Shocker! Couples buy homes before wedding
A new study from Coldwell Banker Real Estate LLC says that about one in four married couples between the ages of 18 to 34 purchased their first home together before their wedding date, compared to 14 per cent of those … Continue reading
Insurance Industry VS Weather Disasters
The Insurance Bureau of Canada says the frequency, severity and cost of extreme weather in Canada are increasing, with Alberta leading the way. Alberta accounted for 67 per cent of disaster payouts in Canada, according to the bureau. Don Forgeron, … Continue reading
Affordability is Key
Despite how many reports are claiming that new construction is the key to developing a healthy recovery method for the real estate market, it would appear these reports aren’t looking in all directions very effectively. If they were, there would … Continue reading
Taking Advantage of a Renter’s Market
The property market’s slow yet steady recovery is not a result of new home-owners entering the market, but instead can be attributed to the purchases being made by investors to capitalize on the market’s vulnerability and the current amortization restrictions, … Continue reading
The High Road to Success
The world is filled with talkers, but not many walkers. The timeless question for many real estate agents and brokers is how they can differentiate themselves from the competition; to appear as the more legitimate choice when it comes to doing business. … Continue reading
Generation Gap In Buyers
Beyond speculating the ups and downs of the market, there seems to be a disjoint in most peoples’ thoughts about the future of the real estate market, and more importantly, its future buyers. The future of the real estate market … Continue reading
Green Properties Save Money
via Vancouver Sun An environmental program started by employees in 2006 has reduced energy consumption, water use and waste sent to the landfill at Cadillac Fairview’s Vancouver properties, the property management firm said Monday. Cadillac Fairview’s Green At Work program … Continue reading
House Prices To Remain Flat Over 10 Years
According to predictions made by TD Bank, as outlined in the original article included below, house prices in Canada are estimated to remain constant (and flat as a pancake) for the next 10 years. How is this possible? Well, the … Continue reading
Will Housing Become A Luxury?
Everybody right now is complaining that there’s too many houses on the market; which is true. There is certainly a bit of a general market flood occurring in most areas of the country. However we might be too quick to … Continue reading
Haunted Houses…Literally
In the event of foreclosures or long-standing ‘For Sale’ properties, things aren’t always going to sail as smooth as they seem. Due to the peculiar nature of human beings, there’s never a set in stone safety measure that can be taken to … Continue reading
Sizzling Marketing
An article released by the National Post this morning is bringing a particular amount of attention to the world of real estate marketing. A Calgary, AB, based real estate agent recently released a billboard advertisement that’s been drawing a lot … Continue reading
Non-Disposable Housing
It’s typical of our culture to replace rather than reuse; this applies in all areas, such as clothing, vehicles, food, housing, and more. We live in an essentially ‘disposable society’ where the norm is to replace or be rid of … Continue reading
Groundbreaking Sustainable Living Space
Gizmodo featured an article this morning that caught our immediate attention – a walk-through of a 350 square foot apartment that’s been customized to fold and expand into up to eight different rooms. To boot, the apartment’s owner is the … Continue reading
Agents Need To Step It Up
Technology has revolutionized many industries throughout the course of time. It’s permitted for the development of new realms of employment and opportunity, while simultaneously doing the exact opposite. We’ve replaced bank tellers with ATM’s, cashiers with automatic registers, industrial workers with computerized … Continue reading
The End Is Near
The past year has been one of many great steps forward. One might even say we’re using this year to triple-jump into 2013 by launching a new version of our software jam-packed with great features for all to enjoy. It’s … Continue reading
Market Slump Contributes to Recovery
You’d think that the market being down in the dumps would be something to worry about, but according to new theories put forth by several economists this could be somewhat of a God-send for real estate recovery. Like we were … Continue reading
Collaborative Recovery
A short while ago we talked about how the real estate’s market recovery will more likely than not depend on full societal collaboration and participation within the market, in a post called ‘To Stabilize We Must Equalize’. If only those … Continue reading
To Stabilize We Must Equalize
Speculations around market recovery are many. The desolate state in which the property market resides is remaining stagnant, with fragments of measurable recovery being made. Therein lies the question of how to inject some life into the current market; enough … Continue reading
One Page At A Time
Real estate, according to a recent article, is responsible for the fall of one tree per 17 transactions completed. This may seem like a lot, and it may appear as an overzealous assumption, but rest assured that this is most … Continue reading
Thanks Again – RLPNSC
Last weekend we were lucky to take part in an amazing weekend conference for the Royal LePage National Sales Conference. Upon our return – in typical fashion – we were bombarded with extra work, and only just got a moment … Continue reading
Southern Security
Canada’s property market, as we talked about in our post last week (The Market’s Flip-Flops), has been shaky as of late – and that’s understating the fact. With predictions of another market slump on the horizon, property investors are spinning … Continue reading
The Market’s Flip-Flops
It seems the market analysis of the current North American real estate situation isn’t in agreement with anyone in particular. One day we’re hearing that everything’s doing better, but with some digging you can scratch beneath the hopefuls and figure out … Continue reading
Unplug and Unwind
Post-vacation season (aka Fall) tends to be dreary for most office and professional types as the days get shorter and the darkness literally closes in. There also seems to be a sentiment of borderline regret in terms of not taking … Continue reading
Are We There Yet? The Long Road to Recovery
Unfortunately, no, we aren’t even close. BC, and quite possibly the rest of Canada, are presumably about to experience what economists are calling a double-dip recession, meaning that housing prices are going to drop once again, and this time in … Continue reading
We’re Going To RLPNSC!
And what a mouthful of an acronym that is. The Royal LePage National Sales Conference (RLPNSC) is taking place in Vancouver, BC in just under a month and we can’t wait to see you there. We’ll be accompanied by our … Continue reading
Boomerang Benefits
The boomerang generation – a title freely used to describe most people who were born in the late 80’s and early 90’s, who are now in their 20’s, have gone to college or university, then moved straight back home. One … Continue reading
Home Improvement Breakdown
Every once in a while we run into some houses that have been personalized, adjusted, tailored, or whatever else you’d like to call it, just a little bit too much to the owner’s liking. In fact, most of these “little … Continue reading
The Problem With Change
People have a problem with change. No need to gasp, this isn’t exactly a new concept – and frankly, to some extent, fearing change isn’t a big deal. If the change you don’t like is relative to your obsessive-compulsive resembling … Continue reading
Here We Go Again
As it turns out, the housing market is reportedly stabilizing as we, among many others, have been talking about for the past couple months. The interesting portion about this is where the stability is being derived from. From what we … Continue reading
No! Not My Commission!
Calling all agents – we have a situation on our hands. A recent website, http://bidcomhomes.com/, has taken the real estate world by surprise, and is changing the structures of how you guys are making your commission. Once upon a time, Giorgio Lupinacci … Continue reading
EstateVue Partnership Announcement
The Ultimate Real Estate Marketing and Back Office Solution EnviroMint is pleased to announce its new partnership with EstateVue – a leading marketing agency that combines technology, design, and an intimate knowledge of the real estate industry, to provide brokers, … Continue reading
Let’s Try This Again
Okay, so a month ago canadian mortgage laws were announced to be changed in a very drastic way. We even wrote a post about it –> http://www.realestateaccountingsoftware.ca/industry-news/buyers-beware/. Read it. You know you want to. Anyhow…when we originally wrote this post … Continue reading
Protect Your Passwords
In this world of digital dependence we must put a lot of trust in the security of our online information. But as hackers become more sophisticated, it put a lot of our passwords at risk. That is, unless your password … Continue reading
The Road to Recovery
Roaming around the internet today, we stumbled into a prominent theme: real estate recovery. A few articles we found were making statements about the market’s recovery, but only pertaining to North America, which, frankly isn’t a very broad spectrum. So … Continue reading
Confessions of a Calgarian Broker
Interview with Corinne Lyall Broker/Owner of Calgary’s Royal LePage Benchmark Why did you decide to switch transaction management providers? We had been dissatisfied for quite some time with our original document management provider. The system had difficulties integrating with our … Continue reading
Back to the Basics
Technology and industrialization have played a large role in the past century, carrying humanity to its current state. We have houses as big and creative as we want, with more power and air conditioning units than we could ever need, with fast … Continue reading
Buyers Beware
Today, Canada’s housing market took a strange turn that isn’t sitting quite right with some, and appeases others. The changes that took place were that the CMHC (Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation), who oversee and insure the vast majority of … Continue reading
Cali Goes Solar
California, being the environmentally progressive state that it is, has approved a new set of building guidelines making it mandatory for all newly built houses to have roofs that are solar-ready roofs. These new construction standards not only encourage positive … Continue reading
Pre-Fab: Fab or Fad?
Real estate seems to be changing with the influx of pre-built homes hitting the market. Sitting outside the Scotiabank plaza in the parking lot sits a pre-built home waiting for interested passerby to peruse the property. During the hockey season … Continue reading
Truth Be Told
Last week we made the presumption that the real estate industry is on it’s way to recovery, and it turns out that it is…but at what cost? In our previous article we pointed out that Realtors had seen their first … Continue reading