Family members of Arkansas real estate agent Beverly Carter, who was murdered in 2014 after being kidnapped from a rural property outside Little Rock, have brought a wrongful death and negligence lawsuit against her brokerage, Crye-Leike. The family alleges that the company failed in its duty to properly train Carter to avoid life-threatening situations in the course of her real estate work. Carter is survived by her husband and two sons, though
Step out of your box, and give it a tryWhen Myrtle Beach-based agent Abe Safe was newly licensed, he started out purely cold calling for a few months. As a new agent, he had little else to do, so he was committed.After he got comfortable making cold calls, he started on expireds and FSBOs. His goal was to make a minimum of 40 contacts per day.By the end of his first year, he closed 40 transactions, and roughly a quarter of those deals came from
Inexpensive fixes tend to offer the highest returnsKey Takeaways Sellers often lose money making high-cost renovations. Inexpensive renovations tend to offer higher ROI and present less risk than costly projects.Can you list the home renovations that get the best returns for sellers? If not, can you honestly claim to get top dollar for sellers’ homes?Tracy McLaughlinOn a podcast with Pat Hiban, Tracy McLaughlin shared her expert advice on home
Heartbreaking video shows a postal truck delivering mail to a ghost townA neighborhood turned to ash is perfectly still save a lone postal truck slowly traversing the street. Surrounded by scorched earth, charred car frames and nothing but sticks where houses once stood, a USPS worker forges on delivering mail to a ghost town in Santa Rosa, California, at least where mailboxes remain.If a picture can paint a thousand words, a short drone video as
President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday to get the ball rolling on the creation of association healthcare plans. It’s intended to help small employers access more affordable health insurance coverage for their employees. Such a direction may hold promise for real estate professionals if the administration proposes new rules that would include independent contractors—but currently, that’s not part of the program.“The Wh
Holding a seller counseling session can set expectations and help kick-start planning at the beginning of your agent-client relationship. There’s no official way to conduct one of these sessions, as they can be a sit-down meeting, long phone call, or virtual video conference. The most important factor, however, is utilizing your one-on-one time with the selling client.Making sure your client is prepared before selling is a key takeaway from a s
Young adults are forming a new movement known as YIMBY—“yes in my backyard”—as they advocate for more affordable housing in their communities.Young adults reportedly are turning out in bigger numbers to zoning, planning, town, and city board meetings to advocate for more affordable housing in their districts. Activist groups are gaining momentum, particularly in markets that have faced surging rental costs and home prices the last few yea
For the first time on record, living at home with parents has become the most common living situation for adults ages 18 to 34, according to Pew research.More than one-third of young adults ages 18 to 34 live at their parents’ home, according to Census data, and the percentage continues to grow. In 2005, 26 percent of young adults lived at their parents’ home. In 2015, the percentage grew to 34.1 percent. In 2016, 15 percent of 25- to 35-y
Move downtown if you want to be happier and healthier, according to a new study that appears in the medical journal Lancet. Researchers found that density and walkability played a major role in health outcomes of participants they studied.Researchers from Oxford University and the University of Hong Kong evaluated living conditions and health outcomes of 400,000 residents living in London; Glasgow, Scotland; and Cardiff, Wales, and then compared
Renters may finally be getting some relief. Apartment rents are not increasing as much as they have in the last few years.None of the major metro areas studied had seen annual rent growth of more than 10 percent. Rents rose 2.2 percent, on average, in the U.S. over the 12 months that ended in the third quarter, according to Yardi Matrix. That marks the slowest rate of increase in rental prices since April 2011.“We don’t believe it’s time
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