I'm in! I just registered for #rebcsd (rebarcamp San Diego). Its the day before #NAR2009 - and I have to say, I look forward to rebcsd much more than NAR. However both will be great as the REBarCamp and NAR are in Sunny San Diego.
SD is a fantastic city, and I highly recommend hanging around and taking in the sights. I lived in SD for 14 months, and spent way to much time hiking the hills, sailing the harbor and soaking up the sun on my favorite beach (la jolla shore).
Airport -It is Downtown - I mean right downtown. 3 miles to convention center / Gaslamp District.
Hotel location Tips - NAR and REBCSD are both in the Gas lamp district of SD, essentially South side of Downtown. The area is very pedestrian friendly, safe and with cabs and the train station within a short walk.
Convention center - Located in downtown and gas lamp district. It is downhill at the end of the road (literally) and sits on San Diego Harbor with views of Coronado Island, home of the Hotel Del Coronado
Hotel Del Coronado - $$$$$ Very nice. Known as "The Del". The Marylin Monroe movie "Some like it Hot" was filmed there, and they say there is a ghost in the hotel as well. Visit the Hotel for a beverage or meal overlooking the Pacific and the huge beach. There are high end shops in the basement of this amazing wooden structure.
San Diego Harbor -During my time in SD, My job was to take tourists sailing on the harbor on 25-32 foot sailboats. You can still rent sailboats with or with out a skipper (captain) Or, take a harbor cruise on one of several large 3 story White "Hornblower" ships. Very touristy - but you get nice views from the water. There is also a harbor taxi (small powerboat) that will take you to Coronado island restaurants and shops ($7).
Mexico - Tijuana - known locally as "TJ" - The trolley/train is the best way to go to avoid parking and the traffic jam. Don't drive into Mexico unless you get insurance to do so, and have no fear... There is parking on the US side of the border, and yes, a bridge to walk over to get to the vendors and shopping in TJ. Bargain with the vendors - this is the fun part. That cool Mexican blanket you want to buy? Think 1/2 price as "beginner negotiating". Biggest tip is stay with the crowd. Be safe and smart.
Mission Beach Known as "MB" -Fun filled area with nice wide boardwalk for people watching. Wooden roller coaster, cold beer and cocktails, fried seafood good times. Try the small local places rather than the big chains for more local flavor.
Golf - I'm bad at golf. Best of luck getting in and playing Tory pines. Rancho Bernardo is Home to several nice courses with views of the hills but 20 miles north of downtown.
Hope This helps, Ill See you in Sunny San Diego California!
Im VERY biased, but you need to go to the AR BBQ Contest the first weekend in Oct.
The American Royal BBQ in Kansas City is the Best BBQ contest or for that matter, outdoor Cooking Contest in the nation. On their website, they simply say its the largest... "Best" is subjective I guess.
Just across the Kansas state line in downtown KC MO sits the American Royal BBQ Contest - and each year for the last 10 or so, Ive gotten together with friends and family as a team and entered the worlds greatest BBQ contest. Our team name is "Where's the Smoke?" and we've had our share of success. Last year we won the Brisket Category, and we've placed as high as 4th in Pulled Pork. Typically there are 500 or so teams that enter, many of them own restaurants, sell rib rub or hire help to enter the contest - Our team is made up of bankers, Real Estate folk, FloorPlanOnline, Sprint people etc... so its no small feat to compete and win.
If you have never been, A trip to the American Royal BBQ is a must - simply standing in downtown KC the first weekend of October your senses will be engulfed in the sweet smell of apple wood, hickory and mesquite smoke that hints at the tender mouth watering Brisket, Chicken, Pulled pork and Pork Ribs slowly smoking in the cookers, smokers and grills next to Kemper Arena.
For the First timer, the big event for the public is the Friday night Party. There is a small fee at the gate to get on the grounds. Open Contest Teams set up a festival like atmosphere, with food, beer and bands that grove into the night, they seem to stop only for the fireworks show.
Saturday teams are hard at work - but its a blast for the family to watch, simply walking the grounds to view teams with $10,000 smokers, to teams like us with Weber WSM's and the extravagant tents, stages and space set ups is worth a few hours of your time. Several teams bring in Trees, plants and build whole gardens for people to enjoy. Our party is not huge, we have no trees - its pretty laid back, with couches, darts and beer. Infact we mooch off our neighbors who have a good live band.
So Heres the bad news - Parking is sort of a pain in the rear for guests. The tip: there is a bus that goes from Union Station (and other places) that will save you a few bucks and the aforementioned PITA. Also, most of the party's Friday are invitation only - so ask around to find people who are hosting big events. But be sure to check out the Amerian Royal BBQ - Largest BBQ contest in the world.
(If you are an Active Rain agent, give me a ring ahead of time, come try some great award winning BBQ and a beer with me Friday night Oct 2nd!)
When I golf, I scare woodland creatures as the ball wizzes off the green into the woods. Even so, I still enjoy the "idea" of a good game of golf.
Its been a while since I posted a "cool home tour" that weve produced - There have been plenty to share, Ive just been swamped with other stuff (not like working on my golf game).
Check out this brick bute in Carolina. Great golf views from the deck. click the red icons to view the photos on the tour.
As always you can Click the Facebook and Twitter buttons at the bottom to share. Enjoy!
Lots of cool projects coming out of development right now. (but...some projects are boring and I wont bother talking about 'em)
One of the cool things we released this week was the new photo download page and Hi-Res Photo page. Now, any of our FloorPlanOnline clients may select to download all the photos from thier tour in different sizes or download photos individually. The Hi-Res should be in around 2500x1800 in size, which is good for printing.
This will be especialy helpfull when you want to place a Hi-Res photo of the listing in a high end printed publication, digital billboard or if you wanted to have a screen print of the home on a t-shirt. ;)
Its Early, but I Found what I want for Xmas this year, and it got me to thinking about what I want for all Real Estate Agents this year as well.
I really want agents to embrace social media - not that it would make the world a better place like peace on earth - but it might open the public up to thinking that agents were not stuck in the newspaper era.
Even many agents on AR seem to be sluggish. I think its odd that there are so many posts regarding "Social media, is it a Fad?" The only fad, is the format we view social media in. The format will continue to change. Social Media has been around the USA since the first east coat taverns opened, People socialized - Ben Franklin started printing Social media - then Radio, then TV, Internet ....where will it go next? Simply put Social Media will continue to evolve in different formats, and those agents who want to keep on top of their game have to evolve as well - Ride the wave, paddle back out and catch the next one.
Now on to what I am putting as #1 on my wish list. The Duel Screen Laptop!!
How Cool is this? (very) At 12 lbs and 3k - going to have to be very, very good this year, and hire a sherpa to haul it around. The Duel Screen Laptop.
Ive seen several of these videos, This one is the best yet. Its still crazy to see how important Social Media is today, and where it will be in the future. Fad? Hardly.
Social media - and the feedback we receive for our work online tells others about the quality of our work. If you don't represent / take part in the conversation - you loose.
FloorPlanOnline has empowered and enabled its top of the line interactive tours with Twitter and Facebook. Each tour has built in buttons that allow buyers, sellers and Agents to post, tweet and share listings with friends.
Try it out your self - Here's how in 3 steps and 22 seconds:
Yeah - we almost capsized the ship due to the flood of orders and response from agents. I had no idea social media tools tied to virtual tours could have such a profound effect! FloorPlanOnline Tours are going viral - homeowners are happy, homes are selling and agents are calling in the praise. Thanks to those of you that have said the nice words.
Brief Summary to review: We simply added the ability for anyone to comment, post, tweet, blog (you get the idea) to any FloorPlanOnline Virtual Tour. there are buttons on each tour - you click "twitter" and the listing pops into your twitter feed - then you can comment on it - Same with Facebook! (No extra charge here either)
However, There is demand for more - Several agents have requested assistance getting started with Facebook, Twitter, (even Active Rain) etc...We may have a solution for those of you with questions on the horizon. Give me a shout if interested or you have questions about tying together your Social Media and virtual tours.
For years the Real Estate Community, including FloorPlanOnline has been on Twitter, (twitter.com/fpo) Facebook (facebook.com/floorplanonline) and Here on Active Rain (ActiveRain.com/FPO) to network, learn and educate. FloorPlanOnline has long been the main player in the Floor Plan Virtual Tour Business - so it really only made sense to combine the power of social media and the effectiveness of Floor Plan Tours.
As of right now you can see more than a dozen of your favorite social media tools built into your FloorPlanOnlineTour. Also included are MySpace, Linked in and Blogger as well as many up-and-commers that are all embedded for you, the savy agent as well as the seller or serious home buyer to utilize. The feature works for all FPO Tours, instantly transforming the wildly popular and easy to use FloorPlanOnline Tours into an easy to use viral marketing tool.
FloorPlanOnline now boasts the most easy to use, robust, interactive viral virtual tour available. Its easy for even very basic users - they open a tour, click the icon and the tour is linked on their social media page. Each listing takes less than 20 seconds to add to Facebook, allowing you to easily show your listing to your network. The most savy of agents will have their seller to do the same. Best of all, it is free with your Photo Tour or FloorPlan Tour.
At FloorPlanOnline we run into agents sometimes that take good photos, but more frequently than not, we run into agents that THINK they take great photos. (that's why we offer to take photos for agents, and offer to measure the listing). Sometimes the issues are easy repaired....the lessons easily learned.
But every now and then a listing comes along that simply is not photogenic. This is not the fault of the photographer. Sometimes its paint, and other times...well its more of an architectural issue. I believe the guy that built this place must have traded a jet ski for a random assortment of windows on Craig's list. It looks like he got quite a deal.
This place could be yours for just under 3M - that's about 250k per type/size/style of window.
Disclaimer: ActiveRain Corp. does not necessarily endorse the real estate agents, loan officers and brokers listed on this site. These real estate profiles, blogs and blog entries are provided here as a courtesy to our visitors to help them make an informed decision when buying or selling a house. ActiveRain Corp. takes no responsibility for the content in these profiles, that are written by the members of this community.
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