Tony & Darcy - The C Team's Blog

I just was perusing the UAR Magazine for the first quarter of 2009.  There are many great articles that I highly recoommend everyone involved in the Real Estate Industry in Utah to read.  I wanted to discuss in brief some of the changes in the approved forms for 2009.  The REPC as many of you no doubt know has been drastically changed.

Some of the areas to familiarize yourself with are: Section 6.2 sellers will provide a much more comprehensive title policy for the buyers it is more costly, but offers much more protection to the buyers.  Section 8.1, the Due Dilligence Condition gives the buyers much easier to understand rights to conduct inspections of the property and give the buyer the right to cancel the contract in writing.

Sections 10.2 and 10.3 in the new REPC the seller is not personally obligated to repair any item on the property.  This makes the Buyers Due Dilligence much more important and necessary to be thouroughly conducted.  Section 10.3 makes in imparative that we as agents spend time with the seller going over the the Sellers Disclosure form so that the seller can accurately fill them out. 

Please study these changes in the REPC, this is a very brief overview of the changes that I picked up on.  Also several forms have been done away with: "As-Is" Condition addendum, Removal of Appraisal Condition Addendum, Home Warranty Plan Addendum.

These forms have also been modified: Exclusive Right to Sell Listing Agreement & Agency Disclosure, Exclusive Buyer-Broker Agreement & Agency Disclosure, Subject to Sale of Buyer's Residence Addendum, Option to Keep House on the Market "Time Clause" Addendum, Transaction Document Receipt Form, Simultaneous Closing Addendum, Assignment of Interest Addendum.

These Forms have been added: Addendum to Exclusive Right to Sell Listing Agreement-Generic, Addendum to Exclusive Buyer-Broker Agreement & Agency Disclosure-Generic, Addendum to Exclusive Right to Sell Listing Agreement-Lease Option.

Please be professional and learn what each of these changes mean for you and your clients!  It really isn't asking to much from your client for us to be on top of these forms and changes.  Go out and Make it a great week, what's left anyway!

I spent too much time tonight going back through the blogs that I have written here just to see what I have blogged about.  The one thing that I noticed was that although timely, several of them lacked perspective.  There were a few when I thought that after a few busy days that the buyers were returning to the market and that things would pick up; now 6 to 10 months later, that really hasn't happened.  There are deals being done, just not in the number that I thought that they would in those earlier blogs.

We had a referral showing yesterday on a short sale property that had been a rental.  It is one side of a twin home that was built in either late 2006 or early 2007.  Normally they are very nice units, they have the jetted tubs in the master bath and large rooms with an open floor plan.

This one was horrible, it was like the renter did everything that they could to destroy the place.  There was a huge dent in the dryway where it looks like someone was pushed into it very hard.  The walls are filthy both from grime and crayons.  I hate to think about the carpet let alone describe the filth that existed there.  It honestly looked like 20 year old carpet that had never been vacuumed nor cleaned.

The bathroom mirrors had a film that looked like a small child had their hands in motor oil and then rubbed them all over the mirror.  The poor buyers realized that it was a great deal for the price to find something that large and new, but it was still going to take nearly $10k to replace the carpeting and repaint the entire unit, as well as repair the drywall and replace mouldings around the doors.  I should have taken photos, but I honestly wish to forget about the lack of respect and class that I saw yesterday afternoon.

I will never understand why some animals (sorry that isn't fair to our furry friends) think that it is alright to trash a house or apartment.  I am glad that I am not the owner, I would be sick to my stomach to see the amount of damage that was done in a relatively short time.  I guess that this is sort of a rant, but what I am really trying to do is understand why people do things like this.  It was obvious that the renters had small children, so I guess that there will be another generation that believes that it is ok to act like that and destroy things.

Anyway enough rambling and venting.  I hope that you all make it a great weekend!

I don't know how many offices do this, but our office has a breakfast meeting every year in January to give out the awards that we have earned from the previous year as well as go over what went on in the previous year.  We try to figure out what worked well, and what we need to discontinue doing to be successful.  It is usually a very good and informative meeting.  ERA Realty Center in Cedar City has been the #1 sales office for quite a number of years in our area.

The benefit of that is that gives us that haven't reached the pinnacle of success the opportunity to rub elbows with and learn from other highly successful agents in our office.  Some people look at it as a disadvantage, not me, I get to see up close and daily what makes some of these great agents successful.  Will everything that they do work for me?  Probably not, but if I am humble and smart enough to pick up on what they're doing, I may just get ahead in this business.

One of the interesting facts that came out of the meeting was that in spite of thinking that sales were way down, our office only missed the office production goal by $6 million dollars.  I know that seems like a ton of production, but our office goal was $92 Million and we achieved $86 Million.  I expected it to be down much further than that, I wish that we as a team had come as close percentage wise to our goal as the office did to it's goal.  That means much more work!

This is a great industry that we work in.  I hope and pray the the Administration will lead us out of the feelings of doom and gloom and back to where it feels like there is hope once more.  Housing, which is nearly 25% of our gross domestic product needs to rebound for this to happen.  I know that we are all out there working to make that happen!  Make it a great week!

A few weeks back one of our Mortgage Brokers left a flyer on my desk that had this on it.  I believe that it was originally written by Brian Tracy, but I am not sure.  I liked it, so I thought that I would share it with you.  It is called the 10 Keys to Success in Selling:

1. Learn to love your work, and commit yourself to becoming outstanding in your field.  You can never really like yourself and accept yourself as a worthwhile person until you have become good at what you do.

2. Decide exactly what it is that you want in life.  Set it as a goal and decide the price that you will have to pay to get it.  Nothing worthwhile ever comes without sacrifice.

3. Back every goal and plan with persistent determination and willpower.  Resilience the willingness to bounce back-and flexibility are key characteristics of successful people.

4. Commit yourself to lifelong learning.  Read, listen to audiocassettes, attend seminars and take courses.  The most valuable asset you will ever have is your mind - invest in it continually.

5. Use your time wisely.  Make sure that you are not wasting a minute and are always spending your time in valuable ways.

6. Follow the leaders.  Determine the people who are the best in your field and decide to be like them.  If you associate with people who are not success oriented, that alone can prevent your success.

7. Guard your integrity.  By integrity, we mean not only being honest with others, but also being true to yourself and your goals.

8. Use your inborn creativity.  Each person has enormous reserves of creativity deep inside him, which can be used if he stirs them up and practices every day.  Always look for a newer, better, faster and easier ways to do things.

9. Treat every prospectlike a million - dollar customer - as though he were the most important person in the world.  Conduct your life as though everyone were going to do exactly what you do.

10. Work hard and you will succeed.  If you hold back, you will never attain the heights of success that you are capable of reaching.

Use these questions as a guideline to determine your strengths and weaknesses.  Know that in good times and bad, if you will work hard and work smart and follow the above guidelines; you can achieve all the satisfaction and rewards you want!  Make it a great Week!

Our society in a large part has lost sight of the Golden Rules.  So I thought that I would post a list that my broker has on the bulletin board, feel free to add more: (As long as he who has the gold, makes the rules isn't one of them.)

1. Treat other people the way that you would like to be treated.

2. If you open it, close it.

3. If you unlock it, lock it.

4. If you turn it on, turn it off.

5. If you break it, repair it.

6. If you can't fix it, call someone who can. (Or Replace the Broken Item with a new one.)

7. If you borrow it, return it.

8. If you use it, take care of it.

9. If you make a mess, clean it up.

10. If you move it, put it back.

11. If it belongs to somebody else and you want to use it, get permission.

12. If you don't know how to operate it, Leave it alone.

13. If it doesn't concern you, mind your own business. 

I know that I shouldn't end on thirteen, but when I played baseball, 13 was my lucky number!