JL's Columbia SC Real Estate Blog: June 2009

 Have you ever heard the statement that people feed off of one another when it comes to emotions? Well, guess what, it's true. And there will never be a time when that statement is more true than when people are looking to you for guidance.

 In this business it is our job to protect and guide our clients through the task of buying a home or selling their current house. So, they will feed off of the emotions that we display when we deal with them throughout the process. This is why confidence is so important and why honesty is so imperative.

 If you act like you are afraid to do your job, then you can guarantee that your clients will be afraid to let you. But if you put your head down, press forward and remain calm, then chances are your clients will follow your lead. If you're honest, even when it's hard, they will respect you.

 No one wants to look at a client and tell them that their expectations are unreasonable. However, in order to protect our clients, we must sometimes protect them from their selves as well. If this means explaining that the home for sale will not bring the price they expect or that a buyer will not get that mansion on the hill in their price range, then we must be willing to dispense this advice. It's what creates respect and integrity and we must have both in order to have our client's trust.

 The times of fake it until you make it are far behind us now. So when the time comes that you don't know the answer to a question, and it will, then be willing to admit that you don't know but you will find the answer. If you feed your clients a load of crap, then you can expect to have some bad experiences with these clients when they find out what you're full of.

 So stay calm and confident when you deal with anyone in your business, and chances are they will do the same. Remember that they look to you for help, so they will certainly feed off of you in the process.

Columbia, SC Real Estate

 Lately there have been a lot of rumors floating around about what will come of the tax credit for first time home buyers. Will it be extended? Will it be expanded to include all those that buy a home and not just first time home buyers? The truth is that at this point none of us know for sure.

 But what is the possible backlash of all the rumors that the $8,000 first time home buyer tax credit will be extended or expanded? Isn't it possible that some buyers who would have bought a home will now sit back down on the fence to wait and see what will happen? For now all we know is that the credit is here now and it will expire December 1st.

 But with members of Congress now introducing bills to extend and expand the credit, there are many people who wonder if they hold out longer will they get a better deal.

 In the beginning the issue with buyers sitting on the fence was mainly centered around price. Prices were declining and buyers were waiting for the "bottom" of the market in an effort to get the best deal possible. Now could we be setting ourselves up for another reason to sit back on that fence and see what else the Government will throw their way?

 At some point this will all have to come to an end and there will be no more tax credits. As for now no new tax credits have been passed and the current first time home buyer credit will come to a close the first December of this year.

Columbia, SC Real Estate

 I do a lot of open houses and I do them to gain attention to my listings and myself. You never know what you will get when you open a door to the public, it could be a great thing or a complete waste of time, you never know what you're going to get.

 My favorite thing at any open house is the visitor that hates me the second they walk through the door. It's open to the public, but have to understand that in most cases it's still a home, and the owners have hired me in an attempt to sell the house. I'm hard to avoid at these things, because I'm right there and I'm the guy who opened the door for you to walk through in the first place.

 Now please allow me to explain that I am not there to harass so much as I am there to help if necessary. I'm also not going to let someone who just walked through the door wonder around alone in a house filled with my client's valuables. I'm not there to offend you, but let's face it, there are bad people out there and I need to make sure that nothing goes missing on my watch. Also, you walked into an open house, so how could you not expect me to at least say hello and introduce myself?

 Another thing you may notice is that we will ask questions. It's not a crazy, deceptive tactic on my part to trick you into something. It's an effort to see if I can help you or if you even want help. Let's say for example I ask " are you from around here? " It does neither of us any good for you to reply " I'm from up there ", which people have done. I usually reply to that answer with the fact that I live over there and I think it's close to up there, have you heard of it? The original question is only an effort to understand whether you are relocating or whether you are already familiar with the area.

 When I greet you and you look at me like I'm an idiot and say in a stern voice, "I'm just looking alright!", and then try to rush past me, I'm not impressed with your tough negotiation tactics. If you just want to look, then just say you popped in to have a look around, it's an open house and I don't mind the public being there. Believe it or not, that's even the point of the whole thing. There's no need to be rude to me, I'm not there to be rude to you.

 I have encountered many types of people in all my open houses, and I enjoy doing them. I actually like meeting people and having a little small talk while they browse the home. But I will tell you this, when you walk into an open house or a model home in a new home community, you're going to run into a Realtor. That's sort of our job. Most of us don't have sharp teeth or claws, we're just going to ask a few painless questions while you're there to find out whether or not we can help. After all, if you went to a restaurant and a waitress/waiter asked what you would like, would you freak out on them? You walked into the restaurant knowing they would be there, the same can be said for us at open houses or model homes.

  So remember, it's not likely that I'm going to bite you, you can even carry on a conversation. When I ask where you're from, sometimes it's just small talk, it's not because I think people from a certain area of the country taste better.

Columbia, SC Real Estate

Columbia, SC Homes For Sale

 Recently I saw a news report that said our Governor, Mark Sanford, seems to have disappeared. His office has not really commented on his where abouts, and when Mrs. Sanford was questioned she told reporters that she is unaware of his location. The only thing she knew was that he said at one point he needed some time away from the children to write something.

 If this seems a little ambiguous, you are not alone. The only thing that I really know at this point is that news stations are reporting that the Governor of South Carolina is currently missing. Friends who were contacted by the media have made the statement that he is tired after a hard battle at the State House due to the stimulus package that Stanford did not want to accept from the Federal Government. However, they also report that they do not know where he is either.

 So with all that in mind, if you see Mark Sanford out anywhere, tell him to call his wife. If she really doesn't know where he is, she is likely a little worried at the moment. If you get the impression that I do, that she knows where he is and he just wants the media to leave him alone, then just ignore the guy if you happen across him. He may just want to take a day off.

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 The crowd cheered so loud that I could barely hear myself think. Thousands of tiny bursts of light erupted throughout the crowd and you could just feel the intensity boiling over. Everyone was in a frenzy as I stopped long enough to look at the time clock. Blight yellow bulbs made up the 99 to 101 score and we where down. 8 seconds remained on the clock and it seemed like too little time to eclipse that insurmountable task of claiming our victory.

 As the buzzer sounded and declared the end of our last timeout, my heart pounded in my throat and my legs felt like jelly. The ball was inbound and seconds felt like hours as they ticked away and the crowd held it's breath. Suddenly the bounce pass came my way from Jordan and I shot almost as a reflex without time to think of what would happen if I missed. The ball left my had and I knew it was good even from that distance the second it did. As the ball passed through the net the buzzer screamed and so did the crowd as we became champions and my mother called from the back door that dinner was ready.

 It was 1992, I was 12 years old and that was the first of many NBA championships that I would claim along side Micheal Jordan, Scottie Pippen, and the rest of the gang for the Chicago Bulls. As I turned to look at my Mom smiling at me from the back porch, the arena and the crowd melted away, returning to the sandy court where my step father had put up my new basketball goal in the backyard. It wouldn't be the last time my Mom interrupted a championship celebration, later that evening she would also interrupt a last second lunge across the goal line to win the Superbowl to tell me that I had a phone call.

 Just the other day I was playing a game of H.O.R.S.E. with a friend that lives up the street and I thought of these moments. It's always funny to think back to a time when I won tons of championships in multiple sports, sometimes 6 or 8 a day. They were really stacking up by the time I became a teenager and everything turned from baseball cards and bubble gum to girls and guitars. There's something powerful when you still remember those dreams so vividly as an adult. We spend our entire youth wishing we were grown and our entire adulthood just wishing we could be a kid again.

 The funny thing is that we never get to choose when we will grow up and we never get to truly return to that crazy imagination that cultivated so many Grammy's, championships, and Oscars in our youth. But something of that child within you will always remain. You are now really just a larger version that will not allow yourself to let go long enough to return to this simple fantasy. Letting go is always the hardest part. Of course these days, people really look at me like I am out of my mind when I jump up and down, cheer and wave to a crowd that only exists in my head. They look at me like I've lost my mind and I wonder how they would think if they found out that I felt like I had just gone sane.

 The greatest accomplishments in the history of our existence all started as a whimper. A dream in the mind of a madman that saw a sanity the rest of the world was unwilling to comprehend. Someone was just crazy enough to set that dream in motion despite the naysayers that stood on the sideline too afraid to fall on their face to join the game. So here's to all the lost dreamers drifted through a life of caged reality. There's no need to be trapped inside your skin and the only impossibility in this life is the idea that's unrealized or given up on. You never know how far you can go until you are willing to go too far, so why not give it a shot?

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  The funny thing about brilliance is the fact that most brilliant ideas come from the minds of ordinary people. They're not the sterotypical Einstein of modern society that locked themselves away reading ancient texts in an effort to unlock the secrets of the universe. Instead, they are everyday, dare I say normal, people who have a spark go off in their minds that leads to fire burning out of control that consumes all it touches. A fire of brilliance.

  Fire itself is a living breathing entity that requires heat, oxygen, and fuel to burn. And once it burns it spreads and takes on a life of it's own. So can every brilliant thought that's put to good use. You just have to catch the spark and have the courage to add some fuel to that fire and watch it burn like mad. In business, conformity is one thing I see that seems to smother a good fire faster than anything else.

 When I first started a career in real estate, some of the first advice I received was that there was no need to reinvent the wheel. I heard it repeated constantly from other agents, other Brokers, and from various other entities tied to the business. No need to reinvent the wheel, no need to rock the boat, and all I could hear was no need to be anything other than what everyone else already is now. The fact of the matter is that many people survive following the same pattern and there is some merit to tactics that always work. Those that excel seem to take it further and become completely different from their surrounding.

 While conforming might get you by, standing out from the crowd will typically take you much farther. Why on Earth in a business where you need to stand out from the crowd would you ever want to blend? So, when I realized that the wheel that was given to me from the start had a flat tire, I went in search of something different. I watched what successful agents did, and more importantly, I watched what they didn't do that would improve their business. Then I did that.

 Standing out in an endless sea of the same old thing is not always easy. At that point in the eyes of the consumer, you are guilty by association and lumped in with the crowd. But you have to keep your eyes open and on the prize, because you never know when that stroke of brilliance in your head will cause a spark. And as soon as it does, you throw as much fuel as you can on that fire and burn baby burn!

www.jlboney.com

 Heard this joke from a friend and thought I would share with the crowd.

 A gentleman had been trying his best to lose weight but could not get motivated. He saw an ad that claimed you could lose weight guaranteed or your money back and thought he would give it a try. The first level was to lose 15 pounds. He called a signed up. The next day his doorbell rang and there was a cute blond standing at the door wearing nothing but a pair of running shoes. She said if you can catch me I'm yours. He chased her for miles and never could catch her. The rest of the week went the same way and by the end of the week you had lost 18 pounds.

 He was very excited about his weight loss and decided that maybe he should sign on for the guaranteed 30 pounds to see how it would work. The next day his dorrbell rang and he opened the door to see a drop dead gorgeous young lady standing there in nothing but a pair of running shoes. She said the same as the first, if he could catch her, then he could have her. This went on for the next week and no matter how hard he tried he could not catch the young lady. At the end of the week he had lost his thirty pounds though, so he was very happy.

 Being so excited about his tremendous results so far, he called up the company and told them that he wanted to try the last level. It guaranteed that he would lose 50 pounds. The operator asked him "are you sure you want to do this?" The man's mind was made up that he had to go to the next level. The next day a huge smile crossed his face when he heard the doorbell and he ran over to open the door. Standing before him was a huge body with rippled muscles wearing nothing but running shoes. The body builder said " if I catch you, your ass is mine!"

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 Just a few random thoughts on how things may shape up thanks to the buyout bailout and how things will change with the Government taking over the majority of stock in companies.

 10- We can now refer to Congressmen as Brokers. I mean what the hell, we already trust our hard earned money to someone we call a Broker, why not call Congress the same. After all, they cause us to go broke faster than anyone else anyways.

 9- We will have to call a representatives office in order to take out a loan. If you thought this was a difficult process to start with, then it's going to be a real treat when you try to get one of them on the phone.

 8- We can now demand a right to be present at GM meetings. I've never heard of a company that would deny it's majority share holder the right to be present at meeting and since the American tax payers now own 61% of GM, now's our chance to go hang out with the board.

 7- Jobs will become outdated. There will be an effort to ensure millions of small individual bailouts. This way no one will ever have to work again.

 6- Social Security #'s will be used as credit card numbers. Due to the ease to remember them and an effort to go green we will no longer use plastic, but instead use our SS #'s as credit card numbers. This is how we will spend our individual bailouts at Government owned companies.

 5- Government will realize that Mills and Coal mining companies had it right years ago. Prior to jobs going out of style, we will all have to work in Government owned companies. Then will have to spend our money in government owned stores so that we just give it right back. This will of course be after they seize everyones homes so we now have to rent from them as well.

 4- There will be a sex tax. After realizing that they left this out when they where passing a tax on everything else that people enjoy, "the brokers" will immediately set a tax on any sexual act in the U.S. I don't mean to frighten anyone, but I think it will be a flat tax.

 3- China will go bankrupt. After lending and ending billions to the U.S. China will suddenly come to the realization that they can no longer support our habits only to find out it's too late. This was our plan all along to spend them to death so we can have all our overseas manufacturing jobs back.

 2- Once the jobs return, more mill towns spring up across the Nation. See number five if you need to know what will happen there.

 1- We will no longer be allowed to use denim to make cloths. Since left over denim is a main ingredient in the making of paper money here, we will have to use all the denim just for money. At the rate we're planning on printing it out, this may happen sooner than I expected.

**** Disclaimer **** This is just a little fun the expense of our Government. In all honesty, if you don't get a good laugh out of the thought that some of these things may sound like good ideas to them, you are likely not American. If it was better where you are from, please let me know where that is, I would like to go back with you when we get a chance.

www.jlboney.com

 All my life I have been a strong supporter of placing blame where it belongs. Find the guilty and punish them for their wrong doings and their inconsiderate actions toward society. But at what point does the chase for the guilty become the search for a scapegoat? At what point does it truly become a witch hunt?

 We all know how bad the economy has been and crunch of the economic crisis has been felt by far too many. But at what point is it counterproductive to spend valuable time and energy in search of a place to point our finger and a door step in which to lay the blame of this debacle?

 We could blame the banks for lending too much money to risky borrowers.We could blame the government and the worlds leading economists for not seeing the writing on the wall and warning us. We could blame GM and all the other failing and failed businesses for poor practices that cost many their jobs. We could blame the borrowers who knew that would not be able to afford the home once the rates adjust. We could blame Realtors for continuing to sell homes. Who else would we like to blame in search of our witch to burn at the stake? Here, I'll make it simple for the world, the government, and society at large, the current state of our economy is completely my fault. I did it and I'm not proud of it, but I caused the entire thing.

 Now that we have a a scapegoat to blame and someone to point the finger at, do you think we could possibly start using our effort to solve the problem. There is a ton of blame to go around in our current status, however, trying to pinpoint who or what exactly caused the situation really doesn'tt help much in solving it. I know the fact that I can't swim would be reason that I might drown if I fall out of a boat, but that doesn't save my life if I fall out before I learn to swim. At that point I just need to figure out how on Earth to stay afloat and get the hell out of the water. Once I learn the fact that I would have been fine if I knew how to swim, then I can learn to so so. Next time I fall out of the boat, I will be prepared. But that's next time and what about this time?

 My big point in all of this is that we should focus a little more attention on how to make our situation better, rather than who to blame for our predicament. Maybe if companies would focus their attention on how to make their business better, rather than who to complain to about it, then they would start doing better. This is a method that could be beneficial all the way down the line. Focus on the solution rather than who to blame for the problem. But then what the hell would I know, this is all my fault remember.

www.jlboney.com

 My Mother for as long as I have been alive has been someone that I have looked up to. The reasons are glaringly obvious as she has always been there for me when I needed her and she has always to great lengths to put her family first in all facets of life. A person could pick a far worse role model, but today, role models are not my topic of conversation. Instead I would like to discuss something else.

 Today just for some fun I would like to talk about personality traits. My Mother has a sharp sense of wit and humor, a deep love for sarcasm, and obsessive compulsive disorder. Why on Earth would I choose these three traits to bring up? Well I do so because these are the very traits the my Mother passed on to me. While my wit and humor is a little more twisted than hers, we run hand and hand on the sarcasm, and my O.C.D is a little more under control I think, it's not hard to see where I get it all from when you have the two of us in the same room for a short period of time.

 Like I said, my humor gets a little more twisted, and we do both have the ability to laugh at our self. So, every time I visit her, I have to make a special effort to irritate her O.C.D. for my own amusement. She is one of those people who firmly believe that everything has it's place. Well, she also collects tons of trinkets that she proudly displays throughout her home. She has painstakingly placed them in her desired location for each one. She can feel it in her bones when one of them is moved in the slightest of ways from their spot.

 If you have guessed by now that I move one of these trinkets every time I stop by, then you are absolutely correct. She notices as soon as she walks past whatever I move, and she immediately returns it to the correct spot from which moved it. She just can't help herself and I have started to notice that neither can I. Which make me wonder if I have now created an entirely new personal quirk in the process of trying to make fun of her. Because now when I am out there, I just can't walk past her displays without being able to control the urge to just move a few around.

 The fact of the matter is that no matter who you are and whether or not you like to admit it, you have contracted certain traits from your parents. Sometimes these are obvious and other times they are only noticeable to a very keen eye. Either way, they are there for sure. So take a close look at yourself, and you may see a few things that are all too common amongst you family. It might also give you better understanding of why you and they do what they do.

www.jlboney.com