The Price of being a Realtor!

I guess we just need to keep cranking out the blogs!!!

David, didnt' they just go up yesterday.  Dang it seems soon to have another price increase.  I do most of my marketing over the internet and that makes me glad that I do.  I did try some direct mail marketing last year and just spent a lot of money and got nothing in return.  I did it for 9 months before I finally decided it was not a good use of my money.

David,

  If I knew how to stop the price of anything, I'd be a millionaire and not have to worry about prices!! HA!

I agree with you that our money can be spent on other things  then direct mailings. Personal contact is a big thing here in Huntsville. I do better with a phone call (make sure not on do not call list first) or a visit than any postcard in the mail.

I am actually going to buy alot of the first class stamps that you can use once the price does go up.  I still have Christmas stamps in my wallet that I would be too embarassed to use right now.

If the extra 1 cent is going to cause harm to an Agents budget, then the Agent needs to analyze what mailings are effective and which ones are not effective.  Then, start paring back the ineffective mailings to make up for the extra cost.

The problem is that the UPS is really a money maker, and congress loots the til the same way they loot the til on Social Security!  The UPS was once a semi-autonomous entity, the Congress put back under budget to loot!  So the answer is very simple, price increase? They need more money!  Think of all those worthless stamps that people collect and put in a drawer someplace to pay for their kids college.  They have never been redeemed for their value as actual postage.  

Looks like it's time to start thinking outside of the box again... I am moving away from direct mail and more into other forms of marketing.  As postage continues to increase it makes other forms of marketing that in the past were out of reach from a cost perspective seem more reasonable and possibly more effective too!  I predict that as postage continues to climb that in a few years that real estate related direct mail will follow the diminishing trail being blazed by real estate print advertising in the newspaper.

You need to get a bulk mail account for your mass mailings! This will cut your cost a lot, if you don't do enough mailing for that partner with someone else like a mortgage broker or a title officer and let them pay for part of the postage. I've been doing this for years and it helps cut the cost a lot and in some cases it can become a profit center.

You can buy the "forever" stamps at today's rate and use them after the rate increase.

I still have 39 cent stamps that I'm using with 2 cent stamps!

David, you and I are most certainly on the same wave length here.  I'd probably get over it if the window service at the Dallas post offices was respectable, but it isn't.  Long lines, frequently only one clerk, people bringing in 2,000 packages to send to their ebay customers.

And I am a very firm believer in using commemorative stamps rather than flag stamps, so buying a bunch of "forever" stamps isn't an option for me.

Billycherry

David:

I just raised my commission by 1 cent. Ha. Just kidding. The cost of everything keeps going up but my wages.