David's Blog

The Real Me Too

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 15:52:02 -0600

Hmmmm . . . My "thanks" to Cedric (Ced) Reynolds - (909) 597-3502 (CedReynolds.com) for tagging me for this lastest MeMe , called the Real Me. The rules are:

Create a blog post with a link to the person who so happily tagged you. See above!

1. List all of these rules in the post. Feel free to cut and paste this.

2. Share seven things that others may not know about you. Do or have, or did you have, a life outside of real estate? Gosh, something other than real estate after the year we have just had? Ha!

3. Identify seven friends, contacts or near enemies in which to adorn this MEME. Tag them at the end of the post and give a link to their blog (hey, it's super easy. Even, I figured it out - I cut and paste it :)

4. Contact each of the tagged members and let them know that you were indeed fast enough to catch them and that you did indeed tag them...no matter how much they say you missed them! No schoolyard rules in this MEME, nope you gotta do it if you are tagged. Sorry guys!

So here are 7 things you may not know about me. So here goes:

1. I am a big computer nerd

2. I love cars (4 wheel drive monsters(

3. I enjoy paintball, its great exercise and the perfect team building experience

4. I'm always looking to buy a new cell phone because I'm a phone nut

5. I love playing the Nintendo Wii, and oneday ill hold the unofficial Wii olympics

6. I am not permitted to drink soday by my wife but I occationally cheat.

7. I know we can't say it but I love real estate or at least looking at houses.

Here are the 7 people I am tagging:

Jean Joh

Nicole Machado

Blogging on ActiveRain if you sign up you should blog!

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 17:57:17 -0600

I did a count for our office and we have about 35 people out of 100+ people who are registered on ActiveRain. Out of the 35 only 10(less than) have a score above 700, and 50% of those will not actively post.

What about the 25 people who have lower scores. I know they don't post, I will wager they have forgotten their password maybe even their user-names.

If you are a registered user

you should post.
you comment.
you should grow your presence on the web

otherwise you wasting an oportunity to earn some advertising presence through the internet.

I think it looks worse if you have not posted because everything is so generic people think you are brand new in the business or you don't know what you are doing or you are out of the business.

Protect your name

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 21:26:24 -0600

I have a fellow realtor who ran into a problem with a YELP review from some one who was not their client. The review present this capable agent in a very poor like and went as far as to say she was an uncaring person.

The writer of the blog was a tenant and just didn't want to leave the property. The complaint was she didn't get money to help her move.

I think it is a joke that this happened but now the review is up and yelp won't remove it. hope it doesn't have to go to legal

share your experiences of bad review that were not deserving

Remote Locks (what about our lock boxes)

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 17:26:12 -0600

Schlage Lock company has come up with an internet linked electronic key system. It would allow people to use PDA and access the lock or to change the combo on the door.

Not a bad Idea but if somehow you had a listing with it and your PDA phone could work like a lock box key that would be great.

Craigslist a Cheaper Alternative

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 23:22:41 -0600

I have been a photography nut for a while. I purchased many cameras from stores or online. With the sight down turn in the economy I decided to look for a new camera body on craigslist.org. To my delight I found a used Canon Xsi for around 400 body only, with all items and box. I tested it and found it to be just what i was looking for and at a bit over $325. This is still a lot of money but a great deal.

One cut back stragety is to purchase some good used items instead of new. I have taken some pictures of listings and will be using it for business.

a good photo can speak volumes.

pretty nice camera and I can uses the lenses I already have for my Xti

Consumer Electroincs Show (CES) toys for our future

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 23:02:57 -0600

I have a mini computer that I have been carting around to do business with. In addition I also have a PDA phone. This years CES has a cool mini computer from OQO. It looks awesome and with internet I can see running most of by business from it. especially if I meet with clients or have to chat online with them.

Can you see in two or three years as Wifi become more common Realestate migrating to this format?

What do you want the big discount or a realtor who can do the job?

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 17:45:26 -0600

I received a floor call from potential buyers. We spoke for a while and I qualified them as serious buyers. We made an appointment to look at a house that was very similar to what they wanted.

During the process we talked about making the offer and out of the blue they had a realtor (a relative). This one question is something I go over every time and I know they said they did not have one.

I politely told them that if they were planning to use their relative them we should end our discussions here and that the person they were planning to write the offer with should help them. Thirty minutes wasted is only thirty minutes.

40 minutes later I receive a call, they were again asking questions about what to make the offer for and how it should be done and if this is a good deal...

I asked if they would like me to write the offer and help them or if they would prefer using their relative, which they replied their relative. (I'm guessing that there is a huge discount)

I believe I did the correct thing and told them to go back to the relative but alas no more than 2 hrs later a call again.

The questions for you is:

What should I do next?

Magazines are they getting thinner

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 16:50:41 -0600

I see that the Homes and Land and Homes.com magazines are getting really really thin. The people are the same and I don't see anything new about them. The photos change but the message is the same. I am wonder how much of your business or leads are generated from magazines. Has there been a drop or has or is it the same as it has always been. I started in the business over 3 years ago and i had people call on magazine adds before but in the past year i have only fielded one call asking about a Homes and Land ad. I am curious to see if you are also getting the same results.

How much time should we put into prospecting

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 17:14:59 -0600

I finished my business plan for 2009 and it is pretty good. I looked over and over and found that i have put a tone of time into cold calling and door knocking. Is it really necessary? I ended up cutting back on some time and added more to build up my internet presence.

My questions to you all are

1) how many transactions do you get from the internet based on

2) how many leads and

3) how many hours you are adding to things like activerain.

even though I am satisfied with the business plan I have I would be happy to change it if there was a poll the audiance feature and it returned something unexpected.

thank you in advanced answering some or all three of the questions plus your thoughts

Is your computer a Zombie? New Facebook Virus

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 17:21:41 -0600

Good Afternoon ActiveRain Bloggers, There has been a virus spreading around. You will recieve a message that there is a video that is fantastic and blah blah blah. You click on the email which then tell you that you must update flash player. Zombie city a worm has entered you computer and your world crashs around you. No its not that bad but we are in the holiday season and the last thing we want is to have a hijacked computer to fix.

careful of those emails. my warning came from a friend using facebook who computer just went pooh.

If you have been hit please tell us I'm trying to see how wide it has spread

Google SEO rules to change, Do you have something to worry about?

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 21:53:02 -0600

For the past month I have heard rumors of Google rolling out a new algorithm for search engine optimization (SEO). It is confirmed. The major change is stickyness, how long are people staying on you site, and what do they do on the site. There is a good chance google will compare your surfing habits of the past to the site you are visiting.

So make your sites sticky, it doesn't sound like a lot but there are a lot more changes than this, however they all revolve around the idea of people finding your site informational. Have content that people want to see and will stay on your site for longer than 30 seconds.

There are plenty of companies that will start advertising that they already know what the criteria is and that they can get you to the top.

My very close friend in Yahoo, will tell you that it is all lies. At this moment only Google know's and if they are anything like the last time they made a change to their algorithm no one will know for sure ever...

I will post more if i get more intel

thanks for following

Work Hard & Play Hard

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 16:53:05 -0600

Christmas is upon us again, I wanted to know what you do for your office during this time of year. Since it has been a pretty trying year for real estate we thought that people would not be doing much in the way of office celebrations but our office will keep traditions alive.

we have our annual dinner

we will be decorating the office, this is usually a big deal and at least 50% of the agents will show up and make a huge mess in the office

Just interested to know what you do in your office to celebrate

The Real Estate Technology Cycle

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 19:20:19 -0600

The statements I make are an over view and not meant to insult but to provoke a response for or against my views.

To understand the terms used in this blog
web capital is your web presence
web equity is what and how other perceive you and your web presence.

The Big Picture for the internet is like everything else in our business. They are all related. The easiest way I can explain how the interation works is to compare it with a tradional form of marketing / prospecting.

The Website is your base for your internet system. This is where you want potential leads to end up if they are serious about doing business with you.
Webpage are are the different pieces of marketing drawing people to your website.
Blog Posting, Twitters, Craigslist Ads, are all forms of attention advertising that spread your maketing.

You need all of these to build a successful web based lead generation system.

How do these conpare to a traditional marketing / prospecting? Lets look at farming, flyers are like the blogs and tweets. Newpaper ads are like craigslist ads. All of these are meant to grab attention and draw people to a property or cause a person interest to contact you.

your web page and website are like a business office and resume. People will go there to find out a little about you and what you represent.

We all want a nice looking flyer with nice paper and a good lay out, our office clean and professional, If either of these pieces are negative or reflect poorly on you, you could potentially lose the business.

The internet is the same way, and if any piece is missing then you might not have a chain to bring them to the website.

next time we will look specifically at the website

keep reading

The Real Estate Technology Cycle

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 14:46:31 -0600

The Real Estate Technology Cycle provide by http://myhome-ca.com

This cycle of blogs represents the observations of the real estate industry for the past three years, The statements I make are an over view and not meant to insult but to provoke a response for or against my views.

To understand the terms used in this blog
web 1.0 refers to websites where you the owner of the site provide the information.
web 2.0 refers to websites where you and others as a community provide the information.

As an industry real estate is struggling with technology. Those of us in the forefront are using web 2.0 ideas to increase our business. Those of us who are following are being left behind everyday. Too many of us however do not see the big picture.

If we were to see the big picture I think as an industry we would find a new way to capture leads.

What I want todo is breakdown the internet and technology into these 8 pieces and address them in different blogs

Intro / The Basics (what you are reading now)
The Big Picture Introduction
Websites
Webpages
Social Sites
Blogging
Online Ads
Craiglist
The Big Picture Conclusion

Blogging is it a form of prospecting for clients

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 12:34:15 -0600

2008 is coming to a close and 2009 aproaches swiftly. Like many of you I am still working on my business plan for next year. I have at a juction that is confusing. Is blogging / twittering / linkedin a form of prospecting.

There are 4 basic groups first there is PROSPECTING and second there is MARKETING. Prospecting can be broken down into active and passive. Marketing can be broken down into Now or Future.

Now marketing are the flyers for you open house to service now business the primary goal is to market the property, as secondary goal is to pick up sellers and buyers

Future Marketing are the flyers to maket you. They could be the popular calendars that we are all rushing to send out. no other purpose but to stay in touch and have the people we know use us again.

Passive prospecting is working the floor and waiting for a call to come into you.

Active prospecting is calling on the phones to make a connection.

At this moment I think that blogging cover all the areas mentioned above. If you don't think it is a form of propecting please let me know why. I am very interested in you opinions

Property tax time

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 14:18:08 -0600

It is the end of the year and property taxes are due by DEC 10th or it will be late. I have some of the counties for northeren CA and for Fresno. As I up date I will add more.

To pay them online, or view status, visit the sites below:

For Alameda:
http://www.acgov.org/propertytax.htm

For Alpine County:
http://www.alpinecountyca.gov/departments/treasurer

For Amador County:
http://www.co.amador.ca.us/depts/treasurer/

For Butte County:
http://ttc.buttecounty.net/Default.aspx?tabid=63

For Calaveras County:
http://www.co.calaveras.ca.us/cc/Departments/TaxCollector.aspx

For San Francisco County:
https://services.sfgov.org/ptx/intro.asp

For San Mateo:
http://www.sanmateocountytaxcollector.org/SMCWPS/pages/secureSearch.jsp

For Santa Clara:
http://payments.scctax.org/payment/jsp/currentSecured.jsp

For Contra Costa:
https://taxcolb.co.contra-costa.ca.us/taxpayment/main/

For Sacramento:
http://www.eproptax.saccounty.net/

For Fresno:
https://www2.co.fresno.ca.us/0410/fresnoproptax/

For the ones I have not found to pages to this is a good place to start you search

Alameda	www.acgov.org
Alpine	www.alpinecountyca.gov
Amador	www.co.amador.ca.us
Butte	www.buttecounty.net
Calaveras	www.co.calaveras.ca.us
Colusa	www.colusacountyclerk.com
Contra Costa	www.co.contra-costa.ca.us
Del Norte	www.co.del-norte.ca.us
El Dorado	www.co.el-dorado.ca.us
Fresno	www.co.fresno.ca.us
Glenn	www.countyofglenn.net
Humboldt	www.co.humboldt.ca.us
Imperial	www.co.imperial.ca.us
Inyo	www.inyocounty.us
Kern	www.co.kern.ca.us
Kings	www.countyofkings.com
Lake	www.co.lake.ca.us
Lassen	www.co.lassen.ca.us
Los Angeles	www.lacounty.info
Madera	www.madera-county.com
Marin	www.co.marin.ca.us
Mariposa	www.mariposacounty.org
Mendocino	www.co.mendocino.ca.us
Merced	www.co.merced.ca.us
Modoc	www.modoccounty.us
Mono	www.monocounty.ca.gov
Monterey	www.co.monterey.ca.us
Napa	www.co.napa.ca.us
Nevada	www.mynevadacounty.com
Orange	www.oc.ca.gov
Placer	www.placer.ca.gov
Plumas	www.countyofplumas.com
Riverside	www.countyofriverside.us
Sacramento	www.saccounty.net
San Benito	www.san-benito.ca.us
San Bernardino	www.co.san-bernardino.ca.us
San Diego	www.co.san-diego.ca.us
San Francisco	www.ci.sf.ca.us
San Joaquin	www.sjgov.org
San Luis Obispo	www.co.slo.ca.us
San Mateo	www.co.sanmateo.ca.us
Santa Barbara	www.countyofsb.org
Santa Clara	www.sccgov.org
Santa Cruz	www.co.santa-cruz.ca.us
Shasta	www.co.shasta.ca.us
Sierra	www.sierracounty.ws
Siskiyou	www.co.siskiyou.ca.us
Solano	www.co.solano.ca.us
Sonoma	www.sonoma-county.org
Stanislaus	www.co.stanislaus.ca.us
Sutter	www.co.sutter.ca.us
Tehama	www.co.tehama.ca.us
Trinity	www.trinitycounty.org
Tulare	www.co.tulare.ca.us
Tuolumne	www.tuolumnecounty.ca.gov
Ventura	www.countyofventura.org
Yolo	www.yolocounty.org
Yuba	www.co.yuba.ca.us

homes and land why is the price wrong?

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 21:18:20 -0600

A fellow agent in the office has a listing that has taken the owners a bit of time to prep. In that time like the dilgent office we are, we prep it to be advertised in as many venues as we can.

As he went to enter the data, the property profile already came up and to make it better the price was lower than list price on the homes and land website.

He is trying to get the problem corrected which should be easy but if you have a listing run a check for your listing to see if there is an incorrect price.

How Do You Keep Track Of Craigslist Ads

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 20:45:55 -0600

http://craigslist.org/ is a great tool for the realtor. How do you keep track of all the ads.

Todd alerts is the solution http://toddalerts.com/ . I have used this great search tool and it seems to be the perfect solution to an otherwise overwhemling tool. I have been able to see qiute a few pocket listing type properties through craigslist. There is not much to explain because it is very easy to use so good luck.

Black Friday Strike team are in place and ready to go

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 20:36:33 -0600

It is 6:30pm in California as I post this. Like some other insane individuals out there I have decided to go and shop on BLACK FRIDAY. Our big delima this year is we have more stores to cover than the previous years. So with out fail my friends and I have expanded on a plan that has worked in the past.

We form teams of people usually about 2 or 3 and wait it out at different stores. Normally there are about 10 of us, this year 29. We then have list of what we want and we buy buy buy (keeping the economy going) and split up the good when we are done.

I realize that I should have posted this earlier if you have not thought of this as an idea. There will always be next year....

my mission this year is computer electronics

best of luck to all you shoppers

Don't mess with RESPA follow up

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 23:53:14 -0600

So I blogged earlier in the week about how title reps won't be able to make flyers for agents anymore. I wanted to clarify some things.

Its not just the flyers, according to the limits I heard there will be farming packets and nothing over $10 which has to be directly related to title and escrow with their branding clearly marked. This basically means scratchpads.

I am not complaining I have always made my own flyers as well as all other marketing materials. One thing I did get which will no longer be available is the listing binder when I have the listing. They will be able to supply the prelim but the binder and all the other useful materials will be purely my responsibility.

If your title rep is caught (usually turned in by a competitor) providing you with anything that is not acceptable by the new rules he or she could be out of business for 5 years. This is a tough penalty so don't push them, pay your kids or a high school students it will pay off in the long run.

Show other you are thankful

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 22:57:07 -0600

It is the season where we gather together with our families and friends. What will you do to share with others. At a young age we were taught to share our good fortune with others. I can't say that it is always on the top of the list but at this time of year you realize how much you have and how little other may have.

As an industry, I know that, it has been tough in general. The transaction we have had often are short sales or REO's and people have lost their homes. And the short only refers the the amount going to the bank and not the time and effort involved.

I have seen many blogs suggesting that we should help others in lots of different ways. This year if you are not doing it for Thanksgiving, volunteer at the homeless shelter serving food for christmas eve (lunch if you have dinner plans) take you children especially teenagers they will understand when they get there and even with out saying a word they will learn/teach themselves a lesson more important than anything else than.

compassion can not be taught in the traditional sense but we all know what it is.

Happy Thanksgiving, eat lots of pie its good for you

ps. where else can you go where everyone needs a home (not joking at all)

Gmail Talk with Video

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 20:24:09 -0600

I am a big tech person when come to new things for the computer. goggle.com has allowed gmail to provide gtalk. I have played with it for a few weeks now. My out look of this add on is great. Skype was my go to video chat software but now its Gmail video.

There is an issue with security but for casual conversation it works great.

I have had a client who wants to list a piece of investment property in Fresno but they live in Nevada now. We have talked two to three time and this last time we were on gmail video and it was very productive.

If we could have had online signitures we would have been set.

RESPA rules no more flyers

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 16:04:53 -0600

I'm sure you all know that the RESPA rules for next year dealing with Title reps. No more flyers not even updating a photo. It has been a mad house for some agents. Its almost like some people are going to have all their flyers made for next year by their favorite title reps.

If any of you are enterprising we should work together gathering of all the templates we can and share. I will redo some of my youtube vids on how to work with publisher

To the title reps, we will miss you when it comes to flyers but follow the rules and don't get fired.

Happy Thanksgiving

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 13:13:07 -0600

I wanted to reply to everyone who wished the ActiveRain Community a Happy Thanksgiving but, comments are down for the time being. So I'll post to say

Happy Thanksgiving. Wondering how your offices celebrate the holidays?

Our office in the bayarea is pretty good sized and after Thanksgiving we choose a day to decorate, there is usually a small competition to see which area of the building is done the best.

This years theme is going to be great, hoping to use a tim burton theme or something,

Well the rain has let up here so I will going back on tour now.

Be safe and have a great time with friends and family

up call to tucson AZ agents

David Wang | Prudential | 650.504.8190 (Prudential California Realty) — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 12:52:18 -0600

Hi there Tucson Agents,

I have a property that I think I want to sell, (not 100% but close). since I'm an agent and all our clients wonder would I use an agent heres my chance. I will use an agent other than myself if I sell

what I want
CMA of propterty (will provide the info to you via email)
know I will interview at least 3 agents
some marketing questions

experience I don't care, if you can do it I'll be satisfied.
New agents I can still see my first listing presentation,

email david.prucalbayarea@gmail.com
subject line shoud read AZ AGENT

or if you just want to give me your info in a reply comment here i'm good with that too.

thanks I will probably get back to all of you right after the holidays so no rush for the Thanksgiving. I'm not expecting anyone to work on the holidays, unless its an offer over asking JK.

BTW if you havent guessed it I will be out of the area of AZ so its an investment prop.