Wow.. it's June..  We are halfway done with 2011.  For those of you who had the pleasure of taking Amy Davis's training classes last month, you would have learned a lot about the new prospecting upgrade & how to maneuver through Realist. The new prospecting features will be released in the next few weeks.  Watch the Board Bulletin to see when it's launched.  One of the great improvements I learned in prospecting, would be the ASAP function.  This means your prospect will no longer have to wait 24 hrs after the listing is entered in the MLS.  Once we have access to the new prospecting, you can set your prospects listing cart to email them whenever a listing, that fits their criteria is immediately emailed to your prospect.  Cool stuff..  Also, a representative from Realist had visited with our principals last month to listen to all their concerns about Realist & give them an overview of what upgrades & improvements are to come in the next upgrade to their software.  If you have any questions, just ask your principal. 
Lastly, if you've been experiencing some Innovia issues when you input listings or it's just acting funky for you... here's a tidbit that may help your sanity.  Some of you may be using a desktop shortcut to access Innovia.  If this is your normal way of accessing Innovia, I would highly suggest revising your routine/habit.  Innovia is always doing upgrades to their software & if you access Innovia via the desktop shortcut, you will not be able to benefit from the upgrades.  To avoid the funkiness, just save the INNOVIA URL (address) in the “Favorites” or bookmarks section of your browser.  What I do, is type in the first few letters of the Innovia site in my address bar, & my laptop recognizes the letters & actually fills in for me the rest of the Innovia address.  Just in case you do not know the address, its   www.WNCRMLS.com   Hopefully that should help, if not, just contact Amy Davis at (82 553-4704 or email her at amy.davis@ncmmls.net.. she has all the answers.. & if doesn't, I'll bet she'll do her best to find you the answer.  She's awesome. 
Oh & don't forget to RSVP for the Summer Shindig at Cataloochee Ranch (replaces our Christmas Party) on July 30th.. Lisa is awaiting your RSVP..  It'll be fun YALL...   hee...hee.. it's funny when a Southern California girl says.. YALL..    

I recently attended NCAR’s Legislative Day with Billy Case, Christine Mallette and Heather Williamson. I also attended the NAR Mid-Year Event in Washington, DC. They were both eye opening and educational experiences. There is much ado about NAR’s Realtor Party Political Survival Initiative which was voted on in and passed. Many of you are probably wondering what is this and why should I care, besides the fact that you will be paying an additional $40 per year to NAR. I’ll make this as short as possible. There was a recent Supreme Court Ruling that allows dues money to be used for political advocacy, not for individual candidate contributions! So now, every profession that has a membership base that pays dues will be paying more to push their own agenda’s on the national, state and local levels across all forms of media. That opens the door for each trade organization to push their political agendas to the public. That means we will potentially start seeing ads on TV promoting agenda’s that will support the “Insurance Party”, “Pharmaceutical Party”, the “Dentist Party” etc… I have mixed emotions about this Ruling but of course we as Realtor’s do not want the “Realtor Party” and its issues to be forgotten. Another issue that is of concern is a potential lawsuit or settlement that literally affects all of us. This was not made public to anyone in the general membership until mid-week of my trip to DC. NAR is currently working on the details of a possible settlement. I have written a “Trip Report” and included Doug Kinney’s trip report as part of it. This report deals primarily with my trip to DC but also touches on our Board of Realtors potential Regionalization. I sent the letter out to our principles before our meeting last week and I felt it was important to send to our general membership as well. Lisa has sent it with this newsletter as an attachment. Even though it is somewhat lengthy, I encourage everyone to read it!! Our business is changing and will continue to change. This report is meant to inform you of what’s currently happening and what is being looked at for the future!

As your MLS President for 2011, I am very excited to represent & bring back the information to our membership from the Region. There is not much to report at this time since I've only been to one meeting, however what I can report is the following..
Real List will be rolling out an upgrade this month to fix bugs we've been experiencing & if you have any questions or suggestions on how to improve Real List, please contact AMY DAVIS at amy.davis@ncmmls.net or you may call her directly at (828) 553-4704.  She is our direct contact for Real List & is the expert in our region for Real List.
I look forward to serving you as your 2011 MLS President & let me know if there is anything I can do to help..  Have a great 2011.

Christine

Jump on and hold tight cause ready or not 2011 is here! There are many challenges in front of us this year as Realtor®. Not only do we face a challenging real estate market, I feel one of the bigger obstacles of 2011 will be the probability of a State Tax on Services. With our state facing a $3.7 billion short fall in its budget and the previous two years of budget cuts, our political representatives will have to come up with money from somewhere!
Another issue that is sure to come up again is the state wide Safe Slope Ordinance. Of course we all support safe building practices and Haywood County has an Ordinance already in place. My main concern is a requirement that would hold Realtors® and/or Property Owners accountable to know and disclose whether or not a parcel is susceptible to or is a slide hazard.
Of course your leadership team is still engaged in researching the pros and cons of a potential merging of local Realtor® Boards. All of the Board’s leadership teams have the same concerns and all have decided to slow down and take a closer look at what the benefits would be and if it will be worth moving forward with a vote.
There are many local issues that will come into play this year as well. Our County’s Revaluation will conclude this year which will more than likely affect our County and City tax rates as well. Our landfill seems to be an on going elephant in the room. Our local rock quarry has requested a permit for expansion and is under review by the EPA. Our County and Townships are continually looking for better ways of doing business.
Everything I have mentioned, and more, affects our membership and our business. When I was first elected to our Board, I started attending as many of our County Commissioner meetings as I could after I saw that the HCBOR had a strong impact on our County’s Steep Slope Ordinance. I don’t say anything at these meetings but I have been noticed and the Commissioners know that I’m there as a citizen, a Realtor® and a representative of HCBOR. They know we are paying attention. I know many of you attend meetings and serve on local committees and boards but I would like to see more! We are one of the largest trade organizations in our county, state and country and we should let politicians know that we are paying attention and willing to help.
What’s my point? If you have a complaint or know of a better way of doing things, make a recommendation on how to make it better ….. or better yet, get involved and have a part in making it better!
That’s about all I got to say about that!!

Randy

Hard to believe that Summer is almost gone?!?!
The MLS board is still hard at work to improve the Innovia system and the customer support for our agents in the Region.
We continue to monitor the Lockbox needs and inventory. Currently the regional system has 9000 boxes and Haywood County has excellent control thanks to Lisa Brown. The board hopes that the listing inventory has peaked and that no more boxes are needed. The Regional board will decide if we need to order more boxes at the September meeting. If necessary we will order the boxes but there seems to be about 1800 unaccounted for in our last inventory. Doug Kenny was asked to add fields to MLS for commercial and land to ensure that those boxes are inventoried. You may want to consider removing boxes from listings that are shown infrequently or listings that require the Listing agent to show anyway. This could save our Regional a great deal of money if we can get over the peak.
The Local board continues to brainstorm on ways to promote Haywood County and the latest idea is the “Why Haywood” campaign. Tom Mallette will head this campaign up with the Chamber, TDA and Homebuilders Assoc. The kickoff meeting will be September 7th so if you have ideas about what makes Haywood County a great place to live and play please send those to Tom.
The Regional MLS Board voted last month to allow other firms not in our current group to join at a price that will not undermine current rates. Thus far we have not had other firms to join but hopes are that Franklin, Cashiers, Rutherford, Polk or Jackson County will see the benefits to being part of our MLS. The Regional MLS and HCBOR representatives have met twice with Jerry Matthews from NAR to explore forming a true Regional MLS and Realtor board. When we have completed the period of discovery our intentions are to present the facts to the general membership for a decision…

until then…
In the words of Rosanna Rosanna Dana,
There’s always something…

September is here and hopefully cooler temperatures will follow. Your leadership team has been extremely busy this summer with meetings on MLS and Board Regionalization discussions.
We want to keep you up to date because ultimately you are the deciding factor. Lisa had sent out our survey and we had a very good response.
As of our last meeting with NAR facilitator Jerry Matthews, we are getting very close to having a complete package to present to you with all the facts, budgets, staff, etc. Jerry is in the process of getting flow charts plus legal and accounting information for our next discussion with Brevard, Hendersonville, and Asheville.
The big questions of cost and representation have been discussed and concluded that all merging Associations would have equal voting powers. As far as the cost to you, preliminary budgets show your dues could possibly be less or at least stay the same, but your membership services would be greatly increased. In the large consolidated budget, monies would be designated back to the respective counties for local projects like community service activities.
All localized issues are being discussed with your directors so that your wishes will be made known. We know that you may want some services to remain local such as our membership meetings, lock boxes and key distribution, CE classes, and IT training.
Your leadership team has spent a great deal of time and effort on these Regionalization discussions and we want our membership to have as much input as possible. Please let us know if you have questions or concerns. It is important to hear from you so that we may bring all issues to the table.  You may contact Lisa, Billy Case, Randy Siske, or me.

Have a great September and Happy Selling!

Happy July 4th to Everyone! What a great time to celebrate our Country’s Birthday with family, friends and clients.
I want to thank everyone again for the opportunity to be your Board President this year. It is already half way over and time continues to fly so fast that it is hard to catch your breath.
I want to thank Paulette Childers for the great job she did stepping in to handle our last Board Luncheon while Lisa Brown, Randy Siske, Billy Case and I were out of town in Raleigh at the NCAR Legislative meetings.  The meetings were positive and productive. The issues that are still on the radar are Private Transfer Taxes, State Transfer Taxes, and State Slope Ordinance,  As your leadership team we will continue to monitor these along with our NCAR Government Affairs Director.
On the National Level we have the Flood Insurance issue to contend with and this has become a very major problem. Many of us have already been affected by this in lost contracts. Continue to blast those emails to our US Senators. If you have not become active in this, do so. Call, contact by mail or email, but this is something we all must become involved in.
Now, on the local level we have many things coming down the pike, so to speak. Your leadership team has been very active in attending meetings in our local region gathering information on becoming part of regionalization for not only the MLS, but also for our Board of Realtors. This is becoming the future picture for many Realtor Boards and MLS Boards not only in our State but nationwide. We are meeting with our directors for the MLS and Realtor Board next week prior to a larger meeting with other boards from the area. This is so that we will be able to gather information collectively
On July 8th and 9th the Realtor Boards from 6 counties or more will be meeting at the Gateway Club. NAR will be providing us with an industry expert to help facilitate this retreat. He will be listening to what our wants and wishes are along with the other directors and EO’s. He will also be giving us model plans and directives on how this has been done in other areas across the Nation.
The best outcome would be our ability to provide more enhanced services and increasing our educational offerings, government affairs, technology, and much more for the entire membership. These are only exploratory and fact finding meetings but we want everyone in the loop. We will continue to keep you up to date on the information as we gather it.
Enjoy the rest of your summer!!!

Carolyn

Spring is gone and so are the First time Homebuyers Tax Credits , USDA loans and the FEMA Flood Insurance. The good news is that interest rates are still at record lows and unemployment is down. March was the lowest in recorded history for new construction permits but existing housing sales appear to be slightly increasing.
On the local MLS Board level we stopped the Newspaper ads for the $8000 Tax Credit and voted not to spend money in Billboards. I meet with TDA, the Haywood Chamber and the Downtown Merchants Association this week to discuss a marketing campaign dubbed “Why Haywood”. (take off on Buy Haywood). The board voted to explore joint ads to educate visitors on why Haywood County is the place to live, work or play. The MLS board would like to fund this in conjunction with all the other entities to keep visitors here instead of loosing them to other counties and surrounding states.
On the Regional level we continue to explore the benefits of a true Regional system and try to attract other boards into joining for a Western Regional system. There is definitely a benefit to pooling money for Lockboxes, Showtime and MLS software. More to come on this later this month after a work session with the AE’s. Lockbox inventory is stable.
Last week was my first trip with the board to Raleigh for Legislation day. This is a working trip and we studied on the way down on the talking points of issues that are currently before the “short session” of the State Lawmakers. The meetings started with our lobbyist covering our Representative records and moved directly into the bills and the effects they would have on our industry. I was really impressed at how our lobbyist support our industry! The following day we met with our representatives to talk one on one about the issues and how we need them to vote. The issues were: 1) Slope legislation 2) Appraisal Management Groups 3) Private transfer taxes. I don’t have enough space to go into all these but if anyone wants a copy please email me…

Until then…

In the words of Rosanna Rosanna Dana,
There’s always something…

Billy

GREETINGS TO EVERYONE!  I hope everyone is off to a great start for the New Year. “Ole Man Winter” has sure given us a wallop this year and as the predictions come in, more to come. So we go about business as usual trying to show homes in the snow?? ! What fun…….

How time flies, Randy Sisk and I just got back from NCAR Vision Quest in Raleigh with a full week of classes and meetings. We did take away with us a great deal of information.

One of the things of interest will be new forms are coming out next October. One will be the Offer To Purchase which will be very similar to the Commercial contract with some changes. The forms committee has not worked out all the details yet, but hopefully in the spring we will have more information.

At the last directors meeting we brought up the Marketing Campaign. We started with an ad-hoc committee and they have worked hard to get this going. You will see the results very soon. Please let us know if this works for you with obtaining clients. We all are hoping this will be a jump start for everyone and will need your feedback.

Your Leadership Team is working hard for you, so please call or email and let us here from you.

Keep Warm and have fun in everything you do.

Carolyn

Well… Our new board has attended our first Regional and local MLS board meetings for 2010. This is going to be a Fast and Furious year…I see alot of positive changes are on the way. As you know 2009 was a tough year but we all got through relatively unscathed and the Lockbox issue is now a distant memory. We are discussing car chargers for the new Suprakeys since recharging them regularly is a must for these to work properly.

On the horizon is the MLS software upgrade issue and unless something unforeseen comes up we will stay with Market Linx but with upgrades. This will be the topic of discussion until the contract is finalized next fall..I will bring you updates as we go through the process and information from all the Technical committees.

On the local level we formed a joint committee with the HCBOR to start some self promotion advertising. This Advertising was finalized last week and should start appearing in the Mountaineer and the Smoky Mountain News. The Ad will emphasize the Federal tax credits for upgrading and first time homebuyers in effect until April 30th. Along with these ads comes individual Realtor responsibilities. The Board agreed that to be good stewards of your money we need to know if the ads are effective so please ask callers where they learned of this credit being available. The second responsibility is on educating yourself on the credit or where to find/direct the client. The HCBOR has the Federal guidelines on our website so please take the time to read and understand who can take advantage of this credit. Our hope is that this will greatly increase our client base this spring. In addition we are having further discussions on having a permanent budget Advertising item to promote Haywood County Realtors…maybe a Billboard when a good location comes available. The winning Tag line for the Ad will be announced by Phyllis Robinson. Thanks to all that participated in the contest!

2010 according to RealTrend reports is set to be an improvement (7%) in existing home sales as well as an increase in New home permits over 2009 . So get out there and educate the public on this being the best opportunity in years to buy their Dream Home.

until then…
In the words of Rosanna RosannaDana,
There’s always something…