The Phoenix Real Estate Guy

FHA Buyers: Phoenix housing market 2nd class citizens

Marty Boardman — Wed, 16 May 2012 18:11:18 +0000

Call me an infrequent flyer.

Last week, I stood in the long line at the Phoenix Sky Harbor security checkpoint like a lamb being led to slaughter. The short line, the one that guys in fancy suits get to use, was strictly forbidden because I didn’t know the secret handshake. I also lacked preferred silver diamond elite status.

I boarded the plane with the Zone 5’ers and passed by the first class passengers as they sipped their free booze and closed multi-million dollar deals on their smartphones. Worse, these stuffy elitists refused to make eye contact with me as I made my way to coach, where I would go to suffer with the rest of the commoners for the next three hours.

(Make sure you follow Marty on Twitter here)

Then it dawned on me as I took my middle seat in aisle 27. I’m a 2nd class citizen of the air travel world.

In case you haven’t heard the news, the greater-Phoenix area is a seller’s market again. Inventory levels are down and prices are up. Cash buyers accounted for 40% of all sales in March. And this new phenomenon has turned FHA loan approved buyers into the 2nd class citizens of the housing market.

Why?

For starters, FHA loan approved buyers have very little, if any, cash to put down on their home purchase. In rapidly appreciating markets like Phoenix it’s difficult for appraisers to keep up with values. If you’re a home seller or fix and flipper like me and are under contract with an FHA buyer what happens if your house doesn’t appraise for the offer price? You either lower it to match the appraised value or put the house back on the market. Neither option is very attractive.

If you’re a home seller and are under contract with an FHA buyer and the house does appraise you’re still not out of the woods. The FHA requires a second appraisal, usually ordered about 5-7 days prior to closing. The FHA honors the lower of the two.

Then there’s the inspection. The FHA has a laundry list of stuff that must be done in order for them to approve a buyer’s loan. Last year, I flipped a house to an FHA approved buyer that didn’t ask for any repairs. After the home inspection was complete the FHA came back and required I fix a bunch of stuff – to the tune of $1,500. Even worse, they had to send the inspector back at my expense to verify the items had been corrected, which pushed out the closing one week.

This is why many FHA borrowers are getting squeezed out of the market. They are the last people a home seller wants to deal with. Sellers here know that over asking price offers likely won’t appraise. The only way to get a deal done is to find a cash buyer, or a conventional buyer with enough cash to cover the difference if the appraisal comes back low.

So if you’re an FHA approved buyer what do you do?

I recommend you put more money down. That lets the seller know you can at least make up some of the difference if the appraisal doesn’t match the offer price. If you don’t have any money to put down then save some and buy later. Homeownership is not a life or death proposition.

The alternative is you get treated like a 2nd class citizen. But take it from me; it’s not that bad. Just be prepared to wait in a long line before finally getting to your seat.

You should follow Thompsons Realty @ThompsonsRealty

Photo Credit

Originally posted on Phoenix Real Estate Guy. If you are reading this anywhere but inside your RSS feed reader or your email client, the site you are on is guilty of stealing content.

Contracts are neither moral nor immoral

Dean Ouellette — Mon, 14 May 2012 14:27:40 +0000

Contracts have no morality

Are short sales moral?

I am going to talk a little bit about the “moral side” of a short sale. My favorite part of this story… the twist at the end that makes the whole thing laughable.

I was reading this article on CNBC this weekend about short sales and felt I needed to jump into the discussion. The Phoenix Real Estate Guy has written a lot about short sales as they have been a major part of the Phoenix housing market for the last few years.

The premise of the article is, should people who can technically afford to pay for their underwater home continue to do so, or should they be allowed to walk away? Here is how the author sums up the situation:

These borrowers have the wherewithal to make their monthly payments on their underwater homes but choose not to, because they know they won’t make their equity back any time soon. They also see that they can now buy more home for less money, given how low home prices have fallen. They can get in at the bottom, rather than pay what amounts to rent on their current homes. In other words, they’re in a position to make more money by walking away from their debt and letting their lender eat the loss.

I’m no bank apologist, but is that fair?

When I have this conversation with home owners I always tell them, no matter what have been taught to think, what you are doing is making a business decision. If you invested $400,000 in a stock that was now worth $250,000, and was unlikely to return to $400,000 for another 10-12 years, would you continue to hold that stock or would you sell it and invest in a better option that will guarantee you a higher rate of return?

Most agree when I phrase it like that it is a no brainer. There is always the follow up thought, but they signed a contract.

You should follow Thompson’s Realty on Twitter here.

But they signed a contract

Sure they did, but there are always options. Right inside all home contracts it lays out exactly how these options will work. You as the home owner have the option of stopping to make payments. If you chose to stop to make payments, then the bank has a right to take the property back.

In every situation, when we sit down with a someone considering a short sale we discuss this. If you are no longer happy with the terms of the contract, then the bank is giving you a way out. How is this different than what businesses do every day? They look at their bottom line and when things are bad they make changes.

You have options

You do have options, they are listed right in the original contract you signed. You can stop paying, and the bank can take the property back. But there is another option. The other option is you can renegotiate a contract. That is exactly what a short sale is. The seller goes to the bank says I am not happy with this situation. I would like to renegotiate the contract and agree to give you $xxx,xxx.00 for the home now instead of continuing our current business agreement. The bank then has an option of agreeing to this renegotiation because it is better than the foreclosure alternative, or no they can decide not to agree and instead foreclose. Both sides have options here.

So even though both sides have options, obviously the Mortgage Bankers Association is not happy with the results. Showing his frustration over the situation, John Courson, chief executive of the Mortgage Bankers Association said of those looking to short sale “What about the message they will send to their family and their kids and their friends?”

But are you ready for the punchline? The Mortgage Bankers Association did a short sale on their own building in Washington DC.

So before we get all high and mighty about morals remember, contracts are not moral or immoral, they are business documents in a business transaction.

Follow Thompson’s Realty on Facebook here

Originally posted on Phoenix Real Estate Guy. If you are reading this anywhere but inside your RSS feed reader or your email client, the site you are on is guilty of stealing content.

It almost feels like 2005 all over again

Jonathan Dalton — Wed, 09 May 2012 23:07:57 +0000

If you’re going to make your debut on a widely-read website, what better way to do so than with a bold prediction … I boldly predict that inventory here in the Phoenix real estate market will not decline by more than another 7,900 homes over the next millennium.

What’s striking is such a prediction, timeframe aside, would have been laughable back in 2007 when there were more than 40,000 single family detached homes for sale across Maricopa County.

Oh, for those halcyon days of yore. For now, as we slowly creep toward the second half of 2012, there are fewer than 7,900 detached homes for sale in Maricopa County, an area (as both readers of my own blog know by heart) roughly the size of New Jersey. Or even Macedonia, for our more worldly readers.

Granted, large portions of Maricopa County are inhabited only by ground squirrels and cacti, but the general idea still holds – there’s just not a whole lot available right now.

And that leads to the current great debate in real estate, or at least one of them – the existence of shadow inventory and the coming next wave of foreclosures.

If you’ve heard anything at all about real estate or the economy over the past while, you’ve likely heard that there’s a mass of shadow inventory – homes that have been foreclosed upon and never put back on the market, or homes that should have been foreclosed upon but weren’t – looming in the wings, ready to swamp the real estate markets and crush the burgeoning appreciation we are seeing.

What you may not know is there has been a predicted second wave of foreclosures for more than four years running, ever since inventory dove and sales started to pick up in March 2008. And yet, this wave never has reached the market, not after four years of solid doomsaying. The numbers also suggest the wave may not be what some believe it to be.

There are factors that have led us to where we are, with less than 1,000 bank owned homes on the market, most significant the so-called robosigning scandal where banks were foreclosing on homes that they shouldn’t have (in theory) that then caused said banks to stop foreclosure proceedings.

With robosigning firmly in the rear-view mirror, there should be an increase in foreclosures and thus an increase inventory.

That covers the supply side of things.

From a demand perspective, it’s damned hard to get an offer accepted on a home priced under $100,000 these days. Most buyers are discovering they are but one of a dozen or more potential suitors for these rare finds, which means all but one of the dozen or more walk away without a home.

Even with negligible inventory, sales in the Phoenix market are about what they were a year ago when there were nearly three times as many homes for sale.

All of which is a long way of saying that there’s sufficient demand in the Phoenix market to handle an increase in inventory – a significant increase, even, up to an additional 10,000 homes – without much of a blink. (With the assumption the homes hit the market pre-Labor Day versus post-Labor Day, when they would languish a little bit longer.)

For now it’s just a matter of waiting to see if and when these other homes get added to the inventory. And, in the interim, we can watch the shrinking inventory secure in the knowledge that there’s a definite hard floor to the number of homes available … zero.

Photo credit

Get an iPad 3! Phoenix Real Estate. Peyton Manning Cut! Phoenix Homes. Elections!!

Originally posted on Phoenix Real Estate Guy. If you are reading this anywhere but inside your RSS feed reader or your email client, the site you are on is guilty of stealing content.

Phoenix Real Estate Guy Turns Seven!

Jay Thompson — Tue, 08 May 2012 14:25:44 +0000

Seven years ago today, the first post on Phoenix Real Estate Guy was crafted and published.

OK, “crafted” is a real stretch. But it was published on May 8, 2005.

That seems like a lifetime ago.

Since that day some 2,000ish articles have been published here, some of far better quality than post #1, many not. Over 30,000 comments have been left by some four million visitors.

That last number is what blows my mind. I never would have dreamed that many people would stumble across our little corner of the interwebs.

Though I would still write if no one visited, there are few things I cherish more than those that take the time to stop by, read, search for homes, and comment if they feel so inclined. I sincerely appreciate each and every one of you.

I know things have been a bit slow here the last couple of months. Getting a new job, relocating, and having a heart attack all in the span of six weeks has taken up a lot of time formerly devoted to writing. Hopefully things will slow down a bit from here. Phoenix Real Estate Guy is not going away.

In fact, soon you will see some new talent here alongside me. Some Thompson’s Realty agents will be posting, and I should be able to kick in content as well.

I would be remiss if I didn’t specifically thank three people that have done more to help me keep this thing alive than they realize. My lovely wife Francy and two stunning “children” James and Lauren – who were 11 and 13 when TPREG was born and are now adults — have supported me, encouraged me, and been as mystified as I have by the success of the blog. They are everything I live for. Thank you all.

It should be interesting to see what the next seven years bring!

Photo credit: Yours truly. I have no idea how I managed to find a bottle of Jack Daniel’s lying around…

Originally posted on Phoenix Real Estate Guy. If you are reading this anywhere but inside your RSS feed reader or your email client, the site you are on is guilty of stealing content.

Announcement: Dean Ouellette named Vice President of Business Development for Thompson’s Realty

Jay Thompson — Tue, 01 May 2012 16:15:26 +0000

We are thrilled to announce that Dean Ouellette is taking the position of Vice President of Business Development at Thompson’s Realty effective immediately.

Dean has been with Thompson’s Realty for over two years, and is an outstanding real estate agent. His passion for teaching and helping agents is known by many and fits perfectly in this new role.

As Vice President of Business Development, Dean is chartered with growing the brokerage by bringing in new agents and working closely with existing agents to help them continue to develop and refine their business. As an instructor, consultant, short sale expert, technology aficionado, and one of the most dedicated and hardest working people I’ve ever known, there is no question that Dean will be successful in this role.

Here’s Dean in his own words on this new position:

Thompson’s Realty is truly one of the most unique brokerages in the country. I am glad to be working with them to continue their growth. We look forward to making Thompson’s a home for any agent looking to grow their business and provide excellent service to our clients. After all, that is what Thompson’s has always been about; providing a quality service that will make our clients want to come back for all their real estate needs and refer us to all their friends and family members.

We are excited to have Dean in this new role, and excited for the future of Thompson’s Realty!

Originally posted on Phoenix Real Estate Guy. If you are reading this anywhere but inside your RSS feed reader or your email client, the site you are on is guilty of stealing content.

On Having a Heart Attack

Jay Thompson — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 00:38:16 +0000

Life can change in the blink of an eye.

Or the beat of a struggling heart.

A week ago at this time, I was being wheeled from the emergency room into the heart catherization lab at Banner Heart Hospital in the middle of what a cardiologist described as a “massive heart attack.”

Believe me, it sucked.

Yes, it was excruciatingly painful. You know how a doctor will ask you, “On a scale of 1 to 10, what is your pain level”? I’ve had broken bones, debilitating migraines and a couple of surgeries. I always labeled those a “10″. The heart attack was more like a 27. The pain is intensified by an overwhelming dread running through your heart (literally and figuratively) and soul that you are about to die.

But that pain is temporary.

It’s the look on your wife and children’s faces that really hurts.

That is a look I will never, ever, forget.

I am blessed beyond words to have an amazing family, and a lot of wonderful and caring friends. I asked Francy to post a status update on my Facebook page as I was going into the cath lab to let my friends know and to ask for support and prayers.

The response was overwhelming. We cannot begin to express our thanks to everyone that reached out. It really did make a difference.

Many people have asked for “the story”, so here it is. Fair warning, I’m going to get a little preachy on you at the end. Deal with it, there may be some things said that could save your or a friend’s life.

“That Day”

I flew in to Phoenix from Seattle late Friday night. About 12:30am Saturday morning, I went to Jack in the Box (ironic, isn’t it?) and grabbed a typical meal — two tacos and a Jumbo Jack with cheese — which I snarfed down with a soda and went to bed about 2am.

Here was the last Tweet I sent before my heart attack:

The car in front of me just ordered 60 tacos. (@ Jack in the Box) 4sq.com/Jg4hFn

— Jay Thompson (@PhxREguy) April 21, 2012

Six hours later (note to self, you need to get more sleep) I woke up and felt fine. I plopped down in front of the computer like I do on any other morning and started looking at email, going through my feed reader and checking social media sites. Oh, what a thrilling life we lead.

Ten minutes or so into that, I felt a sharp stabbing pain right in the middle of my chest. Kind of cramp-like. Like a “stitch” you get in your side sometimes but this was right in the middle of my chest. “What the f**k?” I thought to myself. And then it was gone.

A couple of minutes later it happened again. And again.

Francy was out running errands and I called her to tell her I was having weird chest pains. She was on her way home and said I should wake up our daughter. We both thought it was most likely indigestion from the damn JITB tacos.

But this felt different.

Just moments later, it felt like Chuck Norris kicked me in the chest. I couldn’t take a deep breath. I couldn’t get up off the couch to get my daughter up. And then I started pouring sweat from every pore in my body.

I knew something was horribly wrong.

I called Francy back to tell her I was going to call 911 and she said to call them before I could get the words out.

I couldn’t even dial the phone right, so my daughter called them for me.

“911 what is your emergency?”

“I’m having really bad chest pains.”

“I’ve already got paramedics on the way…”

The 911 operator asked me a lot of questions. They were very calm and professional — which is good because at this point I’m pretty convinced that I’m dying, right in front of my baby girl. Francy arrived home moments before the firetruck got there. It felt like it took an eternity for them to arrive, but looking back and piecing together the timeline, they got there less than five minutes after we dialed 911.

From that point on, things were a blur. The pain was getting worse and worse. I remember the firemen / paramedics giving me oxygen, starting an EKG, putting nitro under my tongue, and putting in an IV. I remember getting annoyed because they couldn’t hear my answers because of the oxygen mask. I remember asking them if my wife and daughter were OK.

I remember thinking that I wasn’t going to make it to the hospital. The sense of impending doom was overwhelming.

Francy tells me the ambulance arrived and one of the firemen handed the driver the EKG strip and they glanced at it and ran outside to get the stretcher. She said when she saw that, she knew it was bad.

As I was wheeled past my wife and daughter, I told them I was going to be fine and not to worry. But to be perfectly honest, I thought to myself that I might not ever see them again.

The firemen loaded me in the ambulance and since Francy and Lauren weren’t there I asked them point blank, “Am I having a heart attack?” They aren’t doctors, and can only say, “We don’t know, but you have all the symptoms so we’re treating it like that.”

We only live about three miles from Banner Heart Hospital, but it felt like it took an eternity to get there. The firemen/paramedics were awesome though. At one point I apologized for repeatedly dropping the F-bomb when a wave of chest pain was particularly bad and one of the firemen responded, “Don’t fucking worry about it”. For whatever reason, that struck us both as funny. So did this exchange:

“We need to give you more nitro. Before we do, it’s important to know if you take Viagra or Cialis or anything for erectile dysfunction. It can interact with the nitro.”

“I may be dying, but I don’t need that stuff.”

“I think you’re going to be just fine.”

Once we got to the emergency room, things moved very quickly. There must have been 10 medical personnel in the room. I don’t remember much — lots of questions, at some point my wife and kids showed up. They were remarkably brave, but I suspect their fears were similar to mine. I distinctly recall some doctor looking me in the eye and saying, “You’re having a heart attack. We’re going to take you to the cath lab.” I kissed my wife and kids goodbye and was rushed into the cath lab. There I met my cardiologist for the first time, M. Joshua Berkowitz, M.D. He was very calm, very reassuring, but believe me, when he injected some dye to see if there were blockages in my coronary arteries and he looked me in the eye and said, “You are having a massive heart attack. You have one artery that is 100% blocked and another that is 95% blocked,” that will scare the shit out of you no matter how calm and confident the doctor is. Your fears aren’t relieved any by having the doc tell you that if you’d had the heart attack eight hours earlier on the plane, or waited another 20 minutes to call 911 you would be dead.

But that’s exactly the message I needed to hear because unless I make some significant lifestyle changes, the odds of me having a subsequent heart attack are high.

Dr. Berkowitz cleared the completely blocked artery via angioplasty and put in a stent, and opted to wait a couple of days to clear the one that was 95% blocked to allow the heart to recuperate some and for the kidneys to work on eliminating the dyes used in the procedure.

I won’t bore you with the details of the next four days in the Cardiac Intensive Care Unit and the “Telemetry floor” (where your heart is monitored 24 x 7) other than to say the care I received at Banner Heart Hospital was world class. The nurses, staff and doctors were without fail caring, compassionate and professional.

During those four days, the support from my friends all across the country — those I’ve met personally and those I’ve only ever “met” on-line — was overwhelming. Believe me, it makes a big difference to know that people out there care about you. I wish I could personally thank each and every one of you. You were, and will continue to be, a big part of my recovery.

A Wake Up Call

I don’t want to sound over-dramatic, and I certainly don’t want anyone feeling sorry for me, but I think it’s important to say this…

I am lucky to be alive. Through the miracle of modern medicine I went from having chest pains and calling 911 to lying in the cardiac cath lab in under 90 minutes. Thank God for the Mesa Fire Department, the paramedics, nurses, hospital staff and doctors that literally saved my life.

That’s all well and good, but truth be told I brought a lot of this upon myself, and my family and friends.

I’m just 51 years old, but I don’t eat well, I don’t exercise, I’m overweight, my blood pressure is too high and my cholesterol levels are even higher. Back in my younger days I smoked like a chimney, quit smoking years ago then started back up as what I called a “casual smoker” or a “social smoker”. I claimed, “I’m not really a smoker. I smoke less than a pack a week. I go days without cigarettes.” Yeah, well that’s a load of bullshit. It’s like being a little bit pregnant. Or saying, “This double cheeseburger isn’t bad for me because it doesn’t have bacon on it.” (oh how I already miss bacon)

There is nothing I can do about the fact that my Grandfather died at the age of 42 from a heart attack, or that my father has an defibrillator implanted in his chest. But I damn sure can do something about every other risk factor.

And you can rest assured I will. It is past time to change my dietary habits, lose weight, exercise, get my blood pressure and cholesterol level under control and not smoke one cigarette or cigar again. Ever.

I don’t ever, EVER, want to have another heart attack. Selfishly, it is excruciatingly painful and staring death in the face really jacks with your head. Far more importantly than that though, it puts your friends and family through hell. I don’t ever want to do this to my kids, my wife, my family and my friends again. I’m going to do everything I can to no longer be a “walking heart attack waiting to happen” because sooner or later it will happen.

I also don’t want to be “that guy” and tell you how to live your life. That’s not my place. Who am I to tell you how to live? But I can share my experiences with you, share my successes and failures as I make some pretty radical lifestyle adjustments. Share what I learn along the way. I can encourage you to eat better, to loose weight, to stop smoking. You won’t hear me say things like, “Those cigarettes are going to kill you!” and “My God you’re clogging up your arteries with all that fat and sodium you eat!” But you will hear me share what I can and do what I can to help my family and friends be healthier.

Trust me, you don’t want to have a heart attack. It BLOWS.

Learn these heart attack symptoms. Remember, you may not experience every symptom. I had zero pain radiating into my arms, shoulder or jaw. DON’T SCREW AROUND if you have any of these symptoms. If I’d waited just 20 more minutes to call 911, I’d be dead. If I’d waited 5 more minutes, I’d have more permanent heart damage. My cardiologist told me people die (usually men) every day because they wait too long to call 911. You can’t “tough out” a heart attack. You can’t will it away. Heck, I came *this* close to having my wife drive me to the ER. If we’d done that, we’d have missed out on all the medications the first responders can give you, missed out on the hospital having the EKG in their hands when I arrived. Missed out on crucial care in the first minutes of the heart attack. If you call 911 and it turns out you had indigestion or a panic attack, so what? At least you will be ALIVE.

And if you are like me — eating poorly, overweight, not exercising, pushing the blood pressure, have a lousy lipid profile (high cholesterol and triglycerides), or if you smoke at all, then please for the love of all things holy do something about it. If not for you, do it for your family and friends. You don’t have to go all vegan ultra-marathoner. Just start living healthier.

Sure, it may suck. Let’s face it, there is an awful lot to like about snarfing down two tacos and a Jumbo Jack at 2:00am and chasing it down with a cold sugary Coke or a frosty beer.

But there is a hell of a lot more to life than that. And I will gladly give up all the double-doubles on the planet for one more hug from my wife and kids. One more phone call or text or visit or email from a friend. One more day ALIVE and sharing all life really has to offer with friends and family…

Originally posted on Phoenix Real Estate Guy. If you are reading this anywhere but inside your RSS feed reader or your email client, the site you are on is guilty of stealing content.

RETSO 2012 Presentation: Internet Prospecting with WordPress

Jay Thompson — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 15:48:20 +0000

As promised, here is the slide deck from my presentation at RETSO (Real Estate Tech South). They won’t be a whole lot of good without the accompanying talk, but…

So sorry there wasn’t enough time to get to all the (great) questions. Feel free to drop your question in the comments and I’ll be happy to answer them. If you want your question to be private, email me.

Internet Prospecting with WordPress

View more presentations from Jay Thompson

Originally posted on Phoenix Real Estate Guy. If you are reading this anywhere but inside your RSS feed reader or your email client, the site you are on is guilty of stealing content.

Phoenix Real Estate Market Update: April 2012

Kristin LaVanway — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 18:36:11 +0000

Jay’s Note: Here’s a nifty little video by Thompson’s Realty agent Kristin LaVanway with an update on the current Phoenix real estate market. Writing about market stats is difficult, and boring. Which is why you rarely find stats posts here. How does one make statistics interesting? Kristin does in this video. Hopefully there will be more to come!

Here’s the video synopsis, in Kristin’s words: The real estate market in Phoenix continues to return to a more “normal state” whatever that means. Prices are edging up especially in price ranges below $250K, and inventory has dropped below the 2 month mark. Yikes!

Think the shadow inventory is going to replenish the market – don’t be so sure. However you look at it, we are going to be low on inventory for a while. Buyers: get over the fantasy that another big price drop is going to happen here in Phoenix. All signs point to higher prices.

Good luck buyers and welcome back sellers!!

Originally posted on Phoenix Real Estate Guy. If you are reading this anywhere but inside your RSS feed reader or your email client, the site you are on is guilty of stealing content.

Revisiting: A life-altering moment. Putting things in perspective.

Jay Thompson — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 13:45:24 +0000

Jay’s note: This week last year I came upon an horrific accident scene that I was certain involved my only son. Shortly after I wrote this someone, I can’t remember who now, said I should revisit it in a year. So here it is. “Personally, I’m going to make a concerted effort to stop taking things for granted. To appreciate life more. To not sweat the small stuff,” was a pledge made in this article. I’ve done OK with that. Certainly not perfect, but the memories of this day are still strong, and many times I’ve found myself getting spooled up over something that doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things. I stop, think of the day this happened, and move ahead to focus on what really matters. So read on; think about it. Read some of the comments from others sharing similar stories — and try focusing on what really matters.

Imagine this…

You are driving down the freeway at ten o’clock at night. Up ahead you see the flashing lights of multiple emergency vehicles and traffic slows.

“Great, an accident. All I want to do is get home…” you may be thinking.

As you approach the scene, you see a flipped over and mangled car.

A car of the exact make, model and unusual color of what your 19 year old son drives.

By the time you can cross two lanes of traffic and pull over, you are well past the accident scene. So you slam the car into reverse and drive faster in reverse that you’ve ever driven before. You get out of the car and run toward the accident.

The entire time, all sorts of thoughts are exploding in your brain. You’re praying like you never have before. As you get closer to the scene and see that yes, it looks exactly like your son’s car, you practically lose your mind.

Two police officers approach you – you the grown man who has been reduced to a blubbering incoherent pile of goo on the side of the road. Out of breath with your heart pounding you say something to the police. You’re not sure exactly what but it must have been some combination of “my son”, “his car”, and “dead” with a whole lot of “Please God no’s” in there.

The police offer puts his hands on your shoulders and all you hear is, “Your son? No, it’s a girl. It’s a girl’s car. Not your son. Not your son. There was no male in the car.”

“Are you sure?”

“We’re positive.”

A cop walks you back to your car and takes your keys. “You can’t drive like this,” she says. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

So you sit in your car on the side of a road, thanking God and Jesus that your son isn’t involved when it hits you that someone’s daughter is lying zipped up in a body bag 50 feet away. How can you be so happy, and so relieved, sitting so close to death? Guilt sets in.

**And you really start to think about things.**

Lots of things.

I sincerely hope you only have to imagine this scenario, and not actually experience it because believe me, it sucks. I know, because I went through it 20 hours ago.

It still disturbs me greatly.

An experience like this makes you think. It puts a lot of things in perspective. Life is fragile, and short. Too short to go around pissed-off at what really is, in the grand scheme of things, not-so-important. Hell, it’s practically immaterial.

We get mad about lawsuits. We get angry with the NAR. Maybe we’re frustrated by a client or fellow agents that don’t “get it”. We bitch and moan about having to work too hard. We get upset over a stupid social media “debate” at a conference. We yell at our kids, or our spouses. We fuel “blog wars”. We complain about the housing market, and the government, and how things “just aren’t fair.”

We need to stop and think. We need to put things in perspective. Well, at least I do. I can’t tell you what to do.

The bottom line is this: is all this crap really that important? Is it worth expending time, effort and energy?

I had a really shitty experience last night. For about two minutes (that felt more like two hours) I honestly thought my son was dead.

I wept. I cursed. I prayed. I think I might have thrown up. I don’t remember a lot of details as apparently my brain shut down in those adrenaline overdosed moments of shear terror and gut-wrenching panic. Shutting down was an instinctive reaction – and a good thing because I might have just lost my mind if I could remember everything during those moments.

And I felt sorry for myself for having to go through this experience.

Sorry for myself? There are people out there right now who did know and love the young lady in that car last night. Those people are experiencing infinitely more pain than what I went through last night.

They have something to be pissed-off about. They have the right to feel that things “just aren’t fair.”

When you get right down to it, all the trials and tribulations most of us go through on a daily basis are nothing. They are inconsequential. People like the friends and family of the young lady involved in last night’s accident, people like Clint and Angela Miller who are undergoing a torturous battle against testicular cancer, those people have something worthy of complaining about.

Us? Not-so-much.

I’m not trying to make light of anyone’s personal situation. I know times are tough out there for a lot of folks. I’m just suggesting that when you get upset, when you think the world is against you, when some person, some thing, some situation makes you angry, sad, bitter or hell-bent on vengeance, try taking a step back and putting things in perspective.

Personally, I’m going to make a concerted effort to stop taking things for granted. To appreciate life more. To not sweat the small stuff. I’m not saying that we should all join hands and sing Kumbaya – that’s not realistic, and perhaps not even healthy. It’s OK, good in fact, to be passionate about something. To be emotional. The world would be a pretty boring place if we all agreed with each other and no one voiced their opinions.

Maybe I’m being Pollyannaish, but it does seem like there is a lot of negative energy out there of late, a lot of bitterness, jealousy, and animosity. I know I am guilty as charged.

Perhaps it is time to step back and reassess priorities. Time to appreciate more fully all the goodness that life has to offer. To enjoy time with loved ones, or time alone.

Sitting on the side of the road last night made me think.

Maybe this will make you think a little too…

Photo Credit: “Candle Smoke” by The Ewan on Flickr. CC Licensed.

Originally posted on Phoenix Real Estate Guy. If you are reading this anywhere but inside your RSS feed reader or your email client, the site you are on is guilty of stealing content.

On Joining Zillow…

Jay Thompson — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 19:11:15 +0000

What you are about to read may very well blow a few minds across the real estate Internet space. Or not. We’re about to find out…

Ready?

Earlier today, I accepted a full-time position with Zillow.

No, really. Soon I will be Zillow’s Director of Industry Outreach & Social Media.

Interesting, isn’t it?

Why? When? Where? What?

Why? In a nutshell, because I love a challenge, and I love working with ridiculously smart people. And trust me, this will be a challenge and Zillow is full of ridiculously smart people.

When? Soon, very soon. There isn’t an official start date yet because much needs to be done around here first. Primarily, the lovely Francy Thompson, Master of the Real Estate Universe and Queen of Brokerage Operations is going to be adding, “Designated Broker, Thompson’s Realty” to her job title.

I can’t work for Zillow full-time and be the DB of Thompson’s Realty, there just aren’t enough hours in the day. So Francy (who really has been “The Boss” since Day 1) is going to put even more work on her plate.

She’s a tough chick, she can handle it. Last night she enrolled in broker licensing classes (God help her) on the three-week plan. By the end of April she will have a freshly minted Arizona Broker’s License.

This isn’t a good time to get me started on everything that is wrong with being able to get a real estate broker’s license in three weeks — and actually, believe it or not, you can do it in 9 days. But people would die if she tried to complete it in 9 days. Hence the three-week plan. Here’s a post I wrote about my experience in broker licensing classes over 4.5 years ago. Whoops, I digress.

Francy will be the broker, Thompson’s Realty won’t really change for the foreseeable future, and I will be doing something completely different.

Where? My job at Zillow will require some travel, and a lot of time in Seattle (where Zillow is headquartered). For a long time now I’ve wanted to try out the “urban living” lifestyle – living right smack in the middle of a thriving and vibrant downtown community — and now is my chance. I’ll be renting an apartment in downtown Seattle (I’ve found several possibilities on, ahem, Zillow.com), and Francy will make frequent visits there and I will make frequent visits back here. This will be a big change for us, but we are both really excited about the opportunity.

What? Like “What the heck is he thinking?” or “What the heck will he be doing?” What I’m thinking is I have an opportunity to work with an amazingly talented team in a sector of the real estate space that has always fascinated me. While it may seem odd to some to give up control of a successful real estate brokerage, sometimes you have to take a big leap into something different and just follow your passions.

I have always loved education and training, and if you’ve followed any of my travels about the interwebs it should be no surprise that I am a bit of a social / new media enthusiast. I think — strike know — that I can help Zillow progress, improve and grow as well as help agents all across the country understand and develop their business. And Zillow and those agents can help me do the same.

But, it’s Zillow…

Believe me, I know what some agents think of Zillow. I got yelled at on the NAR Annual trade show floor for wearing a Zillow t-shirt (which BTW is too small now. Wonder if I can get a new one? Or a hoodie!). Granted, I have freely admitted that I don’t fully understand the fear of Zillow some seem to have (I wrote this almost five years ago. And this, over five years ago). I think it’s mostly the unknown. Or the misunderstood. So what say we try to fix that?

I have written about Zillow since they launched. I’ve met many people that work (or worked) for Zillow and consider some of them good friends. So why not join the Zillow team and see if we can’t just change some perceptions and help out some agents and brokers? I think we can. And I can’t wait to start.

The bottom line is this — I’ve pondered this change long and hard and decided why not follow my passions and see where they take me? Life is a journey, and this is just one more step along the path.

Mark Twain may have said it best…

20 years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the one’s you did. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.

It’s time to explore, dream and discover!

As always, your thoughts and comments are appreciated. Don’t be shy!

More here:

Press release

Zillow Blog

Originally posted on Phoenix Real Estate Guy. If you are reading this anywhere but inside your RSS feed reader or your email client, the site you are on is guilty of stealing content.