Every now and again, things happen to us on the road of life, an unexpected birth, an equally unexpected death. A job promotion or the loss of a job – we all face the dreaded DETOUR….

We come to a point where we get to choose where we want to be NOW, since where we thought we were headed changed.
Seven Gables was born out of a desire to deliver a different kind of real estate brokerage to the community. We hired only experienced professionals – professionals who throughout the years, would continue to enhance their understanding of the market, the trends, and the vehicles by which to market and advertise your property. We were and still are quite proud of the reputation that we have built over the years, one building block at a time. Integrity. Honesty. Commitment. To us these not mere words that look good on a page. They define use and serve as the bar by which we measure every decision.

Times have changed. This is neither good nor bad, it just is. Economically, we have all faced our share of challenges. We have hit this:

How did we adjust? Easy. We took stock in what was important to us. Our relationships with our clients. Our agents. And each other as a company. We acknowledge that the market has shifted and have never taken our eye off of what that shift is and where it’s going. We have redirected how we focus our energy and resources so that everyone – our Clients and the agent who work for us benefit.

Despite the market downturn, we have invested in our future. We hired experts in their fields to evaluate our company, our technology and our options and guide us with regards to what we can do to be better at everything.

Will the market continue to shift, adjust and readjust? Of course. This is a certainty. It always has and it will continue to do so. Will we be in the forefront, learning how to shift with the market while holding to our core values and principles? Definitely! Where will this ultimately lead? It’s hard to say.
In life there are few things you can control or guarantee. But the fulfillment of promises made should be one of those things that you strive to do under every circumstance. We don’t know what the future will bring, but our promise to be a part of it is one we plan on keeping.

I love what I do! I am a Realtor for a FUNomenal company, as well as a sponge when it comes to all things Social Media. One of the reasons that I embrace this new forum is because of the vast reach it has, and I realize that in our Society, this is oftentimes how we get things done. We reach out beyond our borders and relay information to the masses!

Did you know that as a Seller, once your home is listed on the Multiple Listing Service, it is automatically sent out to dozens of websites?

Not just local ones either! Your listing can be seen as far away as Russia or a tiny village in Cambodia (provided of course they have internet).

What does this mean for you? It means that you no longer have to rely on a weekly advertisement in the local newspaper!

It means that a webpage can be created SPECIFICALLY for your home, and will be seen by an innumerable amount of people.

Why is this important, you may be asking yourself? Because regardless of how much money is spent on advertising, the main goal is not to spend thousands of dollars, but to reach thousands of consumers! One of them is bound to be interested in your home!

We, as Realtors, strive to make sure that we give as much information as possible (without security codes of course) to the potential buyers that will be interested in seeing your home.

Some agents even post blogs all about your home, giving not only the details/specifics of your home, but the feel of it. The comfort, the spaciousness, the love that you have experienced living in your home. All of this now translates well on the web, and it is important that you take full advantage of it.

I’m not saying that traditional ways of advertising a home for sale are wrong or ineffective. There was a time and place for that…

kinda like the horse and buggy…it has been replaced to be more efficient…faster…reliable.

How do you feel now that you know this? Does it bother you or excite you to have that kind of reach? Please leave a comment…I’d like to know!

One of the things I love about being a Realtor is the freedom that I have to do research. I can block times out of my day to research trends, neighborhoods, loan information, and social media, anything and everything that is relevant to my Industry.

Today I wanted to post a blog about what it is like for you as a buyer. I had thoughts and ideas that I wanted to put on paper, but nothing was coming…so I took a drive…headed towards the beach and found a place called Inspiration Point. I couldn’t tell you what beach it is specifically, other than I think it’s in Newport.

As I pulled out my laptop, everything that I wanted to say came rushing at me…like the waves that I hear in the background. I hope you are inspired by my thoughts!

There was a time when you as consumers were limited as to what information you could gather with regards to real estate.

As a buyer you had to rely on the information a Real Estate agent gave you. You would have to drive around different neighborhoods to look at Open Houses. Sometimes you would stop in, other times you wouldn’t. More often than not, the times that you did go in you discovered that the house didn’t suit your needs. And so you packed up your family and started again.

It hasn’t been that long ago that Real Estate Agent’s didn’t cooperate with one another with regards to a listing. That is how the Open House came to be.

The Open House was created to lure BUYERS and potential sellers in, gather the information that they needed to look for a home to suit the buyers needs, run to the office, tear off a page from the “Holy Book Of Realtors” (yes, all listing information was kept in a book and changed as needed…) then set the appointment to show you properties.

Eventually came newspaper advertising, and being ever resourceful, Realtors everywhere would advertise their listing’s in print…

this also opened up a multitude of “Homes for Sale” magazines, some which are still in effect today, though the information is most of the times expired. Homes sell, listings are cancelled etc.

Nowadays, we have the internet…

Really it’s only been around for us regular folks for about 15 years.

With the internet came a whole new way to advertise…which meant power to the people!

You could log on to the net, type in a zip code and find a myriad of homes for sale, or Open Houses. They are chock full of information, pictures, square footage, price and days on market! That makes it so much easier for you, the consumer to gather your own information before making the dreaded “call”. You know the one…where you call the listing office asking to see the home afraid that if you show up for the appointment, you will be forced to buy THAT house, or worse…get put on an email campaign!

I know this is true because I have spoken to many buyers in my career and they all say the same thing!

I love the fact that you as the consumer are empowered to create your own searches…I love the fact that there is so much information out there and that because of this, we agents have had to step up to the plate and be transparent in our business.

When you log on, you have the power to create a search that will tell you pretty much everything you need to know about the Realtor that is going to represent you. You can Google their name and see what comes up. Charities they have worked with, blogs, photos…everything is online for you to decide if this is a person you want to work with.

This is the ULTIMATE power for you. I’m curious, did you KNOW that? If you didn’t, doesn’t knowing this now empower you? Please post a comment…I would really like to know!