 27 percent in 2010 to 21 percent in 2011.
An Age-Centric Marketing Strategy?
So, what do NAR and Google’s findings mean for agents? Should real
estate agents target their marketing efforts to homebuyers aged 25 to
34, considering that they make up such a large portion of Internet home
shoppers. Well, not necessarily.
By all means, be an active,
Internet-savvy agent, but ask yourself one question before you redirect
your marketing efforts to that 25-34 age group – what kind of homes am I
actually selling? You could have the most clever marketing approach
since Tickle Me Elmo, but if you’re selling real estate that is not
typical for that age bracket (a more rural property, for instance, or a
more expensive luxury residence), all that work could go to waste.
For instance, though Jean Anderson, an agent with Prudential Rubloff
in Lake Forest, receives quite a few inquiries through the Internet, the
majority of the homebuyers that she hears from are aged 35-45, simply
because, as Anderson put it, “Those are the buyers that are buying the
big houses now.”
And the real estate markets along the North Shore where Anderson
works are famous for their large, stately properties, which only a
handful of 25-34 year olds will be interested in pursuing.
So of course, market away, but keep in mind the characteristics of your market, as well.
Article courtesy of Chicago Agent Magazine
Internet video is one of the brightest stars today in real estate marketing, but why do home shopper actually interact with internet video?
The Internet is a broad, multifaceted medium, one with many uses;
however, its most impressive feature, arguably, is that of Internet
video, and the way that Web users can stream video free-of-charge to
millions upon millions of consumers.
We’ve covered the topic of Internet video marketing
rather exhaustively, but we previously left out one important
ingredient – why Internet home shoppers actually flock to Internet video
sites. Thankfully, though, the recent “Digital House Hunt” study by Google and NAR featured such data, and it’s the focus of our latest entry in the “Google Real Estate” series.
Google Real Estate: Why Internet Video?
In their study, Google and NAR found that there were a number of
reasons that Internet home shoppers utilized video when looking for
properties:
- Interestingly, the number one reason that home shoppers used Internet video was not
to learn more about a specific property, but rather, to learn more
about a certain community; 86 percent of home shoppers, Google and NAR
found, utilize Internet video for that reason.
- Seventy percent, meanwhile, tour the inside of a home with video,
while 54 percent obtain general information and 44 percent compare
features across multiple companies.
- There were other notable reasons that home shoppers used Internet
video – 38 percent, for instance, use video to better understand the
specific features of a home – but what surprised us the most were the 30
percent of home shoppers who use video to watch client testimonials;
we’ve written before about the increasing importance of client testimonials on the Web, and this seems to be only further confirmation of their importance.
Internet Video: Where the Home Shoppers Are
So, home shoppers utilize Internet video to learn about communities,
tour homes, learn the specifics of a home’s features and view client
testimonials – and we should add, they predominantly do those things on
YouTube. Though 37 percent of home shoppers use Google Video and 41
percent a broker website, the majority of home shoppers (51 percent, in
fact) go to YouTube for their Internet video needs.
And those Internet video needs, said Craig Hogan, the director of
Coldwell Banker Previews in Chicago, are defining how real estate takes
shape in the coming years.
“[A] very important segment is the up and coming Millennial buyer. By 2015, Millennials are expected to be the largest consumer demographic
and nearly a third of the U.S. population, and they spend, on average,
26.2 hours each week online and engage with video more than any other
group,” Hogan said. “The consumer is now more interested in seeing the
property on video via their tablet and smartphone and being able to
contact the agent from the same app. It’s also the best way to engage
the associate and see who they are with personal branding videos. It’s
how we engage today.”
Courtesy of Chicago Agent Magazine
The international luxury real estate market appears to be relatively
immune to economic headwinds, according to a report by Christie
International Real Estate, a luxury real estate affiliate network.
Christie’s International Real Estate Index monitors record sales prices,
prices per square foot, among other indicators in the global luxury
real estate market.
London emerged at the top of the network’s index, boasting a record
sales price of more than $121 million for a residential property in
2012. In New York, an $88 million sale allowed it to come in at No. 2.
The international luxury market is showing strong momentum, “driven
by scarcity of quality inventory and demand from international buyers in
many of the world's top destinations,” says Bonnie Stone Sellers, CEO
of Christie's International Real Estate.
There are more billionaires worldwide now than there were in 2008.
What’s more, the percentage of worldwide millionaires has grown by 55
percent since 2000, according to the report.
As wealth has grown so has the number of home buyers making housing
deals in all cash. For example, the report notes that nearly all of the
transactions in Los Angeles above $5 million were cash deals; 90 percent
in New York; and 70 percent in San Francisco and Miami.
Source: “Global luxury real estate market showing 'strong momentum',” Inman News (March 11, 2013)
Article courtesy of Realtor Magazine
Think you use your phone to look at Facebook a lot? Unless you're doing it at least 14 times a day, you're actually below average.
That's just one of the surprising revelations in a research report by IDC released Wednesday. The study tapped 7,446 iPhone and Android
users in the U.S. between 18 and 44 — representative of the 50% of the
population that uses smartphones — and asked them questions about their
phone usage across one week in March.
Depending on your perspective, many of the results are either
depressing or confirm what you knew all along. For example, it seems
that 79% of smartphone users reach for their devices within 15 minutes
of waking up. A clear majority — 62% — don't even wait 15 minutes, and
grab their phones immediately. (Among 18-24 year olds, the numbers rise
to 89% and 74%.)
Given that the survey was sponsored by Facebook, most of the
questions focus on the social network. Which is, it seems, only the
third most popular app on your smartphone, after email and the browser.
Still, 70% of smartphone users are frequent Facebook visitors, with more
than half of them checking it every day.
Peak Facebook time is during the evening, just before bed. But any
time's good: on average, we visit the Facebook app or the site 13.8
times during the day, for two minutes and 22 seconds each time. Our
average total daily mobile time on the site — and remember, this is just
via our smartphones — is half an hour.
That's roughly a fifth of all the time we spend communicating; it's
only slightly less time than we spend texting. On weekends, we check
Facebook more than we text.
Any place seems to be good to check Facebook, too. Some 46% of us
check it when we're shopping or running errands; 48% use it at the gym.
Even preparing a meal gives 47% of us no respite from the social
network. (Well, what else are you going to do while you're waiting for
the microwave to ping?)
Perhaps the most unpardonable sin: 50% of smartphone users admit to checking Facebook while at a movie. We hope they mean only during the ads.
So what are we spending all that time doing? Well, for about half of
that daily half-hour on the social network, we're simply browsing our
News Feed. The rest of the time is divided fairly evenly between
Facebook messaging and posting updates. Half of Facebook users play
games via the service on their phone a few times a day.
Does the smartphone survey ring true to you? Share your thoughts in the comments.
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, franckreporter
Article courtesy of Mashable
The internet is hugely popular, but what about older marketing strategies? Our Google real estate series investigates.
We’ll start the second part of our “Google real estate” series with
an uncontroversial claim – the Internet and real estate are highly
intertwined entities. Nine out of 10 home searches today start on the
Web, and it seems that with the passing of every day, a new app or
technology is released to further modernize the real estate trade.
Yet, as popular as the Internet and its various technologies may be,
agents should not entirely discredit older forms of real estate
marketing, a fact that was further supported by the joint study by Google and the National Association of Realtors on consumers’ Internet behavior in the home search process.
Internet Searches – Inspiring Diversity
The first part
of our series looked at how Google searches often inspired greater
action among prospective homebuyers, and the Google/NAR report found
that using the Internet also inspired consumers to use multiple sources
in their home search:
- For instance, among Internet users, 89 percent still used a real, living, breathing real estate agent.
- Similarly, 53 percent used yard signs and 46 percent used an open house when looking for a home.
- Even the two mediums that garnered the least attention – print
newspaper advertisements and home books/magazines – attracted the
attention of 28 and 19 percent of prospective homebuyers, respectively –
or, nearly half of home shoppers.
‘Google Real Estate’ – a Broader Approach to Marketing
So, what does all this mean? That even among the most Web-savvy
consumers, the traditional, physical components of the homebuying
process (signs, open houses, ads, human beings!) still generate interest
and sales.
Therefore, though you should embrace the Internet with open arms in
your marketing efforts, it would be unwise to completely cut yourself
off from those more traditional elements.
Landon Harper, an agent with @properties in Chicago, said that though
he sees the Web as the best method for wide exposure, he still utilizes
real estate’s foundational aspects.
“[The] Internet is definitely the best way to get exposure and
something every agent should focus on, but we cannot forget what this
business was built on,” Harper said. “Open houses and face-to-face
contact is no doubt the best way to connect with your potential client,
and signs are really good too. It’s our way of having product placement
in our market.”
Article courtesy of Chicago Agent Magazine
Home prices are rising, the number of homes for-sale is showing a
slight increase, and homes are selling faster—all signs that spring is
in the air in real estate, according to the latest MLS data released by
realtor.com®.
Nationwide, median list prices continue to tick up, reaching $189,900
in February. Inventories last month increased 1.15 percent
month-over-month, after recently hitting record lows. Also, homes are
selling faster with the median age of inventory at 98 days, a 9.26
percent drop from the previous month.
“As we enter the busiest time of the year for home buyers and
sellers, our latest housing trend data shows just how competitive the
market is with a significant housing recovery well underway,” says Steve
Berkowitz, chief executive officer of Move Inc. “Looking ahead, we can
expect the amount of inventory to increase this spring along with higher
list prices as sellers become more comfortable with the market
conditions.”
Median list prices were up 5 percent or more in 51 markets on a
year-over-year basis, according to realtor.com®. California markets are
seeing some of the highest increases in list prices as well as some of
the largest declines in for-sale inventory. Other top performing markets
include Phoenix, Seattle, and Denver, according to realtor.com®.
“However, many smaller industrialized markets in the Midwest and the
Northeast registered year-over-year price declines, as did Philadelphia,
Chicago, and New York City,” Lexie Puckett reports in a recent realtor.com® blog post.
“While the number of markets experiencing year-over-year list price
declines had been increasing, this pattern appears to be turning around
as home list prices increased in 78 markets last month on a
year-over-year basis and declined in 39.”
Source: “Spring Home Buying Season Starts Early According to Realtor.com’s February Trend Data,” RISMedia (March 18, 2013)
Article courtesy of Realtor Mag
In January, we reported on a rather startling statistic – that real estate-related searches on Google had increased by 253 percent from 2008 to the present day.
No doubt that’s an important stat, one that plainly demonstrates the
overwhelming growth that e-commerce has undergone the last four years;
yet, we couldn’t help but feel that the stat sold short the report it
was featured in, which was titled The Digital House Hunt: Consumer and Market Trends in Real Estate and
featured dozens of fascinating findings from a collaborative study by
Google and the National Association of Realtors. So, over the next
couple weeks, we’ll be spotlighting the many findings of that study, all
with the intent of showing you how real estate and tech – what we’re
calling Google real estate – can benefit your business.
Google Real Estate: The Power of Local
It’s no mystery that the Internet is an extremely popular tool for
home shoppers, and NAR’s study with Google only confirmed that
relationship. Nine out of 10 of today’s homebuyers rely on the Web as
their primary research source, and 52 percent use the Internet as their
first step in the homebuying process. Furthermore, real estate-related
searches on Google were up 22 percent from 2011 to 2012, and such
searches on mobile devices were up 120 percent in the same period.
But what do these searches inspire? And what is their content? Here’s what Google and NAR found:
- Internet shoppers perform an average of 11 searches before taking
action on what the study called a “real estate brand website,” or a site
for an agent and/or brokerage.
- Interestingly, the process of searching on the Internet made a
prospective homebuyer more keen to take action – the study found that
shoppers who use search engines are 9 percent more likely to take action
on a real estate website than those that don’t.
- Here’s where it gets really interesting, though – 69 percent of
those Internet shoppers who took action on a real estate website did so
after conducting a local real estate search; so, they searched “Chicago
real estate,” or “Old Town real estate,” or “Oak Park real estate,” not
merely “homes for sale.”
- And finally, 52 percent of the actions monitored on real estate sites came directly from a local real estate search.
In the end, it all comes back to what we wrote about before
regarding Google searches: if you want to be seen on Google, it all
comes down to content that is local, more local and the most local.
Courtesy of Chicago Agent Magazine
SALES
UP: U.S. sales of previously owned homes rose 0.8 percent in February
from January to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.98 million. That
was the fastest sales pace since November 2009.
INVENTORY
GROWS: More people are also starting to put their homes on the market,
which could help sales in the coming months. The number of available
homes for sale rose 10 percent last month, the first monthly gain since
April.
CONFIDENCE
RISING: The sales gains and increases in homes on the market suggest a
growing number of Americans believe the housing recovery will
strengthen.
