Monthly Archives: December 2006

What if buying a house was like buying a car?

What if there were no real estate agents. Buyers and sellers could meet and hash it out. Let the smarter person win. Let the more educated person take advantage of the lesser. Would it be better or worse? Well I was thinking of what buying a car is like [...]
Posted in Denver Real Estate, General Interest | Comments closed

Where to spend my marketing budget?

Internet advertising is such a waste of money. Definitely overpriced compared to the returns I get from other types of advertising. Not so much my own websites- they have their use, it’s the Internet lead sources that will no longer be receiving checks from me. Lead sources like Justlisted.com, Realestate.com, HomeGain, and the myriad of [...]
Posted in Business, Denver Real Estate, Internet, Marketing, Technology | Comments closed

Theme change at Spencerbarron.com

Being snowed in, I finally found some time to change out my theme to more of what I wanted. I’m going with this Cutline theme by Chris Pearson. It seems to be fairly well supported, and when I look at the templates it almost makes sense. Well, at least in that I recognize a few English [...]
Posted in Wordpress | Comments closed

How to sell your home quickly for top dollar.

“How do I sell my home quickly for top dollar?” I often talk to people who aren’t sure whether they want to use a broker or not. They’re not sure if a broker can get them any higher of a value than if they sold it themselves. Personally, I think you can [...]
Posted in Denver Real Estate, FSBO | Comments closed

Blizzard of 2006 – Buried in Snow and loving it.

I love the snow, and Denver blizzards are so much nicer than the East Coast and Midwest blizzards of my youth. The snow is fun for the first couple of days, but it wears on you after a couple of days. I love to look out and see a smooth white blanket over everything. It [...]
Posted in General Interest, Personal | Comments closed

Buying a home? Think before making your first offer.

You’ve spent three months on the internet looking at homes until you’ve narrowed down the area you like. You then spent another month looking at what’s available and have finally narrowed it down to one. You want to make an offer but don’t want to spend too much. How do you start the negotiating process? What [...]
Posted in Denver Real Estate, General Interest, Investing | Comments closed

Misinformation and Transparency – What's wrong with real estate

In an earilier post I had mentioned how I had emailed Stephen Gandel of Money magazine with some corrected information on the Denver market. In particular I had been displeased with some of the advice they handed out to buyers. The information for the article had partially been drawn from a local Realtor who suggested [...]
Posted in Business, Denver Real Estate, General Interest, Personal | Comments closed

Rodrigo Y Gabriela steels Guster's thunder

I don’t get out much. Admittedly, I don’t love being in large crowds of people. But some things are worth suffering for. I went to see Guster, December 14,2006 at the Ogden Theatre in Denver and was pleased to see that Rodrigo Y Gabriela were opening for them. It was probably the best opening act I’ve ever [...]
Posted in General Interest, music | Comments closed

Realtors are among least trusted

In case you haven’t noticed, there’s a lot of negative feelings toward real estate agents these days. Did you know that according to a nationwide survey by Harris Interactive, you are more likely to trust your mechanic than your real esate agent?  The study revealed that 20% of people wouldn’t trust a real estate agent at all.  [...]
Posted in Business, Denver Real Estate, General Interest | Comments closed

Zillow's Out – Will it Float?

  “I love Zillow.”  “I liked them before they were big.”    Saying that I was a big fan of Zillow.com from the start is kind of like saying, “I liked Dave Matthews before he got big” (My wife, a Virginia native, loves to say that).  For one, nobody believes you, and second, nobody cares.  Regardless of what people [...]
Posted in Business, Denver Real Estate, General Interest, Personal, Technology | Comments closed