Mike's Real Estate Blog

New Beginnings!!

Michael Swanson, Broker (Keller Williams North Raleigh) — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 17:30:16 -0700

Wow, it's been a while since I posted a blog. I have a good excuse though. I was busy getting married. I had to take some time off from the real estate game and focus on that but I am back and have affiliated myself with a new firm!

I am now a part of the team over at Keller Williams North Raleigh. I am very excited about this new office and am looking forward to goods things to come!

So if you're thinking about buying or selling, stop by or give me a call and let's talk about your possible options. There are lots of opportunities out there! What are you waiting for? I can't wait to talkto you soon!

It Was a Success!!

Michael Swanson, Broker (Keller Williams North Raleigh) — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 08:33:03 -0800

So I had a great weekend last weekend! Remember my last post talking about my open house? Well, it happened! Let me tell you about it!

SETUP:

It was a rainy day, there was talk of snow right around the corner, cold, just not the typical "open house" weather that makes people want to come out. I wasn't expecting much from it considering the weather. I put out my signs in the pouring rain. (I forgot my rain coat because I was running late putting together last minute things for the event.) This home was actually about 6 turns off of the main road so I had to put up 6 directional signs just to get from the big road to this home. The more I thought about it, it just wasn't shaping up to be a good "open house day." I finally got all 6 signs out (no balloons because of the rain), opened the house, and setup the interior with my flyers and other useful info on the home and neighborhood.

THE EVENT:

I got everything setup, found an unsecured network to keep myself busy on my laptop, and sat down with the MLS to just play around. I didn't even get logged in to MLS when I had my first visitor! I though "awesome!" This couple came in, looked around, liked the home, gave me their contact info, and left. I thought, "ok, I just had all of my traffic and I just started." I sat back down only to get up again because someone else pulled up to visit! This ended up to be the story of the day!

THE CONCLUSION:

So here's what I have to show for it! 12 people stopped by, 5 gave me their contact info, 2 are looking to buy in the next 6 months and are going to most likely use me when they do, and one wants to sell his 2500 sq ft home and downgrade to this 1800 sq ft home and give me both transactions! Looking at it, the statistics were right, 1 in 4 people visit an open house turn into business. This was more action and traffic I have had at an open house than all of the other open houses I've done in the past 6 months combined! Now I'm off to be a good Realtor and follow up and keep them as true business and not just looky-loos at an open house!

OPEN HOUSE SAT AND SUN 2/28 3/1 (What will you do with $15,000?)

Michael Swanson, Broker (Keller Williams North Raleigh) — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 16:25:29 -0800

Come see me at an open house this weekend in Cary, NC!! This is a beautiful executive townhome located at 228 Anniston Court in Cary, NC! It will be open on Saturday Feb. 28th and Sunday March 1st from 1-4pm! Come saturday and find out how to win $15,000! Who doesn't need $15,000 right now?

Let Me Do The Hard Work For You!!

Michael Swanson, Broker (Keller Williams North Raleigh) — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 11:13:10 -0800

The market is very different now and requires lots of creative thinking! Let me take that load off of your shoulders! Just a quick phone call or e-mail away! I work anywhere in the triangle area! I promise you won't be disappointed!

"The Right Agent Makes All The Difference In The World!"

Great Food and a Perfect Pint!

Michael Swanson, Broker (Keller Williams North Raleigh) — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 09:04:43 -0800

I found my new favorite restaurant last night. It's an Irish pub located in the Brier Creek Shopping area in Raleigh! The name? It's Tra'Li Irish Pub. The minute you walk in the door of the incredible establishment you are taken to an Irish pub from the Victorian Era. The walls are wood tone, the lighting is warm and welcoming, and the food is incredible! They have a very relaxing atmosphere and there are HDTV's scattered throughout the pub so you don't miss a minute of your favorite rugby team or even a little ACC basketball action!

As I mentioned before, the food was phenominal! I had the Shepherds Pie and it was out of this world. Not the typical "mush" you will find at other inferior establishments but this was a great balance of mashed potatoes and meat and vegies with just the right amount of gravy! My fiance and daughter had the fish and chips and, aside from not being served in the daily newsprint, was really good as well. If you like roasted meats check out their daily carvery!

Did I mention the perfect pints?!? This is the first place I found my favorite stout on drought. Until now I have only been able to get it in cans or go to Ireland to get it out of a keg. What is this incredible stout? Why none other than Murphy's Stout. Brewed in Cork Ireland, this stout rivals Guinness in my opinion! Not quite as "nutty" in flavor as Guinness, it has sort of a coffee character to it. Very smooth and great after a long day's work.

The only complaint I had with this place is there was no live trad session going on. It was piped in through the radio speakers. They do advertise live music but I have not experienced this as of yet to i can't make an educated comment on this. Rest assured though that I will be back for the food or just a good pint. Hopefully I can catch a trad session while there. If not, I might have to break out the uilleann pipes and start one up. If you're even in the Raleigh area look it up. It's about 5 minutes tops from the Raleigh/Durham airport. If you work in the RTP it's only a short drive so come on over and have a pint! I'll save you a seat!

I was running blind and felt naked at the same time :(

Michael Swanson, Broker (Keller Williams North Raleigh) — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 22:33:04 -0800

So I woke up last Thursday and fired up my laptop to do my morning catch-up and get my plan together for the day. It was taking a while to load so I thought it had some updates that it was loading or something. I didn't think about it and went to get a shower instead. I got ready and 30 minutes later the laptop still wasn't up. The hard drive wasn't even spinning. I shut down and loaded safe mode. NOTHING! Now I'm getting frustrated so I ran the diagnostics that came with the laptop. I walked away to walk my dog and came back to a loud beeping. I knew this couldn't be good. I read it and googled the error. BAD HARD DRIVE! I called Dell and they refused to talk to me because I bought it at Best Buy and Best Buy wouldn't talk to me on the phone. I had to take it in.

I walked up to the counter and they said they would have to send it off for 2 weeks. 2 WEEKS!! I told them that this option was unacceptable as this laptop is my business lifeline. It would be the same as me asking them to shut their doors for a week. Of course I exaggerated a little but I had to do something to get it back faster. They went to talk to their "supervisors" and came back and promised it back to me in 24 hours. They would replace the hard drive in house but they might not be able to put another 250gb hard drive in it like it originally had. I left.

I got the call the next day! My laptop is ready! I picked it up and they didn't have the 250gb hard drive like they said, they had to put in a 320gb disk instead. You didn't hear any complaints from me since I wasn't paying for it. Here's the bad news...they were unable to recover any of the files from the bad hard drive. I had to redo all of my files and spreadsheets that I hadn't e-mailed myself. Luckily all of my important files and such were either backed up on my external hard drive or in my e-mail inbox.

So now, I have spent the last4 days rebuilding my files and programs. I hate the feeling of being handicapped and useless like I was the last week. I'm up and running now and open for business!

MORAL OF THE STORY: Always backup your files!

Have a great day and may your hard drive never fail!

YAY!!!

Michael Swanson, Broker (Keller Williams North Raleigh) — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 19:44:21 -0800

So, I'm not as excited at the writing of this post as the title suggests but I can't complain too much! Monday started off pretty much like every other Monday (I didn't want it to start). But no matter how hard I tried it arrived bright and early this morning. Here's what I did.

1) Woke up to play with my daughter a little and see her awesome picture that she was drawing! She even stayed inside the lines for the most part! I'm so proud of her.

2) Went to my "other job" and spent the rest of my day.

Exciting day huh? Well, here's some of the highlights that made it not so ordinary. I got a call from a local home inspector and he wants to meet with me for lunch one day this week to discuss a future business relationship! Somehow he manages to get lots of leads for real estate agents and wants to discuss a future relationship that will benefit us both. So hopefully this will turn into some business for me pretty soon!

After this phone call I received an email from an agent in my office who is managing to get more leads and business than she can handle and wants to share the wealth so she emailed me! I took it as a great compliment because I am new and there are lots of other "seasoned veterans" in our office that she could have chosen!

On top of all of this the caterer that my fiance and I really wanted for our wedding e-mailed me back and agreed to do an awesome menu that meets our budget! And even worked a discount for using them for more than just our reception!

On hindsight I'm glad I got up and started this morning because it turned out to be a great Monday after all! I just wanted to share my awesome day!

Busy sunday!

Michael Swanson, Broker (Keller Williams North Raleigh) — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 00:21:16 -0800

I'm sitting here working up my plans for tomorrow and realized that my day of rest is not going to be very restful at all!

I am waking up at 7 in the morning to go to church. Then I am spending the rest of the day outside walking neighborhoods and meeting people.

I just got a stack of new door hangers that are good for a free home warranty if they list through me and I just have been dying to give them away! In between knocking I am going to be here in the rain trying to build my web presence. I still don't know why I'm doing this as it's been nothing but an exercise in futility. At least tomorrow i'm not using any gas as I'm walking it all. There are several neighborhoods right here where I live that will be easy to walk to so I'm just glad it's going to be relatively warm tomorrow. I won't need full snow suit, just a warm jacket!

Wish me luck as I am desperate for leads. Enjoy your sunday!

SNOW IN RALEIGH!! and some driving tips!

Michael Swanson, Broker (Keller Williams North Raleigh) — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 15:23:36 -0800

Wow, so I somehow managed to survive the "great blizzard of '09" here in Raleigh! I'm always amazed at the panic that even the mention of that 4-letter S word brings on. Why bread and milk anyway? Personally I prefer hot wings and beer especially when there's a great game like the Duke/NC State game on! Anyhow, when I was watching the news after the game, they mentioned about how there were over 100 car accidents in the area. This is absolutely absurd in my opinion! Insurance companies are racking up on premium increases because of you! Now, I'm not claiming to be the definitive authority on driving in the snow but I do have a few tips for for those who are interested!

This is the summary of sll of the tips to follow in one phrase USE COMMON SENSE!! Here's how:

Know where you are going and how to get there before you even leave your house. If you don't know where you're going, you probably don't need to go there in a blizzard. Unless it absolutely can't wait until the next day don't even try to go out! If you do have to get there know how you will get there! The worst thing you can do to other drivers is almost miss your turn and try to correct by trying to slam on breaks or cutting them off! This leads to my next tip!

Don't use your breaks! Of course you will need to break at stop lights and such but I'm talking about when you're driving down the road, quit tapping your breaks! All this does is create an opportunity for your tires to loose traction. Use the natural laws of physics to slow you down or better yet DON'T GO THAT FAST IN THE FIRST PLACE!

Be aware of other cars (stupid drivers) on the road. Even if you're comfortable with driving in the snow, the guy driving next to you might now. I'd hate to see that car do something stupid and slam into you! Keep your distance. Even when stopped a traffic light keep your distance because if that guy rear-ends you and forces you into the car in front of you it's now your fault for that guy and your insurance is going up!

Remember Newton's Law of Inertia. This gets into the technical physics of it all. But here is the law: Every object in a state of uniform motion tends to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it. And here it is explained: Basically your car want to follow the straightest path and go at the same speed unless another force (friction in this case) acts on it. This applies everyday but you have to think about it more on snow. Under normal circumstances we have the force of friction acting on our side (dry road + rubber tires = lots of friction). Now, on snow we lose alot of the friction and on ice it's almost non-existant. So, how do we compensate? Keep the turns to a minimum. your car wants to go in the straighest path as possible and when you tell it to turn you are changing the force and it doesn't like that, friction is what causes it to react. When there is no friction, motion will laugh at you and keep going straight (into the tree or ditch). The law also says that motion likes to keep going, it doesn't like to go away (slow down). So, remember my braking comment? This is why. Even though you want to slow down or stop, motion doesn't and when friction's not on your team, motion wins because there's no external force acting on it.

I hope these few tips helped out. Bottom line is be smart about it and use some common sense as I mentioned before. If you have never driven in the snow, get someone who is experienced to take you to an empty parking lot and practice! Know how to recover from a skid, how to avoid skids in the first place, and how much distance is truly required to stop compared to normal conditions.

Be safe, enjoy the snow, and never enter a snowball fight with the local baseball star!