Austin Texas Real Estate Blog

I haven't ever tried to use my blog in quite this manner, but I will be interested to see what kind of response this brings.

The house next door to us is on the market now.  I sold it for the previous owners about two years ago, and an out-of-state investor purchased it.  With the relatively high rent that he was charging for the place, I thought that would help to ensure that we would get a decent neighbor. 

I was wrong.

Without going into great detail, let's just say that I'm happy it is for sale now, rather than for rent.  The last tenants didn't speak to us ONCE, even though they lived there for 15 months.  Before that, the tenant admitted to me openly that they were racist.  Yes, really.  I think you can see the reason that I am trying to promote and sell this place quickly.

The picture to the right was taken a couple of years ago when I had it listed.

I haven't had a chance to check it out inside yet since it just came back on the market, but it's a nice home, with almost  2700 square feet, red brick, large cul-de-sac lot, covered patio, 4 bedrooms, 2.5 baths, and it's priced $45,000 under the current tax assessment, at just $190,000!  The home was built in 2002 by Ryland Homes. 

We live in the Meadows of Blackhawk community in Pflugerville, about 1.5 miles from the intersection of the toll roads (45 and 130).  It's a very short walk to a nice community pool/playground area.

So, here is my offer to you, if you are reading this post:

• If you are an agent and you send me the buyer for this home, I will pay you 50% of my commission if they purchase it and I serve as their agent for the transaction. 
  
• If you are reading this and you think you would like to be our neighbor and you buy this home yourself, I will credit 50% of my commission to your closing costs.  This would be about a $2850 savings.
  

We have been praying for good neighbors for awhile now.  My kids would love to have other kids to play with, rather than absentee tenants who do not maintain anything.  Frankly, the yard needs a bit of work.  It doesn't look as appealing as the photo, although it could easily be made to look that way with a bit of attention.

A LITTLE ABOUT US: We are a Christian homeschooling family with four kids, ages 10, 8, 3, and 3 months (the oldest is a boy, and we have three girls).  We are supremely easy to get along with, and we love where we live.  My wife is a stay-at-home mom and has done that for eight years now.  She has a degree in Education - she is certified to teach English and Biology.  I am a somewhat rabid fan of the Dallas Cowboys, and I am very actively involved in starting a new Presbyterian church in Georgetown, about 15-20 minutes away.

ABOUT OUR IDEAL NEIGHBORS: Friendly and easygoing, mainly. If you think we would be a good match, you're probably right.

For more specific details or to set up a time to take a look, please call me at 512-796-7653 (cell) or email me at jason@austintexashomes.com.  Thanks!

One of my agents, Victoria Tackett, is a Stone Canyon expert.  As a longtime resident of the area, she also sold many of the David Weekley Homes there when she used to work as a new home sales consultant for them.

She has a new listing at 8404 Lofty Lane which appears to be in immaculate condition.  Offered at $284,000, it's vacant and ready for immediate move-in!

Features:

• 4 bedrooms or 3+ study/office, 2.5 bathrooms
• 2784 s.f. per tax records
• 2.5-car garage
• Built in 2000 by Newmark Homes
• Loaded with upgrades!
• Recent interior paint
• Granite counters
• Built-in appliances
• Extensive wood floors
• Gas cooktop
• Shutters in family room
• Upgraded wiring for networking & speakers in family room
• Full sprinkler and security systems

If you are interested in this home or in making a move to the Austin, Texas vicinity, please give me a call anytime at 512-796-7653 or email jason@austintexashomes.com.  I hope to have the opportunity to help you find the right place.  My Austin real estate website is at www.austintexashomes.com.  Thanks!

I listed a house yesterday for some very good friends of mine.  I hope to have it under contract within the month!  We have priced it competitively at $139,990.

Features:

• 3 bedrooms, 2 full bathrooms
• 2 dining areas (formal dining and breakfast)
• 1772 s.f. per tax records
• Built in 1994
• Immaculately maintained!
• Recent interior and exterior paint
• Fence fully replaced in July 2009
• Open floorplan
• Large kitchen with skylight and lots of storage!
• Rear-entry garage
• Super-low tax rate
• Pflugerville ISD
• Lots of natural light
• Community pool/park/playground
• Very convenient to I-35 AND 45 Toll Road

If you are interested in this home or in making a move to the Austin, Texas vicinity, please give me a call anytime at 512-796-7653 or email jason@austintexashomes.com.  I hope to have the opportunity to help you find the right place.  My Austin real estate website is at www.austintexashomes.com.  Thanks!

As our online radio show (Social Media Edge) has grown in popularity over the past 8 months or so, it has also added more "staff".  Ken Cook and I started the show on a whim back in November/December 2008.  Since then, we have become one of the most listened-to programs about social media on BlogTalkRadio.

Along the way, we added an assortment of friends. 

Mike Mueller was the first to be added as a permanent part of the program.  Mike's tech savvy is second to none, and he adds a much-needed calm demeanor to the show, with the exception of the week that he removed his pants.  It's an inside joke - listen to our archives if you're interested: http://budurl.com/bestofjckc

More recently, Jeremy Blanton joined the show with his own segment.  If you don't know Jeremy already, he is an ActiveRain community builder and longtime Myrtle Beach resident.  He also has the distinction of being the first person ever kicked out of our SME chat room, although it was an accident (I promise).

Tomorrow's show should prove to an interesting one, and it will be our first show with a female cast member.  T.S. Elliott (@ts_elliott on Twitter) was one of our first guests, and she will be with us each week, bringing her crazy laugh and quick wit.  If you don't believe me about her laugh, I actually thought that it would make a terrific sound effect, although we are too lazy to have ever added it to our repertoire.

Topics for tomorrow will include:

• Twitter for business
• Tagging images for Google
• Digg
• SEO techniques - what to do and how to maximize your efforts

As in most recent weeks, we will also have a giveaway if you are listening "live".  We will be giving away a FREE custom Facebook business page, courtesy of Mike Mueller.  He did one for our church and it looks terrific, so I can definitely vouch for the quality of his work!

I hope you can make it!  Should be fun as always!

The show is at noon Eastern, 11am Central, 10am Mountain, 9am Pacific - it runs for one hour:

http://budurl.com/jckc

As I mentioned, our archives are available, too, in this previous post of mine:

Can't Listen Live During Our Show? Here are the archives for Social Media Edge (JCKC Radio)

One of my agents ended up withdrawing a listing a couple of days ago, for a number of reasons.  During their email correspondence, which I later had a chance to read, the seller used the quote you see in the title of this post.

I have NEVER had a client tell me that I should have pushed them harder, so this came as a surprise to me.  I guess I felt that this was worth writing about, since it illustrates an interesting point about real estate sales (and sales in general, for that matter).

There are times when it simply makes sense to push a client, most commonly when they are having trouble making the right decision.  This is not an easy task, especially for newer agents, but it is a necessity if you want to make real estate a long-term career.

A few years ago, I helped some buyers from California to move to this area.  Their original budget was $160,000 or so, but the home they fell in love with was a little higher, at $172,000.  Let me preface this story by saying that I strictly honored their price range - they drove by the more expensive place and HAD to see it. 

When the time came to make a firm decision, the husband was hung up on the higher price.  Here's the conversation that followed (and this is pretty much verbatim):

CLIENT: I don't know, Jason.  It's more than we wanted to spend, and I don't even have a job there in Austin yet.

ME: I realize that, but you're buying this house with cash from your current home sale.  You are going to have enough money to buy two new cars, also with cash.  You just have to cover the taxes and insurance on this place.  Frankly, you could get a job flipping burgers at McDonald's and handle that. 

They bought the house, and they are still living there today.

Don't be afraid to "push back" when your clients are being foolish. 

It's your job to represent their interests to the best of your ability.  Part of that involves pointing out when they are wrong. 

Much of the pre-licensing education in our industry is focused heavily on the liabilities that we face as Realtors.  I remember thinking that the classes should all be called "1001 Ways to Avoid Being Sued".  While this is not all that inaccurate in our litigious society, I think a lot of agents are afraid to speak their mind, even though the client needs direction.

Give your client real help and real opinions.  This doesn't mean that you have to guarantee appreciation, or tell half-truths, or overlook potential problems.  YOU are the professional.  YOU are the one who does this every day.  They need your help.

Thanks for reading!

Photo by Joseph Robertson via Flickr.com.

Help Jeremy's daughter Isabelle win this local photo contest!  As for this morning, she is in second place in a field of over 40 entries.  Vote early (and often).  Demonstrate the power of social media!

Green Expo 2009 is being held this Saturday, July 25th from 10am to 6pm at the Dell Diamond in Round Rock.  This event is hosted by the Williamson County Association of Realtors.  My friend Steve Rosenbaum of GetRatedNow.com will be on-hand, and I plan to check it out myself. 

With the recent required energy audits in Austin, I know that I have a lot to learn about energy efficiency, green building, and all of the related subject matter.  This is a hot topic (pun partially intended), and it's something that will remain part of the public consciousness from now on, in my opinion.

Steve was our guest on Social Media Edge last week as well.  I was impressed to see how much he has used social media to help promote this local event.  All of the "big guns" were used - podcasts, blogs, Facebook, Twitter, and more.

Come join us if you have some time on Saturday!  They will have speakers throughout the day, along with exhibitors and kids' activities. Any time that I can learn something to help with my business AND do something fun with my kids, count me in!

The admission is just $5 for adults and FREE for kids 12 and under.

You can get a lot more info about the event here: http://greenexpo2009.com

Thanks for reading!

I hope you can join us in the morning (or at lunchtime, depending on  your time zone).  Tomorrow's "Social Media Edge" show should be very informative and fun (as always).  I even have a new microphone, which makes me louder and easier to hear on the air.  This is important when you have Ken Cook as a co-host.  :)

Our VERY SPECIAL GUEST tomorrow will be Irene Koehler of www.almostsavvy.com.  Irene wrote one of my favorite posts of the year, entitled, "11 Sure-Fire Ways to Get Me to Unfollow You on Twitter".  She helps people to achieve a great internet presence via social media, and she seems to have a solid sense of humor, too!

Ken and I have a handful of interesting stories to share, including one about MySpace which may surprise you (I was shocked!) and some SEO tips. 

Mike Mueller and Jeremy Blanton will both be on hand as always.  As is my custom, I do not know the topics that they will be covering in the morning.  I prefer for things to remain shrounded in a veil of mystery.  :)

We will have another of our special "fanfare" prize giveaways as well.  Congrats to Diane Guercio (AKA @HeyAmaretto on Twitter) and Tom Burris, our two most recent winners.  Diane received an attractive Social Media Edge shirt, and Tom got a great hat.  You must be present during the live show to win!

You can listen at noon Eastern right here: http://blogtalkradio.com/jckc

If you're interested in any/all of our previous shows, you can access them at  http://budurl.com/bestofjckc

Our new Facebook show page is http://facebook.com/socialmediaedge.  Become a fan of the show!

Thanks very much to our regular listeners, and big thanks to our show sponsor, Clint Miller of Real Estate Client Referrals.  If you are interested in becoming a sponsor, let me know.

On July 3rd, my family and I were rescued by David Castilleja of Braswell A/C and Electric when our upstairs A/C unit stopped working.  I decided to blog about my great experience in an effort to get him more business.  He was quick, honest, inexpensive, and articulate. 

This morning, I received the following email:

Jason - Thanks to your recommendation, I called Dave at Braswell last night with my AC problem. He showed up first thing this morning (Saturday) and fixed the problem. I was amazed at his immediate attention and how inexpensive his service was.  Thanks for your Blog            --Mike

_________________________________________________________

After reading this message, I decided to take a quick look at the original post again:

Austin Texas A/C Repair - Braswell A/C & Electric - The ONLY company I will recommend from now on

I realized that I had forgotten to put David's phone number there!  So, I went to Google and searched for "braswell a/c and electric austin". 

What I found next may amaze you. 

That single post that I wrote on ActiveRain was dominating that particular search term, with SEVEN of the top 10 spots:

As you can see, I have the top FIVE results for this term, with ActiveRain, my outside blog, and my Localism page.  Localism was also in the #6 spot, and my outside team blog with four other Austin agents (www.austinhouseguide.com) was at #8.   I am also #5 for "austin texas a/c repair" with this post. 

I guess I just wanted to illustrate how easy it is to get good exposure on ActiveRain for long-tail keywords.  If you aren't familiar with the concept of the long-tail, these are more specialized SEO keywords that are easier to optimize for. 

Give some thought to fully using AR's tags, channels, Localism, and your AR outside blog to really leverage your efforts.  I have seen this happen a number of times in the past, although this one did surprise me.

Thanks for reading!

As a seven-year resident of the Blackhawk area and a 13-year resident of Pflugerville, I like to keep an eye on the market values here in the area.  When the toll roads opened about a year ago, the prices started trending upward and they have flattened out somewhat since then, with some tough economic factors at play.  As a fellow homeowner in Blackhawk, this stuff is important to me, too! 

Currently, there are 11 resale homes available on the MLS in the Fairways, with an average asking price of $231,252.  The average square footage for these homes is 2,724, for an average price per square foot of $86.05. 

Presently, there are 4 homes under contract in the subdivision, with an average listing price of $247,747 and an average square footage of 2,849, yielding an average price per square foot of $86.96. 

Over the past three months (June through August 2008), there were 11 sales closed within the Fairways of Blackhawk.  The average listing price was $226,188, and the average sales price was $220,286, which means homes sold for 97.4% of the asking price.  The average square footage was 2920 s.f. for these.

In other area news:

Located at the southwest corner of the intersection of the aforementioned toll roads (45 and 130), Stone Hill Town Center is slated to fully open within a few months, and it promises roughly 1,000,000 square feet of shopping and entertainment.  Home Depot, Best Buy, SuperTarget, Verizon Wireless, Mattress Firm, Chick Fil-A, Bealls, Rack Room Shoes, Dick's Sporting Goods and several others are open now!

To read more details about this center and to see a list of stores and restaurants, check out my recent article here:

Stone Hill Town Center - Pflugerville, Texas Shopping - UPDATE!

If you would like to see the entire layout, you can visit the developer's website and see the site plan here:

http://docs.newquest.com/brochures/stonehill.pdf

If you are a consumer living in another area around Austin and you are interested in seeing the trends in your particular neighborhood, please don't hesitate to contact me, and I can create a custom report for you.  All of my contact information is below. 

If you are considering selling your home in the Fairways of Blackhawk (or anywhere in the general Austin area), please feel free to give me a call.  I would love the opportunity to help you get it sold quickly.  Also, You can visit my primary Austin real estate website at www.austintexashomes.com.  You can also reach me anytime on my cell phone at 512-796-7653 or via email at jason@austintexashomes.com.  Thanks for checking out this brief analysis!