Being a REALTOR ® Sucks!

A couple of nights ago on a late Sunday evening, I showed up at my clients house at 10:30 pm after spending the evening negotiating a deal for them. When I showed up at the door the first words from my clients mouth are “Your job SUCKS!”. Now yes, being out at 10:30 pm on a Sunday night isn’t the most exciting or ‘fun’ time to be out and about and some could say that it ’sucks’. Sometimes their are articles written about your industry that labels it as ‘rigged’ and calls clients like mine ‘ignorant’. Now I’m not saying that the industry is perfect, it’s not and there are many things that have to change for it to get better… but I digress.

Being a REALTOR ® isn’t for everyone in fact I choose to work very hard for my clients, thus I’m out driving around this beautiful city of mine at 10:30 pm on a Sunday night getting signatures.

If you have read this far, your probably waiting to read a long list of why being a REALTOR ® sucks… well, your not going to find that here.  Truth be told, Rebecca and I enjoy what we do and love meeting the people we do because of our profession.  I’ve attempted to put together a few reasons why we truly enjoy doing what we do.  This isn’t everything, but it’s a start.

1. Technology
   Now for some this may not be a legitimate reason to love something, but I truly enjoy the new gadgets and toys that we get to use and implement into our business that helps out the bottom dollar for our clients.  I was with some clients last night and we were signing a contract on my iPad and they said… and I quote… “This makes one of the most boring things about selling our house actually really fun and enjoyable”… Now I was shocked to hear that, but it’s true.  As soon as I pull out the iPad to use for signing most clients are impressed and excited to use it.

   The other part of the technology is all the online marketing and mediums that I get to use and experiment with.  This blog for example and being able to be creative with it is something I love and enjoy.  Creating videos while teaching and educating through them is a powerful tool that I truly enjoy and I hope you as a reader of this blog enjoy watching them.

2. Flexibility
   Now what do I mean by flexibility… I’m not talking that I can do stretches like Kipper or would ever attempt to do so, I’m talking about the flexibility that being in business for myself gives us the greatest flexibility as a family with a new little one.  I am a huge promotor of being an entrepreneur and love to help others find their own inner entrepreneurial spirit.  Because I know of and experience the power of being an entrepreneur every day, it’s something that if I see someone who could have it, I want to help stretch that person to become their own boss.  Being in business for ourselves allows us to set our own schedules, unless it is 10:30 pm on a Sunday night =-) … but to be frank, we can schedule holidays when we want to as we have built a solid team around us to ensure that our clients and business still runs smoothly while we are away.
3. The People
   And lastly… The People… This to me is the single biggest reason why we love what we do.  What other profession allows you to find and search out people like ourselves, who you will get along with well and become close friends with over time.  We have been sooo blessed by the clients (many are now considered good friends) that we have been given the privilege to work with.  We have been invited to countless number of weddings, Christmas parties and birthday parties and have had the honor of being invited to some of our clients most memorable experiences in their lives… and we got to be there to experience them.  Rebecca was even in a wedding of one of our clients.  We have held day old babies, helped out those that were going through tough times and have even been argued about by a couple that was getting married about who should sell their house until they realized that she knew Rebecca and he new Me… Crazy!

   “The people” is why we do this.  We get to meet someone new each week and help them find a new home where they will have some of the best times and memories of their lives.  

We are truly blessed in our business and want to thank you for that.  Every year our business grows and we receive more referrals and are able to help more and more people buy their perfect homes and sell what was their home and help them find a new place.

Like in any business their are trade off’s, and if I need to be out at 10:30 pm on a Sunday as a trade off for what we get in return for what we do… I think I can manage that!

Thank YOU!  Because of you, this is why we do what we do!

See more articles over at The Calgary Real Estate Blog.com
Email Me @ Jared @ tcgroup dot ca

Jared & Rebecca

Being a REALTOR ® Sucks!

A couple of nights ago on a late Sunday evening, I showed up at my clients house at 10:30 pm after spending the evening negotiating a deal for them. When I showed up at the door the first words from my clients mouth are “Your job SUCKS!”. Now yes, being out at 10:30 pm on a Sunday night isn’t the most exciting or ‘fun’ time to be out and about and some could say that it ’sucks’. Sometimes their are articles written about your industry that labels it as ‘rigged’ and calls clients like mine ‘ignorant’. Now I’m not saying that the industry is perfect, it’s not and there are many things that have to change for it to get better… but I digress.

Being a REALTOR ® isn’t for everyone in fact I choose to work very hard for my clients, thus I’m out driving around this beautiful city of mine at 10:30 pm on a Sunday night getting signatures.

If you have read this far, your probably waiting to read a long list of why being a REALTOR ® sucks… well, your not going to find that here.  Truth be told, Rebecca and I enjoy what we do and love meeting the people we do because of our profession.  I’ve attempted to put together a few reasons why we truly enjoy doing what we do.  This isn’t everything, but it’s a start.

1. Technology
   Now for some this may not be a legitimate reason to love something, but I truly enjoy the new gadgets and toys that we get to use and implement into our business that helps out the bottom dollar for our clients.  I was with some clients last night and we were signing a contract on my iPad and they said… and I quote… “This makes one of the most boring things about selling our house actually really fun and enjoyable”… Now I was shocked to hear that, but it’s true.  As soon as I pull out the iPad to use for signing most clients are impressed and excited to use it.

   The other part of the technology is all the online marketing and mediums that I get to use and experiment with.  This blog for example and being able to be creative with it is something I love and enjoy.  Creating videos while teaching and educating through them is a powerful tool that I truly enjoy and I hope you as a reader of this blog enjoy watching them.

2. Flexibility
   Now what do I mean by flexibility… I’m not talking that I can do stretches like Kipper or would ever attempt to do so, I’m talking about the flexibility that being in business for myself gives us the greatest flexibility as a family with a new little one.  I am a huge promotor of being an entrepreneur and love to help others find their own inner entrepreneurial spirit.  Because I know of and experience the power of being an entrepreneur every day, it’s something that if I see someone who could have it, I want to help stretch that person to become their own boss.  Being in business for ourselves allows us to set our own schedules, unless it is 10:30 pm on a Sunday night =-) … but to be frank, we can schedule holidays when we want to as we have built a solid team around us to ensure that our clients and business still runs smoothly while we are away.
3. The People
   And lastly… The People… This to me is the single biggest reason why we love what we do.  What other profession allows you to find and search out people like ourselves, who you will get along with well and become close friends with over time.  We have been sooo blessed by the clients (many are now considered good friends) that we have been given the privilege to work with.  We have been invited to countless number of weddings, Christmas parties and birthday parties and have had the honor of being invited to some of our clients most memorable experiences in their lives… and we got to be there to experience them.  Rebecca was even in a wedding of one of our clients.  We have held day old babies, helped out those that were going through tough times and have even been argued about by a couple that was getting married about who should sell their house until they realized that she knew Rebecca and he new Me… Crazy!

   “The people” is why we do this.  We get to meet someone new each week and help them find a new home where they will have some of the best times and memories of their lives.  

We are truly blessed in our business and want to thank you for that.  Every year our business grows and we receive more referrals and are able to help more and more people buy their perfect homes and sell what was their home and help them find a new place.

Like in any business their are trade off’s, and if I need to be out at 10:30 pm on a Sunday as a trade off for what we get in return for what we do… I think I can manage that!

Thank YOU!  Because of you, this is why we do what we do!

Jared & Rebecca

About The Chamberlain Group:
Jared and Rebecca Chamberlain are Calgary REALTORS® who are changing how real estate is done in Calgary by utilizing online marketing and advanced tools to sell your house in Calgary faster and for far more money. They would be honored to have the chance to work with you and earn your business. ____________________________________________________

The 4 L’s of Buying a House in Calgary

Jared Chamberlain talks about the 4 L’s of buying a house in Calgary. The four L’s are Layout, Location, Limit and ????? You’ll have to watch to find out the last one. Any comments or questions you can email Jared at Jared@tcgroup.ca.

Text Transcription

Hey, this is Jared Chamberlain with ChamberlainGroup.ca in the CalgaryRealEstateBlog.com.

So I want to talk to you today about the four L’s of buying a house. So we got four L’s we wanted to go through. Well I want to show you some buyers last week. we were talking about this and they came up with some great ideas. As well as for these four L’s so thank you Chad and Jaime for that.

The first L is Layout. Layout is very very very very important when you’re looking at a house. You can change your cosmetic items. For example, your carpet, your flooring, your paint, even your cabinet tree. Those things you can change but the layout of the house is very important. Do you want it open, do you want it close like a four level split. Do you want it very very separate? Do you want a bi-level, a bungalow? You know, how do you want it look. Do you want vaulted ceilings? Do you want it 8-foot or 9-foot or 10-foot ceilings? Really depends on what you’re looking for. Do you want it very modern, older that you can reno? So layout is very very important.

The second L is Location. With location, what exactly do where is it located. Is it on a boulevard? Is it on a main street? Is it on a culdesac? Is it quiet, is it noisy? Do you have planes overtop? Do you have parks around you? Do you have schools, shopping? What is around you? That is very important for just your simple living in a home. I mean there’s a livability but anyways just the livability of the home and the location of it. You want to make sure that the location is good.

The third one is Limit. What is your price limit? So if your mortgage broker approvers you for six hundred thousand, do you want to spend your whole six hundred thousand dollars or do you have a price in mind? So be very conscious of that too because you don’t want to become house poor. Where everything you put in your house is just, you just don’t have any money for anything else. If your doing your budget and you’re looking at it and you go “wow I only got three hundred dollars left after I pay my mortgage per month” to pay for food, for clothing, for everything, for utilities. Probably not gonna work. So you want to figure out what your limit is.

And the cast one is Lovability. You know, simply, do you love the house? When you walk into the house, that it have what it called a wow factor? When you walk in you go “Wow I can live here, I love it.” Is it something you can work with? something you could live within, again it’s just live and love. So the lovability of the house is very very very important as well.

So if you have questions about this, email me at jared@tcgroup.ca or you could always give us a call, 403-366-3130. That’s what I got and make it a wonderful day!

Jared & Rebecca

About The Chamberlain Group:
Jared and Rebecca Chamberlain are Calgary REALTORS® who are changing how real estate is done in Calgary by utilizing online marketing and advanced tools to sell your house in Calgary faster and for far more money. They would be honored to have the chance to work with you and earn your business. ____________________________________________________

Save Time at the Bank

Jared Chamberlain talks about how to save time when getting a pre-approval at the bank. There are some tips that you must know… For any comments or feedback please leave them below or email Jared at jared@tcgroup.ca.

Jared & Rebecca

About The Chamberlain Group:
Jared and Rebecca Chamberlain are Calgary REALTORS® who are changing how real estate is done in Calgary by utilizing online marketing and advanced tools to sell your house in Calgary faster and for far more money. They would be honored to have the chance to work with you and earn your business. ____________________________________________________

The Purple Train Rolls Along!

Here’s how it all ended up… The Purple Train rolls through the city of Calgary…

Naheed Nenshi is Mayor of Calgary… Congrats!

Jared & Rebecca

About The Chamberlain Group:
Jared and Rebecca Chamberlain are Calgary REALTORS® who are changing how real estate is done in Calgary by utilizing online marketing and advanced tools to sell your house in Calgary faster and for far more money. They would be honored to have the chance to work with you and earn your business. ____________________________________________________

Buying a House in Calgary vs. Selling a Home in Calgary

Jared Chamberlain uncovers some interesting findings regarding Buying a house in Calgary versus Selling a home in Calgary. For any thoughts or feedback please leave a comment below or email Jared at Jared@tcgroup.ca

Jared & Rebecca

About The Chamberlain Group:
Jared and Rebecca Chamberlain are Calgary REALTORS® who are changing how real estate is done in Calgary by utilizing online marketing and advanced tools to sell your house in Calgary faster and for far more money. They would be honored to have the chance to work with you and earn your business. ____________________________________________________

Cranston & Mckenzie Traffic Nightmare

Jared & Rebecca

About The Chamberlain Group:
Jared and Rebecca Chamberlain are Calgary REALTORS® who are changing how real estate is done in Calgary by utilizing online marketing and advanced tools to sell your house in Calgary faster and for far more money. They would be honored to have the chance to work with you and earn your business. ____________________________________________________

Did the Calgary Real Estate Market go Up or Down?

Are Values Increasing or Decreasing in Calgary?

I was reading through the Calgary Real Estate Boards stats and reports from September 2010 and noticed something very interesting…

The report said the following:

The average price of a single family home in the city of Calgary in September 2010 was $460,278, showing a 3 per cent increase from August 2010, when the average price was $445,617 all the while, the median price of a single family home in the city of Calgary for September 2010 was $390,000, showing a 1 per cent decrease from August 2010 when the median price was 395,000.

How is it possible that the market can go up and down at the same time… Let’s dig into this and understand why it’s important to go look at the median prices versus the average prices.

In the month of August there were a total of 25 properties that sold over the $1 Million mark.  Considering August was a slow month, this is great… Out of those 25 homes there were only 2 properties that were above the $2 Million price point, $2.3 Mill and $2.6 Mill.

In the month of September 2010 there were a total of 34 properties over the $1 Million mark.  This is a big jump from August.  Along with the increased number of transactions, the price point was also much higher… There were 4 transactions that were in the $2 Million price point along with one that sold for $3.5 Million.

So, when the report said that the prices in Calgary went up and the media reported the same,  Calgarians were lead to believe that the real estate market in Calgary was on the upswing.  When in reality and when you pull back the curtain, you will see that the prices in Calgary actually declined from the month before.  The median of a range of numbers is determined by ordering all numbers from beginning to end and picking the middle one, or in the case of real estate, the sale prices for that month.  On the other hand, the average sale price, where you’d add all the numbers up (or sale prices) and divide by number of sales, gives us the average price.

When you use the median to look at the real estate market values in Calgary, this will take out the super high values and the low values and give us a true indication of what has happened.

So, in saying all this… Did the market go up or down?  What do you think?

Jared & Rebecca

About The Chamberlain Group:
Jared and Rebecca Chamberlain are Calgary REALTORS® who are changing how real estate is done in Calgary by utilizing online marketing and advanced tools to sell your house in Calgary faster and for far more money. They would be honored to have the chance to work with you and earn your business. ____________________________________________________

Calgary Real Estate Fall Market Trends Report

Calgary Real Estate Fall Trends

After four months of hesitation and month-over-month declines in activity, homebuyers in Calgary are finally showing signs of renewed confidence. While some concerns still exist about sluggish economic growth in Canada and the U.S., buyers who are moving forward have been enticed by lower prices, greater selection, favourable borrowing conditions, and a healthier out- look for the future. Year-to-date sales of single-family and condominium homes in the Calgary Metro area are down 12.6 per cent, with 12,511 properties changing hands vs. 14,317 in 2009. Affordability has kept the condominium segment slightly more buoyant, with sales down just under 10 per cent year-to-date versus almost 14 per cent in the single-family home category, while the average condominium price posted a modest four per cent gain. Average residential price in the Calgary Metro area, (single family and condominiums combined) however, is up a solid six per cent year-to-date to $411,233 compared with the year-ago figure of $388,302. This has been pulled up by the strength of the upper end, as well as the fact that more homes sold at the lower end of the spectrum one year ago.

Our Thoughts :

The upper end of Calgary’s market or the luxury market, there are currently some great deals…

On the front lines, realtors have been noting softer values with reductions relatively common place. This is reflected by the city’s year-to-date median sale prices. The median price for single family homes in the Calgary Metro area is now $387,000 (down six per cent from $412,500 in 2009), while the median price for condominiums now stands at $258,000 (a four per cent decrease from the year-ago figure of $269,000). Currently, nearly 7,500 listings are available for sale, with supply more than adequate.

First-time buyers are most active, driving sales at the $300,000 to $400,000 price point. Move-up buyers are starting to follow suit, albeit with a measure of caution. That growing influx, combined with any positive economic news, should help to kick start momentum going forward. The upper end remains a bright spot in Calgary’s real estate market, with year- to-date sales over $1 million surging 25 per cent ahead of 2009 levels (242 units vs. 194 units), as buyers take advantage of the current window of opportunity. Investors have also recognized their advantage, snapping up condos and half duplexes throughout the city. Multiple offers are still occurring on quality product that is priced precisely at fair market value and in an excellent location. Conditions are firming up in Calgary and buyers are starting to take notice. The market is expected to remain steady going forward, in line with the healthier September momentum, closing some of the gap between year-over-year sales. Ultimately, sales will remain off 2009 figures, but average price will level out and post a modest gain.

Our Thoughts :

I agree with this report and want to add that many buyers are looking and actually purchasing homes right now in Calgary.  The key is that as a seller you need to ensure that you can control the pricing and how your home shows.  Properties that show well combined with a realistic value will sell…

Provided by REMAX Fall Market Trends Report 2010

"Jared and Rebecca Chamberlain are Calgary REALTORS® who are changing how real estate is done in Calgary by utilizing online marketing and advanced tools to sell your house in Calgary faster and for far more money. They are a top real estate team in Calgary that you should consider for your next move in Calgary.

Jared & Rebecca

39 Millpark Way, SW

This home is situated in the south-west area of Millrise, a mature and safe location near many schools, shopping, public transportation, and near many parks and recreational areas. The open concept layout is characterized by the beautiful vaulted ceilings on the main floor. With ceramic tile, hardwood and carpet throughout, you are sure to feel right at home. The main floor which includes the living room, dining room, kitchen with an eating area and family room is bright and sunny with many windows facing the backyard. Upstairs you will find the master bedroom with a four-piece ensuite, and two additional bedrooms. The finished basement has a large recreational room and a secondary room without a window. In the backyard there is a two leveled deck, which is perfect to enjoy the mature surroundings.

VIEW VIRTUAL TOUR OF THIS HOME!

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