1/4/2008 - Media?s objective or biased look at real estate ? part 1

by Robert Lockard
LuxuryRealEstate.com

Quick, guess which of these two stories you’re more likely to read in the news: A family that dutifully makes its mortgage payments each month or a family that misses several payments and is unable to keep its home. Let’s face it, conflict is inherently dramatic and interesting. It grabs our attention and inspires exciting emotions in us that we sometimes don’t experience in regular life. With this in mind, I’d like to talk a bit about an article in RISMedia, entitled “Where the Truth about Today’s Market Really Lies.” This article discusses the media’s current habit of reporting negative real-estate news while missing many positive stories.

Let’s remember not to blame reporters or make hasty complaints against them. I used to be a reporter, actually, so I can share some of what I learned about people in this profession with you. Reporters have a limited amount of time to research and write their stories, they usually contact previously established sources and they zealously guard their independence and neutrality on issues. Let’s be honest, though. Everyone has a bias and opinion on issues they’ve studied and many they know little about but pretend to be experts on.

I’m just getting warmed up on this issue. I’ll hopefully dig far deeper into this complex and extremely important topic soon. Here’s hoping for a strong luxury real estate market in 2008.

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12/31/2007 - What?s on the real-estate forecast? Perhaps a change

by Robert Lockard
LuxuryRealEstate.com

Predicting the future is a tricky game, as you can easily see from the failure of many experts last year to predict the problems this year in this Inman News article, entitled “2007 real estate forecaster report card.” I don’t expect people to be perfect and so it’s completely understandable even for experts to make mistakes from time to time. But here’s my question: Why do these experts spend time trying to predict things that they ultimately have little ability to control? Why not devote more time to simply suggesting good courses of action for regular people to take? That would definitely be more helpful to you, me and other homebuyers and sellers.

People probably pay more attention to expert advice about not getting into too much debt or staying away from certain risks because it’s something they can actually control. But hearing that a certain number of millions of homes are expected to be bought or sold in the coming year means little to most people. I just think it would be smarter to focus less on guessing and more on doing. Instead of asking, “What’s going to happen?” let’s ask “What can we do to better our situation?” Anyway, feel free to let me know what you think.

And, by the way, Happy New Year!

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12/28/2007 - New York luxury market shrugs off real-estate worries in 2007

by Robert Lockard
LuxuryRealEstate.com

Check out this excellent article from Forbes.com, entitled “Priciest home sales of 2007.” After conducting extensive research, Forbes.com discovered that the top five most expensive U.S. home sales this past year were in Manhattan. In fact, two real-estate sales records were broken in New York City: the priciest apartment with the $60 million purchase of almost an entire floor of the renowned Plaza Hotel, and the highest price per square foot ($6,287) at another property in Central Park West. It’s safe to say that the luxury real estate market is alive and well in New York and other places.

It seems difficult to explain luxury real estate’s strength at the moment. However, in his Forbes.com article, author Matt Woolsey makes an astute point about high-end real estate markets: “Prices in the top sector are not affected by general market trends because, quite simply, they exist outside the general market.” In fact, luxury homes are so different from regular homes that they can only be compared to priceless pieces of art. They are seldom sold and are mainly considered second homes, assuring only sporadic use. Feel free to let me know your thoughts on this. Are luxury homes so distinct from other homes as to mark them as outside the regular real estate market? Perhaps this should have been an entirely different blog entry, but I hope you don’t mind.

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12/20/2007 - Charity never faileth ? Rob Thomson gives children hope

by Robert Lockard
LuxuryRealEstate.com

I like talking about good people and the examples they set for others to follow. One particularly noteworthy person is Rob Thomson, the president of Waterfront Properties, which is the exclusive member of the Luxury Real Estate Board of Regents in Jupiter, Fla. About six years ago, this charitable man founded Charities for Children to pick up and deliver gifts for children who have little means of their own. In each of the past several years, this charity has delivered tens of thousands of gifts to local children.

Most of Charities for Children’s funds come from Mr. Thomson himself, although his fellow brokers and other members of the community also donate money and toys. All of the money is spent on gifts for children, with none taken for any other consideration. It’s so nice to hear about good news like this. I hope I can share at least a few other inspiring stories I’ve heard about brokers and agents giving back to their communities.

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12/14/2007 - New real-estate term for your consideration: Hondo

by Robert Lockard
LuxuryRealEstate.com

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