Wow! This is first time I saw so many realtors here! I would say, do not waste time on all this. If you have some spare time, I would like to share with you my Web 3.0 research. i.e. how to get 11 month inventory of listing down to 11 weeks or even shorter.

One tip is this, for condo/townhouse community, you do NOT want to slash the price when list a property. You want to list it on the higher side of the current listing. why? because if there are listing from $200k to $230k, and your listing is $190k or lower and several of that price sold, you can be sure the high priced listing will NOT sell any more due to the fact, mortage company will NOT give the loan, some of you set the price at $180k or $170k in a condo community, and it will be appraised to that, so even people willing to pay $200k or $210k for a condo, bank will NOT give the mortgage and the rest unit would not be sold.

So, at current market, realtors should "work together more", than "fight each other". So, if you client want to list $220k, just let it be, and once your listing squeezed down the low $200k or $190k, and then $210k, then eventually, it would be your turn, listing higher may not mean will get full price.

Also, you want to hold "community open house" i.e. coordiate with all other listing agent in the community to all hold open house at the same day, so even if each listing agent bring just 3 to 5 buyers from their marketing, dozen realtors will bring 40 to 50 buyers, and each buyer will have chance to see many at the same time, and some may then bid on units and get some of the listing sold first! It is a matter of efficiency, and speed.

So, to certain extend Trulia should offer a chat room feature, so that all who want to "fight" can fight faster, and ended. and of course can help each other more effective too.

What else you should do. Go out to tell the world the SOLD properties aorund your "listing", their address and sold prices, but NOT your listing. If you go to Craigslist.org search for New Jersey forum, say, Central Jersey forum, I posted NOTHING but SOLD units, and that educate the buyers the market and price and they can make quick decision to buy. So, you see all sold (click on the web reference below)

There are many first time buyers out there need help, and they have only 60 days to decide buy and move out of apartment or renew the lease with rent hike, so speed is the key, and if you can help them buy, the move up buyer can sell their condo/townhouse, they themselves become buyer after sold the unit. and this is domino effect.

So, to certain extend, you, as realtors, want to refer buyers to "for sale by owner" homes, some seller can NOT afford to pay commission to sell, but if you refer first time buyer to buy their unit, the fsbo seller may become buyer to buy bigger house, and your peer's listing may sell. So, a typical American question is "so, what do I get ?"

So, what do I get, if I help all you realtors and share all the tips? How about helping Trulia to become much more effective real estate service? I got nothing. wrong, I am doing a work that at Nobel Prize level, I may not get the prize, but the model to make "transaction cost" of selling a home low or even make it like a stock, it would be Nobel Economics Prize. To help millions of desperated American families to sell their house to avoid foreclosure, it is Nobel Peace Prize level. To get this Web 3.0 model out to Turlia, and later to many other Web 2.0 services like Trulia, it is ACM Turing Award level (like Nobel Computer Science Prize).

So, can I achieve that? yes, why? President Truman said if one does something NOT for himself, he can did 10 times or 100 times better, and I am doing all this NOT for myself. So, try to start doing what I said, and you may be amazed, in the same time you try your best to help fsbo units sold, help first time buyers to buy, ...and not think about commission, you may be 10 times or even 100 times more powerful, and each house you sold, you create another buyer, and the more you refer, the more new buyers shows up. You would be surprised making lots of commission soon or later.

One thing American is great is that they NEVER owe you a favor. So, when I went out to pick up all tresh of a listed house to mow the law for him, to help referred buyers to the listing agent, it sold, and township came to make the neighborhood trim and clean, and patch pot holes and even repave the cracked roads. So, do not hesitate to do some "free" service, and of course, the more free service you provide, the more free service like craigslist or trulia you can use, and all of a sudden, you found yourself the "expert" of craigsist and trulia.

Click the below web references to see how I can sell all those properties for realtors and sellers and getting NOTHING. To certain extended, I gave all the credit to craigslist, realtors sold the unit without knowing me helping them, and they now think craigslist has buyers.

Thanks Cathy. Email me. You can contact me through my profile. Robin

To Robin Lynch,

Thank you so very much for your answer! Really, I thank you many times over, for your calm assesment and professionalism. I wish there were more people like you in every business. Thank you again.
FYI, I've also updated Carleton's profile here on Trulia, if it helps.

Happy holidays to all!
-Cath

Cathy is a website designer. Obviously she is not a direct employee of Mr. Parker's. Because the Internet can reach so many people, homeseller's with their broker's permission are having their own websites created to increase traffic to their property. I don't see any reference to Coldwell Banker on her website. After doing a search, I don't see anything listed under coldwellbankermoves.com that pertains to this house in Croton. Maybe the listing can be posted under Mr. Parker's firm.

I think it would be more helpful if realtors would perform their due diligence and get to the bottom of things instead of gingerly throwing legal terms out to people in an effort to intimidate. We are real estate agents not lawyers. Before you accuse others of being unprofessional, look at your own comments. I know that lawyers don't like lay people like ourselves intimidating others with legal terms when we are not licensed legal professionals. My lawyer friends who read these boards feel that you need to help someone instead of threatening.

Not every real estate company advertises on the MLS. They market their listings exclusively and they also have relationships with other brokerages and nobody is breaking the law.

If you are so concerned that she broke the law, I have it on good authority she didn't.

Actually, Carleton is a licensed broker in New York State. Chance is not and his name should not be on the website. Cathy does not mention anywhere that she is representing the seller. She has said emphatically that she has designed the website. Believe it or not, there are agents out there who do not use the Internet and have to rely on office personnel to advertise their listings. There are also sellers who do not wish to post on the MLS. That is their choice. Honestly, I believe Cathy George does not need to be attacked by a lynch mob. Mr. Johnson, if you checked the NYDOS you would have seen that Carleton Parker is licensed in NY. Cathy, I am sorry you were treated this way. It's the holiday season. People should be a little nicer.

Mr. Johnson, you call yourself a real estate professional.

To Thomas Johnson,

You went from being very helpful to the opposite in a flash, why?

The broker is licensed. His son, an agent in Colorado, has nothing to do with the listing, other than to relay info to his father, because his father doesn't do email. If you'll look, you will see that the son is not doing the advertising.

The broker is in his 70's. He's been in real estate more than 40 years. He does not own a computer. I am helping him because he does not own a computer. He has employed me to do so, as I've explained.

The seller is completely aware of everything that is happening. There is no reason why they wouldn't be.

I began this discussion with a simple question. I do appreciate your help but I don't appreciate the suspicion and negative assumptions. Its an unfortunate hazard on the internet, and I understand, because there are a lot of people out there who are scammers and so on. Its just that I'm not one of them. I'm trying to help someone out, and your bashing me is not helping.

Please move along now. I do thank you for your previous helpfulness.

Thank you,
Cath

Folks,

Please see the other questions and answers I've made - I have made them so that those of you who are reporting me and/or giving me "thumbs down" will actually read them.

Again, this posting has been made on behalf of a broker, Carleton Parker, who is an older man who does not own a computer and will not own a computer. His information has been entered and is in the web site which is linked from the listing.

Thank you,
Cath

To Thomas Johnson,

Thank you for being so helpful. I will add the listing broker info. I don't think that's backward at all, and I think opening doors for ladies is a very nice, respectful thing to do. Since I am posting the listing on behalf of a technophobe broker, and am not the broker myself, I don't know the laws. So, I thank you again for being so helpful.

Again, to those of you who are not being helpful and who are instead just hitting the "thumbs down" button, please move on, get a hobby, or do something useful and/or positive instead. Oy vey. There sure are lots of people on the internet who need a life.

Thank you,
-Cath

My other question is whether this is against the owner's wishes or not. Anybody who does not want MLS exposure probably does not want to have it listed online at all. Our MLS service will call us and if we have listings online but not on MLS, the seller will have to sign an exclude from MLS form, in that case, the house is normally not ready to be shown at that time; but not because the seller just does not want MLS access. .

Sylvia

Here are the details:

The broker's name is Carleton Parker. His name is on the web site. He employed me to create the web site and to post the listing on Trulia and other places. Carleton is an older man who does not have a computer and will not get one. I recently set him up with a gmail account but I don't know if he will actually use it.

Chance Parker's name is also on the web site. He is the son of Carleton. He is an agent in a different state. His email is on the web site. When people email him, he calls Carleton.

The seller does not want their property on the MLS. I don't know why. If it were my property, I would put it on the MLS.

I know the internet is annonymous and that there are people who scam and its hard to know who's honest and who is not. However, please look a little more closely before you jump to conclusions.

Thank you,
-Cath

http://www.hudsonmidcenturymodern.com

I did not give you a TD because I really don't care, but now that you mentioned, I looked.

The thing I wonder about is how can the broker have a property website (yes, you included that for Advertisement) and have an email address for contact and yet he does not have a compute and won't have one in the future.

Also, also since the seller wants exposure, and there is a broker involved, why not MLS? Curious. Does not seem reasonable. MIght want the broker to work with the seller more so the seller will use the best marketing tool.

I really don't care how you guys conduct business but since you are explaining the situation, guess what, just does not make sense other than you want to advertise the property.

Sylvia

A Broker without a computer????

Are you a real estate agent?