Since this is my first post of the new year, I wanted to wish everyone a very happy, healthy, peaceful and prosperous, new year. In whatever way, or whatever holiday you celebrated, I hope that you had a chance to spend time with your family and loved ones.
I always love the holiday's because, although real estate activity tends to slow down, I have the opportunity to spend more time with my wife, Jane, and our children. We have 3 children, and are fortunate that we are so much a part of their lives. Our oldest daughter, Rachel, is a practicing psychologist with offices in Yardley, and Lawrenceville. She is also on the staff of Einstein Medical Center, in Philadelphia. Our middle child, Lauren, owns a Coldstone Creamery Ice Cream store, just outside of Princeton, and our youngest, Michael, who graduated from the University of Maryland a couple of years ago, is tending bar in Philadelphia, while he figures out what he wants to do with the next chapter of his life.
Every year, at our annual family new year celebration, we go around the room and ask every participant to express what they were thankful about from the past year, and to also say what they are passionate about for the upcoming year. In my case, I feel incredibly fortunate to have such a great family. We are close to all of our kids, and their significant others. We have fun together, and most importantly, we are all healthy! On a personal note, one of my goals for 2007, was to start to learn how to play the guitar. I love music, and it is something that I have wanted to do for years. As each year passed, I got a year older, but still could not play the guitar. About 6 months ago, I finally started to take lessons. I absolutely love it, and practice virtually every day. Who knows, maybe by the end of this year, I will be ready for public consumption.
Besides my family, music, and basketball (which I play about 3 times a week) I am very passionate and committed to giving back to the community that has been so good to us. I am still involved with the Trenton Public Education Foundation. I am working on an exciting project that I was introduced to by a wonderful teacher at Trenton High, who is offering a program to students, called, "From snapshots to the workplace: using industry standard software to engage students in a career focused course." The Trenton school district is a very poor district, and unfortunately, their computers are so old and outdated, that they actually will not run current industry standard software. I am working, through a foundation that my daughter is involved with, on getting new Mac computer systems into the school, so that the teacher can offer this exciting opportunity to her students. I passionately believe that many of the worlds problems can be solved through education and economic opportunity. I believe that people who are educated and have an economic future, don't generally blow themselves up, or shoot their neighbors.
Another charity that I am happy to have supported, is CARE. (http://www.care.org/) This outstanding organization helps disadvantaged women all over the globe. A wonderful group of women, called, "The Web Women's Giving Circle", (http://www.realtown.com/caremoregivingcircle/blog) re-introduced me to this outstanding charity.
So I realize that this post included nothing specific about real estate. In future posts, I intend to offer some very interesting observations from the National Association of Realtor's (NAR) profile of home buyers and sellers, which I just received for 2007. I will also update everyone, statistically, with what is happening in our local market.
As I end for now, I just wanted to thank again, all of the buyers and sellers who have honored me by trusting me with their real estate business. All the best to everyone, in 2008!
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