Interesting article today in the Arizona Republic:

Under-$200,000 market gives home sales a push
Affordability lures first-time buyers, investors

I personally haven’t seen the “bidding wars” on short sales mentioned in the article. Not to say it isn’t happening, but in my experience the short sales are sitting there until the bank takes them back (for the most part).

But there is no question that the under $200K inventory is growing. I’ll crunch some numbers this weekend and report back.

There was one small part of the article I found particularly interesting.

23 year old Bradley Crutchfield, an assistant technician at the Gila River Indian Casino and part time ASU student said he recently bought his first home — a $243,000 foreclosure in Chandler.

It was in the (price) range of what I was looking for, but it was my top end and I was only willing to pay that if I could be closer,” Crutchfield, 23, said. “I’ve been looking for about two years now when the market was really high, and I had the urge to buy. Then the market went down, and I seriously wanted to buy.” (my emphasis)

Mr. Crutchfield echos the sentiments we are hearing from a lot of people right now. Particularly younger and first time buyers.

Just a few days ago I answered “Maybe, maybe not” to the question, “Is now a good time to buy a Phoenix home?” And I stand by that answer. But as Crutchfield and others in the article demonstrate, for some, the answer is yes.

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Technorati Tags: Phoenix real estate market conditions, first time buyers

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Why would anyone want to live In Phoenix?

I really have no idea…

Things to do in Phoenix this weekend. (I recommend anything outdoors)

Saturday Calendar of Events

Sunday Calendar of Events

Spring training games abound

And it would be a perfect weekend to check out the Renaissance Festival

Wear your sunscreen!!

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Technorati Tags: Phoenix weekend, things to do, spring training

Ok, I know I’ve hammered on Trulia Voices in the past. And while I do grow weary of the sometimes awful, and often illegal answers on Voices, there are some good things there.

It’s a great place to see what kinds of questions real estate buyers and sellers have.

It’s loaded with head-scratching, “What the hell are they thinking?” answers from real estate pros. It’s cheap entertainment.

You can learn something there. Sometimes you just have to dig a bit (which is true of any on-line community).

And it’s actually not a bad place to pull in a prospect or two (though I’d have to question the ROI that folks who have answered hundreds and hundreds of questions are getting).

Trulia has some trulyia cool and wicked smart people working for them, and they do come up with some nifty ideas. The latest is adding RSS feeds to Voices profiles. This allows one to create cool widgets like this:

That’s not a bad thing to put in a blog sidebar or static web site page. I’d like to see the Trulia wizards find a way to do two things: 1) have the click send the reader to my answer (so I don’t have to put my sometimes too wordy answers in the widget), and 2) get “Question Removed” out of the RSS feed all together. It would be nice too if I could set the number of Q&As to display. But other than that, I think I’ll slap this guy up on the sidebar here and give it a little test drive.

Want one? EZ instructions are at the Trulia blog.

More: Video on Trulia Voices

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Technorati Tags: Trulia Voices, Real Estate Blog Bling, how long will it take Rudy to show up here?

The newest real estate brokerage in the Phoenix area, Thompson’s Realty, is officially open for business!

Our business model is simple: provide superior customer service in everything we do. That may sound hokey, but it is what Francy and I believe in. Our clients will experience unparalleled support and guidance throughout their real estate transaction. And beyond.

Leveraging the power of technology, combined with the cost savings associated with running a boutique brokerage unencumbered with the overhead of a large franchise, we will enable our clients to actually enjoy buying or selling real estate. 

A virtual office, near-paperless transactions (as close as the state currently allows), and streamlined efficiency will allow us to pass savings directly to our clients. Uncompromised service is the rule, there are no exceptions. 

If you are an experienced, tech savvy real estate agent interested in working for a progressive independent brokerage, please contact us. We are looking for a few amazing agents willing to work hard to make the future of real estate happen today. 

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Technorati Tags: Thompson’s Realty, Phoenix Real Estate Brokerage

There is often discussion on real estate blogs about how far (if at all) a real estate agent / photographer should travel down the photo retouching road.

Athol Kay has a great series titled “Pimp My Listing Photo” that covers acceptable ways to “manipulate” real estate photos.

My personal take is it is perfectly acceptable to correct tilt, exposure, fisheye distortion and other such things Athol frequently talks about. I also don’t see a problem with removing things that are “temporary” such as trash cans, autos, the dog, etc. (though really, it’s far less hassle to move them before you shoot the photo…).

You’re going way too far if you conveniently take out things like telephone poles, holes in the wall and start changing colors, or make the roof look like new. That’s misrepresentation in my book.

I don’t have the technical skills (yet) to pimp a photo as well as Athol. Nor do I have the artistic skills to really manipulate a photo. Want to see what a good Photoshop artist can do? Check out this photoshop contest where folks take a pimping a photo of a bathroom to the extreme.

Here is my favorite: