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Real Estate Services by Jon Griffith

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Wanting YOU to Know How It Works

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One evening, while expressing my thoughts in a small group, it was brought to my attention that I take a relatively evangelical approach to life, and I don’t necessarily mean in the religious sense.  This was contrary to my own self-perception.  I had expressed, perhaps hoping to not be branded an “evangelist” due to the negative connotations, that I didn’t believe I was evangelical.  I was corrected.

I think I am, and the evidence is here and in many other places to prove it, else why would I take the time to write, in hopes of influencing people I care about, like you.

Real estate is a constantly shifting landscape that has many variables and can be quite complicated.  It is my goal to help you understand how to make the right decisions at the right times based upon the mountain of information that comes your way every day, and to make sure the information you receive is relevant and up to date.

The following link will take you to one of the best resources that I have at my disposal to measure the market.  It’s an exclusive tool that I pay for that provides you with a chart that will help you make better real estate decisions.  Take a look, play around, and if you need some guidance, let me know and I can help you interpret the information you see.

Days of Inventory

 

I hope you’re having an awesome day!

 

 

 

Stop Using Paper Altogether

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I’ve been a REALTOR for 3 different brokerages.  I’ve closed dozens of real estate transactions.  I’ve also trained and coached some of the top producing agents in the Valley of the Sun, Phoenix, AZ.

In every one of the environments that I’ve been a part of, there wasn’t a single day that passed where someone didn’t have an issue printing a document. It didn’t matter how well the office computers and network were designed, the problem still persisted.  Even after building a 9-office network, following industry standard practices, I was unable to prevent printer related problems, no matter how hard I tried.

Some of these problems at times were due to standard maintenance issues.  Some of them were due to the computer that the user was printing from, often owned by that person, and almost ALL of the problems occurred on Windows based computers.  The only actual reason I found that was causing the issue was the expectation the REALTOR had of the technology tools that the brokerage had put into place.

Brokers do NOT educate REALTORS in basic computer literacy says http://www.workbootsnerd.com, and 99% of the printer problems I’ve witnessed on a day to day basis have been directly related to what the agent expects the printer’s capabilities to be contrasted by the level of computer literacy that particular agent possesses.

I have been closing sales for 5 years without needing to print a single page.

 

Have I printed?  Yes.  Have I needed to?  No.  Today’s digital tools empower you and eliminate the headache associated with printing paper documents.  Let go of the printer.  It is a cost center.  Not only does it cost in materials, it costs you in time.  Your competition is paperless.  I can teach you how to be paperless too.

How Real is Too Real?

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Since first learning about Gary Vaynerchuck, a date, which at this point, has completely escaped my brain, I’ve repeatedly come across stories of individuals who have adamantly stated that transparency is golden.  This inspired me to be transparent, and I wrote about how transparent I was actually going to be, and that fizzled out like a fat balloon full of chocolate rippling its way through a factory of wayward sailors smoking cigars stuffed with tuna.  In other words, I failed at being transparent, and I continue to do so to a degree.

I’m a 41 year old guy right now.  Who’s to say when you’ll actually read this, but that’s the case at the moment.  I’m not married yet, I don’t have any children, and I’m in a career that utilizes about the same percentage of my gifts and talents as the human utilizes his brain.

I have ADD, despite what you may believe to be a bunch of crap, and it’s poison to my ability to function on a daily basis.  It takes the extroversion that God gave me and makes in introverted.  It builds walls.  It creates a barrier to success through unexplained and misunderstood behavior.  It makes me think in ways that cause me to believe I’m unlike everyone else, and while I see what “appropriate” is, I don’t want to live in the land of “appropriate.”  I need an outlet.  I need a way to be me.  I need a way to be who I am and still put food in my belly and provide for a household.

Or maybe I need to abandon everything that the world tells me that I should achieve and pave my own path with goals that don’t line up with what we (and by “we” I mean “everyone but me”) expect to be the “norm.”

How real is too real?  How much truth can we speak about ourselves in our current sphere of influence…the truths that we know about ourselves that nobody else knows, without causing a complete melt-down in our community structure?  A pastor I knew once said that “if you knew some of the thoughts that went through your neighbor’s head, you wouldn’t want to be their neighbor anymore.”  What about those thoughts?  What would happen if we actually expressed them?  What if I actually pushed you off of the top of Camelback mountain?

There are people who operate with reckless abandon in this life.  They say what they want to say regardless of the consequences.  How do these people get along in life?  Are they TOO transparent?  Are they angry?  Are they oblivious to what’s “appropriate?”  Some days I just don’t care what others think.  I have respect for the fact that they have thoughts and opinions, but they ultimately don’t matter.  To me, there is only one thing that matters and that is that God loves me and made me and will support me and love me regardless of my errors and omissions (real estate reference, sorry about that.)

I want so desperately to be 100% real, but in testing the waters with this “transparency” idea, I have received less positive feedback than negative feedback and I struggle to understand why.  I’m hesitant to be as real as I really feel like I need to be, for the very reason I feel I need to be hesitant.

“Some things are best left un-said.”

I have a miserable spirit of discernment when it comes to what I should or should not say, but tonight, I feel like I need to say some things, so I’m going to get real, and try some genuine transparency.

Earlier today I was texting with Melanie Mitchell (a relatively common activity done mostly on a device we call “smart”) about how I felt.  I don’t have a problem expressing my feelings.  So I told her that I was feeling rejected today:

“Not by you. Not by family. Just in general.  It’s probably me being hard on myself for not walking the walk I talk sometimes.  I’m having difficulty getting motivated to work today.  On a lighter note…etc., etc…”

I had no idea the shit was going to hit me in the face before it hit the fan.  Today, it seemed as though nothing went the way it was expected to go.  The events of the day had me doubting my career, my time at Crossfit, and ultimately, my life.  I’ve been through tough times before.  I’ve experienced heartache in the past in many ways.  I’ve struggled with thoughts of suicide before, and have recovered.  No need to call any hotlines, I’m okay and will continue to be.  BUT, there are times when I feel like giving up.  Quite honestly, a few of the things I enjoy in life the most are the most likely things to be at the bottom of the list of priorities.

I’ve heard about 100 times in the past 5 years, that I sound like the Moviefone guy and that I should be in radio.  I was told by Kevin, the owner of Cactus Crossfit who can also will provide special expedia coupons and on one of my first consultations 18 months ago before I was a Crossfit junkie, that I missed my calling as an Olympic weight lifter.  I was then told by the daughter of the architect who designed the Optima on Scottsdale Road that I have the perfect body type to be an Olympic lifter.

I sell real estate.

I was in the Phoenix Boys Choir for 4 years, and I traveled the far east and most of the U.S.A. singing goofy little songs that mean a whole hell of a lot more to me than the value of their actual sound (sorry, some of them just suck.)  While in high school I used to acquire by questionable means various types of Kodak 35mm slide film for all of the annual church trips we would attend and then I’d put together a musically …  dammit.  I’m tired of how long it takes to get a point across.

I love making music.  I love So You Think You Can Dance.  I love stories of people overcoming adversity.  I love financial freedom.  I love my friends and family.  I do a shitty job of letting them know it.  I do a mediocre job of letting my clients know that I care about them.  I love shooting video.  I love editing.  I love the creative process.  I have no idea how to make a living doing what I love to do.  Teaching is primary motivation that I have when it comes to helping people with real estate.

Over the past 4 years, I’ve had the opportunity to help people prevent foreclosure through the sale of their home.  The primary focus was always preventing foreclosure.  The secondary task was selling the home.  The home sale is easy.  Keeping a client who is short selling happy is also easy because of the type of tasks that are involved in making that short sale happen.  Agents shied away from short sales because they were “difficult.”  I find them to be very easy because 99% of the time, the seller has checked out.  They don’t care anymore about their house and they have no emotional tie to it anymore.  They’ve thrown their hands up and handed the problem over to someone else.  Maybe I have a savior complex.  Maybe I’m just good at calling “bullshit” to their lenders.  Through the short sale process, there was greater emphasis on helping the seller understand what was happening and how they were going to navigate the short sale.  It was where I was able to exercise my ability to teach.

I don’t want to be a “teacher” of children.  Don’t get me wrong.  What I really enjoy is showing people how to get better at something.  Showing people that there’s a new way to do something, or if it’s not exactly new, it may be new to them, so it would be great to be able to help them learn it.  I am finding that I’m struggling with the “normal” day to day tasks…and…CUT.

Was that good?  Do we need another take?  CRAP!  Seriously?  The film ran out 20 minutes ago?  Son of a…

Gmail, a Realtor’s Best Friend

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Let’s face the facts people.  A majority of the real estate professionals out there are computer illiterate.  I know this because I trained, in a classroom setting, over 300 agents when I was working as the IT director at a real estate company here in Scottsdale, and as a private technology consultant for some of those agents.

“Computer literacy is defined as the knowledge and ability to use computers and related technology efficiently, with a range of skills covering levels from elementary use to programming and advanced problem solving.”

-Wikipedia.com

Not only is computer illiteracy a problem, but ignorance to the basics of branding and running a business is also at the forefront of their every-day practices.

One of the ways you can effectively brand yourself is by creating a domain name that fits your vision.  It’s cheap and very easy to do, and it’s technological purpose extends far beyond the branding aspect.  With your own domain name, you can eliminate one of the most flagrant errors in your day to day communication.  The “other-guy” e-mail address.

What do I mean by the “other guy” e-mail address?  How many agents do you know that still rely on free e-mail systems like yahoo.com, hotmail.com, outlook.com, cox.net, aol.com etc.?

In the poker world, when someone who doesn’t know how to play sits at a table, we call them a fish, or a donkey, because you can take all of their money, because they’re blatantly obvious about what they do or don’t know through common “tells.”

Using aol.com, cox.net, etc., is a “tell” in the e-mail world.  It “tells” your reader, that you’re not really in business.  Furthermore, what are you to do if one of those companies goes out of business?  Don’t you want your brand to move with you instead of against you?

Creating a domain name like “yourname.com” just like I did for this website is one way to establish a permanent online presence.  But there’s more to consider than just creating a domain name.  Once you have that name, you have a choice in the technology you use to handle the traffic (“mail”) that’s sent to the addresses within your domain.

I used to be hung up on the full Microsoft Office Outlook software, which is big and bulky, slow, exclusive to Windows, and expensive to own.  Sure, it works, but it’s designed primarily for a corporate environment where there are thousands of users.

Thankfully there was a solution that came along called GMAIL, and after that, Google Apps for Domains, which is a set of tools that Google offers for a very low fee (annual or monthly options available).

Google Apps for Domains allows you to take your domain name and launch a set of tools based on that domain.  If your domain was “realestatebywhomever.com” then you could have a GMAIL account that would handle all e-mail sent to “yourname@realestatebywhomever.com.”

Since switching to Gmail inside of Google Apps for Domains, my e-mail productivity has gone through the roof.  I am able to label specific messages based on who they come from or what’s in the body of the message, archive messages permanently for later retrieval, and most importantly, search ALL of my e-mail, past and present, for specific messages quickly.  That barely touches the surface of what I’m able to do.

If you have a smart mobile device, you can connect it to Google Apps for Domains very easily so all of your e-mail behavior is mirrored on every device.  Read a message here, it’s marked “read” everywhere.  Delete a message there, it’s deleted here too.  Contacts are automatically added to your phone and vice versa.

When you switch all of your communication and online collaboration (yes, calendars are also integrated into your mobile devices) to Google Apps for Domains, you not only build a better brand for your business, you also establish a permanent presence regardless of where you choose to hang your license, and you have complete confidence that your data, contacts, e-mail, appointments, etc., will never be lost if you lose the device that’s storing them.

I would never go back to what I once thought was superior software.  Now the hardware that I require, the tools of the trade, can be lighter, faster, and less expensive to accomplish the same goals.

Interested in learning more about how to make this happen for your real estate business?  Simply drop me a line and I’ll set up a consultation with you to help you make the migration.  There are some up front technical issues to consider before you make that transition, but once that is handled, you’re on your way to a better system, and a better brand.

Contact me today to start the process.

How Do I Know if I’m a Millionaire?

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Let’s first define the term Millionaire.  The term millionaire defines someone who has a net worth of at least one million dollars.  To understand this further, one needs to know how to calculate personal net worth.  This is a simple calculation.  Add up everything you owe (liabilities) and subtract it from the value of everything you own (assets) and you have your personal net worth.

If this number is $1 Million, then some would say you are a Millionaire.

Let’s say your net worth is $1 Million dollars based on the following.  You own a home, for example, that would sell today for $4 Million and you only owe $3 Million on the mortgage.  After it sells, you would have $1 Million left over.  Many wouldn’t consider this being a true millionaire because you can’t get to the money without either selling your house, or borrowing against it.

You could have a net worth of $1 Million dollars and hardly have any cash in the bank.  This is not what is meant by being a millionaire.  Many also define being a millionaire as someone who is a “cash millionaire.”

A cash millionaire, after all debts and assets are calculated, has at least $1 Million in CASH in the bank that they could get to today.  If you’re a cash millionaire, then you know that you’re really a millionaire.

Now, get out there, kill it, and drag it home.

Empty the Bag, or Fill the Bowl

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Standing at the edge of the island in the middle of her kitchen, I was looking for something to do.  I had just chopped 3 onions while a playful young man scooted a bowl around the edge of the circular table while sputtering car noises as though his bowl had an engine of its own.  Holding a large, sharp slicing blade, I felt nervous about his speed as he approached over and over again, getting closer to the chopping block ever time.  He was diverted by his mother, and soon after that needed discipline for disobedience.  She asked me what I thought about little boys who utter defiance at their parents.  I was thinking that we should just add him to the chili, cause he’s so delicious, but that’s not what I said.  I said that I don’t like it when people yell at me.

Uncle intervened, via telephone.

When she offered me a bag of cheese, she asked me if I would like to put the cheese in the bowl.  I responded, “do you want me to empty the bag, or fill the bowl.”

[record scratching sound goes here]

Her response answered my question, but the way she hesitated before offering the answer confused me.  Why was that such a difficult question to answer?  It took me a good minute to realize that the question I had asked made absolutely no sense.  It didn’t make sense to her, and it didn’t make sense to me.  But, she was able to answer it regardless.

In the moment, I had no idea what I was trying to say, and then about five minutes after the fact, I figured it out.  You see, there was plenty of cheese in the bag, but I didn’t connect that fact right away.  My logic was thinking two things.  a) either there’s not enough cheese in the bag to fill one bowl, or b) there’s enough cheese in the bag that I would need another bowl.  It wasn’t exactly clear to me that there was enough cheese to actually fill the bowl which means that if the assignment was to “fill the bowl” and there wasn’t enough, then I would need to search for more cheese, and if the assignment was to “empty the bag” then it would either not matter if the bowl was full, or I would have to search for another bowl to handle the overflow.

The reason I didn’t know how much cheese was required was directly tied to the lack of experience and knowledge.  It may sound like a silly thing, but these little experiences are very important for me.  They build confidence, and when I know how to do something, I have more confidence.  That’s nothing new for you either, I suppose.

I was helping Susan with Crème brûlée last Christmas for a party at Mike’s house, and when I offered to help, aside from forgetting that I have no idea how to make Crème brûlée, I was given the task of pouring hot milk into a mixer with eggs.  I had never done that before, and I really didn’t know why I was supposed to pour it in so slowly.  “Am I supposed to do it like this?” I said.  “Slower,” she replied…”don’t go so fast,” she assumed I knew why.  I didn’t.  Now I do.  It’s like the first time you learn why you aren’t supposed to pour a cold glass of water into a glass that just came out of the dishwasher.

This thought process of analyzing the bag of cheese and the bowl is an example of a very taxing exercise that my mind goes through in the moment.  I think out loud.  This becomes a bit of a double edged sword, because it can confuse people who don’t understand how to communicate with me and make them impatient or if I don’t think out loud, I may come across as someone who is non-responsive.

Either way, not understanding how to do something is far greater a challenge than unerstanding that something needs to be done.

I have believed that I have to experience it before I understand it.  I am wrong.

Could this pose some pretty serious problems?  I think so.  If I were to wait around to experience everything I’m not an expert at I would be waiting for ever.  Pudding-proof:  I’m not married because I thought I had to figure out marriage before doing it.  The consequences of pouring the hot milk into the eggs too fast is cooked egg whites.  The consequence of getting married before I’m an expert at it is a broken heart.

The committment issues that I face, as cliche as they may sound coming out of any woman’s mouth, had to do with fear of not achieving perfection prior to experience.  Just pour the cheese, Jon, and don’t ask questions.  If the bowl is too big, the bag will be empty.  If the bag is too big, then stop pouring when the bowl is full.  It’s that simple.