There are many fellow New Yorkers (and New Jerseyans- they might have even had a better view) who might have a more up close and personal recollection of September 11, 2001. I think there is value in sharing our memories. 

Ann and I were in Rego Park Queens. Our wedding was 18 days away, and her parents were in the air on their way to NY from Korea. I was going to drive her into Manhattan to work on the Upper East Side and then head up to Westchester. When the first plane hit, we all thought it was a horrible accident- I thought it was like some private guy who had a Thurman Munson-like accident. On the way in to work, we could see the smoke coming from the towers from Queens Boulevard, and it honestly looked like a big chimney a few hundred yards away (That’s how large the WTC was- dominated the skyline), billowing a big black cloud of smoke. 

When we got to Ann’s office at Rockefeller University, I accompanied her upstairs, which was something I never did before. Everyone was watching TV, in shock. We saw the second plane hit on live TV. I remember the commentators not saying anything initially, and then another talking head describing it calmly, I think even saying the word “apparently.”

This went from a terrible accident to realizing I was on the edge of a war zone. We were in a war, and worse, in a battle zone. They are flying effing airplanes into the effing world trade towers. We have to get out of here. Then word comes that the Port Authority is closing bridges into Manhattan. Ann  wanted to stay at the office- she was afraid for her parents’ plane and wanted to be where she could be reached by phone. 

I wanted no part of sticking around. If the bridges were closed, we could be stranded. 

What would happen next? 

What would they do to the subways? What if the destruction continued uptown? Were there planted agents with suitcases of gas ready to blow in buses or crowded buildings? I remember thinking about these things. 

The very first (and last) time I ever gave Ann a direct order was to get out of the building with me. I suddenly wondered if this was the feeling my dad felt when he was a GI overseas. I think what convinced her to come was that she couldn’t reach her aunt in Chinatown on the phone- maybe they had already sabotaged the phones. And she wasn’t going on the subway after this. Ann’s last protest was that the bridges were closed, but I told her the Port Authority bridges were closed, not all bridges. We’d take the 3rd Avenue Bridge and drive through the Bronx. 

Our cell phones didn’t work (it would take Verizon months to restore the phones in lower Manhattan as a matter of fact. I still remember those stupid trailers people had to use), and the highway driving north was empty- I felt like I was in a post apocalyptic movie. But it was real. And we didn’t know what was happening next. If the AM radio didn’t work I don’t know what I’d have thought. 

When we got home to my mother’s house in Ossining There was a test pattern on some channels. My Mom, who lived Pearl Harbor via radio in 1941, just shook her head all day. Ann’s parents, we learned from the airline, were grounded in Minnesota and in a high school gym. 

My older brother called to check in and all Farandas were OK. My nephew, who went to college in Manhattan, was also OK. We were lucky. 

Lucky. 

It was hellish, but not the hell some went through, and I am thankful my loved ones are all intact. 17 or so fellow Villanova alumni died that morning. My brother lost a client who was never found. So we cried with everyone else for weeks, and on September 29, got married in a subdued ceremony, all things considered. 2 days later we boarded a plane for Aruba, and that was strange as well. 

Today I will attend NYSAR BAR camp at the Rye Town Hilton, and live my life and work fully. But I will do it mindful of that day, and thankful that I got the rest of my life. I will never forget, and I hope we end the threat somehow. It still feels raw to walk myself through my memories of that time, especially those black clouds in the distance, framed against an idyllically blue sky. 

With a median home price hovering near $700,000, even a modest price reduction on a Westchester County home can be tens of thousands of dollars. I have to approach a reduction with the diplomacy of a funeral director but be as convincing as a physician imploring his patient to quit smoking. 

No one could predict after the stimulus where prices would go, but it is clear that what few buyers we have are skimming the absolute cream off the top and leaving the rest. They even fight over the good stuff, creating an illusion of urgency in isolated precincts. Overall, sadly, median home price is an illusion; it is a metric of the value of those few, unique sought after homes that people watch even when they weren’t on sale. They needed nothing. They were priced to the bone for their category. 

Money lost in a price reduction was never your money. It was an illusion. It didn’t exist. I find myself, more and more, explaining to mournful sellers that the $25,000 that went down the drain when they went from $624,900 to $599,900 was a paramour that never loved them. She never cared, Johnny. The baby wasn’t yours. She wanted to close the Copa and make sure you never worked in this town again. For God’s sake man pull yourself together, it was all an illusion. 

You know, that sort of thing they cover day 2 in licensing class. Or not. 

In 2005, 852 single family homes sold in Westchester County with a median price of $732,000.

In 2010, 424 single family homes sold in Westchester County with a median price of $715,000. 428 people got nothing. 

The pool of able buyers has shrunken by an absurd amount. Millions of prospects have vanished due to either their own disasters or the new draconian lender underwriting guidelines. What few buyers remain are skeptical, drunk with options, terrified of making a mistake, have no confidence in the future, and are heavily invested in the group think notion that they must get a steal or they will be exposed to grave financial risk. You know, all those happy things perspective home buyers have always focused on. 

Here’s the reality: If you are multiple listed, staged well, tidy, and have been on the market for 60 or 90 days with no offers or few lookers, the market has spoken; you need to reduce your price. You aren’t the McClotchkees down at the end of the cul de sac who sold in the first 30 days. They had something, or ten things, you don’t have. And the only adjustment you can make to the buying public is price. A feature ad won’t do it. A newspaper display ad won’t get it done. Busting your agent’s chops to chase down Gladys Pflarphlingston for feedback on a showing 2 weeks ago won’t do it. If you are on the MLS, I can show you how many people have clicked on you online and clicked off every week since we listed. You aren’t a secret. Quite the opposite: with public searches, serious prospects can tell me their opinion of your toothpaste.  

If we are in showing condition with my marketing and you aren’t sold, the faster we address price the faster we’ll sell. The money you are asking for is not on deposit in the bank of buyer opinion.

This market report is for single family home activity in the Ossining school district for August of 2010. All information is derived from the Westchester-Putnam Multiple Listing Service. 

The numbers are up, which is encouraging we we distance ourselves from the stimulus. The number of transactions is up 40% from August of 2009 and the median price is up almost $20,000. Encouraging stuff. 

Another fact from the data: For both 2008 and 2009, homes that sold in the first 90 days got a higher percentage of asking price than homes that took over 90 days- about 2% in 2010 and a whopping 4.5% in 2009. Moral of the story: price it right in the beginning and you’ll sell, and sell for more. 2% at a median price of about $400,000 is $8,000!!! There’s your stimulus! Who needs the government? In 2009 the market was awful, but aggressively priced homes still sold fast.

Available inventory is high (150), with lots of choices on the market. 22 homes are under contract, which has been steady since June and bodes well for the coming months. 

Previous postings on Ossining.  

You can search for a home in Ossining by getting yourself a free Listingbook account. 

We got word last week that a past client’s loan modification was approved. As happy and relieved as they were, my beleaguered clients had to swallow a rough pill: on the terms of the approved loan modification, their mortgage payment would be several hundred dollars higher than their original payment. 

It had been a long process. First, they had a job loss which resulted in their initial default. They were in arrears for almost a year before they could overcome the shock and paralysis and make any headway on a loan modification. All the while they worked like dogs at anything they could find before thankfully re entering the workforce. The trial payments, which were several hundred dollars less then their original payment, started immediately on application to the HAMP process.

It took 10 more months, and they made their trial payments religiously. They were issued a denial once because they allegedly missed payment, which the court referee threw back after given proof all payments were in fact made on time. When the approval came through, it was the same rate and term, and the arrearage was added to the principle, resulting in a higher payment than even their original loan. The bank basically negatively amortized the loan and hit the reset button. 

In their case, they were in a take it or leave it situation; ironically, getting a better job knocked them out of the HAMP program, and the modification was due to the lender’s largess, not the government’s. Since their issue was an inability to write a check for tens of thousands (50k+) of dollars to reinstate and not the amount of their payment, they are going to take it. The only issue they’ll have going forward is if they lose a job again, but that makes them no different than anyone else. 

A few observations:

• Even for sophisticated, educated people with college degrees, the loan mod process is complicated and grueling. 
• Bank staff does little to make the process understandable, probably because in large part the staff themselves don’t get it. 
• If the red tape and vagaries are this much of an ordeal for educated professionals, it must be UberHell for people who aren’t. 
• It is no wonder the re-default rate is so high. People stagger across the finish line and collapse, even in the best of scenarios. 

On the whole in this case however, my people will not lose their house. Disaster was averted. This is one listing I am glad to not get. 

I got this idea from Terry Hunnefeld from the old Goldrush program in the mid 1990’s. Terry was a Grand Rapids based broker who has since merged with By Referral Only. This was my first foray into Direct Response Marketing, and it does indeed make the phone ring, and that is the first step. 

A few things to note:

• The disclaimer is right on top, which is necessary for compliance. 
• The USP, or Unique Selling Proposition, is gutsy and radically different from what people are getting from other agents. 
• The card itself is not fancy, and almost looks handwritten and again, separates you from other mailers which try to be glitzy and impressive.
• If prices in your market area are lower than they are here, make the amount $500. 

 Here’s the small print, given at the listing presentation on company letterhead: 

1. Home has to be priced at a recommended 60-day market price mutually agreed upon by agent and seller. 
2. Home MUST be shown to all reasonable requests- denying a reasonable showing request invalidates the guarantee because it could lose the buyer we were supposed to have. 
3. If an offer that results in a closed sale is not promulgated within 60 days of going on market and the above 2 conditions are met, the amount will be deducted from the commission at closing when the house does sell. 

When I started in real estate in 1996, one of the things my mentor gave me was a dog eared book with a bald guy on the cover wearing a brown suit and pinky ring. 

The book was entitled “List More, Sell More,” and the author, Jerry Bresser, is a legend among real estate trainers. I did not judge the book by the cover; I read it and made the philosophy my mantra: if you want to make a high income in this business, you have to list more properties. The book is out of print; Bresser still sells it, and you can buy it used on Amazon for a lot of money. I own 2 copies. 

“List More, Sell More” was written in 1983, so it did not take into account the possibility of other business models, such as exclusive buyer agencies. If you run an EBA, my thoughts don’t apply. But if you work with sellers or want to, here’s the deal: You’ll make more sales, build a larger team, and build a bigger operation if you have a strong inventory of listings.The more listings you have, typically the more money you’ll make. And as Barbara Todaro (Thanks, BTW, for inspiring me to finish the draft) recently pointed out, if you focus on listings, your time becomes more your own. Working with a buyer means your time in that moment is singular. Working with listings duplicates your time and replicates income. 

I’m not knocking working with buyers; we need  them. I still work with buyers, but I have never made it my primary focus. If you like working with buyers, great. Work with buyers. And if you want to take your operation to the next level, you’ll get more buyers and make more sales if you increase your listing inventory. You can’t really have a store if there is nothing on the shelves, and the firms with the most signs in the yards around here have the largest market share. 

Imagine working with a buyer for 6 hours on a rainy Saturday. You get home tired and soggy. They found nothing worth buying, and you made nothing. You have hope, though, that you’ll sell them something. 

Now imagine working with a buyer for 6 hours on a rainy Saturday. You get home tired and soggy. They found nothing worth buying, and you made nothing. Or so you think- because on your fax are two offers on 2 different listings of yours. You now have more than hope! You have INCOME, 2 happy sellers, and lucrative work to do on converting the offers into closings. 

OK, let’s suppose there are no offers. You are still soggy. But believe me, there will be buyer inquiries on your listings! You work for buyers. But listings in many ways work for you. It is that simple. And you are protected for your commission, no matter what. Show me an agent with 15-20 listings, and I’ll show you a person who is not leaving the business anytime soon because they can’t make money. 

It might be difficult at first, and getting over the initial hump is always the rub for an independent, but let me tell you- when a prospective seller tells you that they’ve seen your sign before, you have reached critical mass. And there is no exhilaration like building your own brand. There is also no greater feeling of momentum than planting YOUR sign in the yard of a referral from a happy seller whose home you listed successfully. 

Feel free to contact me with any questions, and we have plenty of openings in my Expired Listing Mastermind group. 

Happy Labor Day. I’ll be working with a buyer later today, but all of my listings are working for me 24/7. 

This is for single family home activity in the Briarcliff Manor school district for August of 2010. All information is derived from the Westchester-Putnam Multiple Listing Service. I decided to mix things up a little this month and see if I could compare this past August with the previous Augusts going back to the peak of 2005. 

Compared to August 2009, Briarcliff Manor sales volume is down by 2 deals, but the median price, which had nowhere to go but up, grew by $118,000. 2008 must have been an anomaly, as the peak in 2005-2006 had median prices in the low 900’s. 

16 Homes are currently under contract with a median asking price of $839,000. 

There are 49 available home in inventory with a median asking price of $865,222. 

Well, no real trend. Days on market are longer, and prices are lower. No surprises there. But it is interesting to look back. 

Previous posts on Briarcliff Manor.  

If you’d like to search for a home in Briarcliff, get yourself a free Listingbook account and search the MLS like an agent. 

This is more for brokers and owners of independent firms like myself, but if others find it helpful, use it. 

Maybe I’m a total goober for not having fancy software to run my company, but that’s another post. Our setup is probably unorthodox; Ann is typically at home, Ronnie, my admin, is at the office from 9-5, and I’m…everywhere. I have a Netbook which enables access to the Internet from anywhere- my car, a client or prospect’s house, or a diner. 

Cloud computing, or utilizing web-based programs instead of saving everything to one hard drive, benefits our model immensely because we all have access to the same data. Our product of choice is FREE- Google docs. All Google docs are roughly analogous to Microsoft Office, and while they are not as robust, they are free. And they do the job. Better than Office, they have a great filing system. 

All you need is a Google account, and you have access to all word documents, spreadsheets, forms, and plenty of other applications. Here are a few of the things we use daily:

• All messages are recorded on a spreadsheet. Every phone call is recorded and we have notes and color codes to denote status of the matter at hand.
• All buyers and sellers have a spreadsheet checklist. 
• All company forms– memos, offers, and letters, are saved in documents.
• We track the status of all transactions in the Spreadsheet program.
• We track the marketing steps (MLS, photos, signs, lockboxes, syndication) in Spreadsheets. 
• All files can be organized by type, labels, stars, and personal folders. Personalize it as you wish.
• Every agent on the team has a file.  

There’s plenty more, but I think you get the drift. All documents are password protected and sharable between our respective Google accounts. If I create a file, you can’t read or edit it unless I share it with you. All changes occur in real time- I have been on the messages folder and watched someone edit it miles away.

The race goes to the swift. We might eventually get web based Top Producer or some other more feature-rich system but thus far, Google Docs have made a huge difference for us, and, I believe, put me on the same footing as any firm with it’s own proprietary software. We dropped Showing Desk years ago in large part because of it (and CSS). I can’t think of a time where a ball has been dropped because we weren’t organized enough. This has enabled us to track transactions, prospects and many other crucial operations smoothly. 

So, to all my fellow independent broker-owner managers out there, here it is. Google docs are free, can be personalized, and save automatically. You’ll love the ROI.