Carpenter Real Estate News

Annual Sales Rally Motivates and Predicts a Real Estate Recovery

February 20th, 2012

Recently, Carpenter Realtors® held our annual Sales Rally, a great expo of real estate vendors and motivational speakers as well as a kickoff for 2012 and a thank you to our best producers of 2011.

This year's guests were Dr. David Mashburn and Darryl Davis.

Dr. Mashburn, Director of Research and Development for Tidemark Inc, shared his talk "The Elephant, the Rider and the Path." Darryl Davis, for many years one of the highest-rated speakers at the NAR® Convention and the only real estate speaker who is a Best-Selling Author, as well as a successful stand-up comedian, explained how we can find opportunity in today’s market and dramatically increase our production with his top four tips that generate listing leads immediately.

Our theme this year was "In the Red Zone," a nice tie-in to Indy hosting the Super Bowl as well as the coming recovery in the real estate market. In doing so, we (marketing and IT departments) announced several exciting new programs for 2012 that will not only give Carpenter agents another advantage in successfully listing and selling homes, but has many ways to save our agents money(!), time and effort. Want a free virtual tour program from the nation's leader? How about listing enhancements on the nation's (soon-to-be) #1 real estate search site? What about unlimited email capabilities and document storage at no charge? Crazy - enhancements that cost less. Whodathunkit? More later.

We also had a chance to thank our top producers for 2011, including sales and listing leaders from all 30 offices as well as the most productive agents across the company.

Take a peek at the slideshow of photos from this year's rally. Then, take a gander at, and thank the industry-leading vendors who helped make this event the huge success it was!

Posted by:  Jim Newell

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Improvements in Indiana Real Estate are Evident

February 13th, 2012

The local real estate market is healing. We've just released the new edition of Carpenter Reports, and we see some very positive signs in the Indianapolis and central Indiana housing market. Listing Inventory continues to decline. This decline is needed for the market to get back into balance ... to get healthy again. Inventories of single family homes for sale are down in the fourth quarter by 29.9%. Johnson County leads the market with a decline of 36%, followed by Shelby County with a 33% decline. Marion County, as the largest county for inventory saw a nearly 30% decline.

The national and local economy continues to make improvements. That continued improvement reflects on the housing market. The trending numbers during the fourth quarter of 2011 are positive. Pending sales during the fourth quarter were up nearly 14% year-over-year with Shelby County leading the way with a 51% year-over-year improvement followed by Hancock County with a 28.3% improvement in the fourth quarter. Marion County experienced a solid 14.1 growth of pending sales.

The average residential sales price for closed sales in central Indiana remained relatively flat to down slightly. The average for the 11 county area was down by 3.6% from the same period last year. Again, Shelby County led the list with a 14.7% decline. Hamilton, Johnson and Madison Counties saw an increase in their sales prices year-over-year in the fourth quarter. We believe we will begin to see a firming of prices and growth in the averages as the year progresses.

As we have discussed before, consumer confidence is one of the two critical elements in driving home sales; mortgage interest rates being the other. Mortgage rates are now at a record low level; currently below 4%. Consumer confidence, as measured by the Consumer Confidence Index (CCI), rose sharply in both November and December from historically low levels. The January index drifted down only slightly, but held the gains from the previous months. As consumer confidence grows, the demand for housing will grow with it.

At Carpenter, we continue to believe we will see gradual improvement in the local economy, in consumer confidence, and in housing going forward. Bumps in the road are to be expected, especially in an election year, but we believe the improvement will be relatively steady going forward.

Posted by:  David Caveness

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Doreen Leads Naptown Knitters

February 3rd, 2012

Doreen Tatnall, an agent in Carpenter Realtors’^® Eastside Office should be an inspiration to everyone in Indianapolis.  In October of 2010 she got an idea while attending a meeting of the Woodruff Place Civic League.  There, the Superintendent of the Indiana Re-Entry Facility (IREF) of the Indiana Department of Corrections (Prisons) was pleading for volunteer help from the community.  Her idea was to go into the IREF and teach the male prisoners how to knit.  Her specific goal was to teach them how to knit scarves for the Super Bowl Scarf project. She went to work on her idea.

Since then, Doreen has met with the inmates twice a week, taught them to knit, personally provided the blue and white yarn and needles, and led the group to complete 20 scarves for the Super Bowl volunteers.  Every time I see one of those scarves on television or spread across downtown this week, I wonder if that scarf is one from the Naptown Knitters and does that volunteer know where it can from.  At almost 5’ 3”, she is an inspiration to me and to those men at IREF as they prepare to re-enter society by giving back to the community outside those walls.

P.S.  Doreen and the Naptown Knitters are starting another knitting project...they are knitting stocking hats and scarves for breast cancer survivors and the Susan B. Komen Foundation. WOW!  You can click here to reach Doreen about opportunities to help.

Posted by:  David Caveness

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Carpenter Realtors moves to the Cloud with Google Apps for Business

January 27th, 2012

Carpenter Realtors held their annual Kickoff for 2012 yesterday. Amid the many exciting announcements and new programs, we unveiled Google Apps for Business to our sales team.

Google Apps for Business is a paradigm shift in communications, breaking away from the old way to do business – the tired approach of loading software onto one machine and either lugging that machine around or doing without all your documents. The USB sticks, the merging of multiple versions of documents, lost files, inaccessible files, etc. are a thing of the past.

The new paradigm is cloud computing. Everything is stored, processed and accessed on Google’s servers – the “cloud.” The device accessing the data is no longer anywhere near as important. If you’re about to give a presentation and your laptop dies, under the old paradigm you’re completely shut down. With Google Apps for Business you can log into your Google account from any computer, any tablet, any smart phone and access your documents, including that presentation and the show goes on. Google Apps for Business gives our agents 25GB of storage. Consider Dropbox starts at 2GB and our old email server provided 3GB of storage for comparison. Old sales files from years ago can now be kept for the day that buyer from years ago becomes a seller. The platform gives our users business Gmail, Google Docs, Google Video, Google Sites, Chat & Video Chat. And instead of buying one license from Microsoft that gave us one copy of Office to install on one computer (and one copy to upgrade, for a fee, down the road) we get with one license of Google Apps for Business access to all those features on a multitude of devices – as many as that user needs.

Consider an example – an agent creates a document on a walk up computer in one of our offices. They email that document and walk away. Two hours later while they’re on the other side of town they get a call and need that document again. Maybe they retrieve it from their sent items or they drive back to that office. Maybe someone deleted the document. Or someone is sitting on that computer. Or worse, they created the document in Word 2010 and the recipient has Office 2003. Or doesn’t have Office at all. Whatever, it’s less than ideal. So you track down the document, make the changes, email it back to them and later get to the closing table and they’re using the wrong version of the document you emailed. They’re on version six and version nine has all the corrections. Ugh.

Now with Google Apps for Business that same agent creates a document and shares it with someone – not emails it, shares it. The recipient gets access to the document in Google Docs. No software to install, no compatibilities to overcome. No file size limitations to worry about with email. The recipient says they need some changes made. Great; Use the Google Docs App on your smartphone or tablet. Or log in from any computer to your Google Apps account. Make the changes. You’re done. It’s already a shared document. You don’t have to email it again. Or worry about which version of the document they’re going to use. As Google says, there’s only one version of the “truth.” One document, one version that everyone has. Edit it umpteen times and there’s still just one copy of that document. You could be in China or in a cave with really good wifi and you’re just as connected to your stuff as you would be sitting at your desk in your office.

This is the tip of the iceberg – and it will be just like Titanic – the one that grossed hundreds of millions of dollars, not the one that sank – and we will find uses and functions and solutions to problems we didn’t even know existed with this platform. It will reduce sales friction, another Google-ism, and make our agents that much more productive. Oh, and we’ll be writing a six-figure check to Google for these services while providing this to our agents at no additional charge. Carpenter Realtors partners with our agents and continues to look for agent friendly tools to enhance their value proposition.

Posted by:  George Christodoulou

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2012 Carpenter REALTORS Sales Rally

January 25th, 2012

Carpenter will bring together its real estate professionals from throughout central Indiana to celebrate their accomplishments, share best practices and announce new programs and exciting enhancements to our marketing tools.

These programs and enhancements are focused on supporting our agents and providing maximum value for our sellers.  We’ll be sharing more details shortly…and you’ll be seeing our RED TEAM throughout central Indiana!

Posted by:  Ryan Carrell

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Prudential Leaves Relocation and Real Estate Business

December 14th, 2011

Last week, Brookfield Residential Property Services purchased Prudential Real Estate and Relocation Services from its parent, Prudential Financial.  Brookfield is a current player in the relocation industry and will inherit the operations center of Prudential, with its US headquarters in Phoenix, AZ.   You can read the Brookfield press release on the Wall Street Journal’s site here.

On the real estate operations side, Brookfield indicated that the current Prudential franchise members will be able to continue using the Prudential name under the terms of their existing franchise agreements.  Brookfield currently owns a number of real estate franchise brands including Royal LePage in Canada and Real Living here in the US.  It will be interesting to see what strategy they deploy with their newly acquired franchisees.  We saw something similar to this when Carpenter was a long standing member of the Better Homes and Gardens franchise that was purchased by GMAC.  Within a few years, our brand identity had to change – no small undertaking.  Ultimately it worked out, as it was a catalyst to take control of our own local brand image and we became an independent member of the Leading Real Estate Companies of the World.  Change is always interesting…

Posted by:  Ryan Carrell

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Central Indiana Soon to be a Seller’s Market?

November 22nd, 2011

If you read the headlines or watch the evening news, some days you may think the world is coming to an end.  However, if you delve into the statistics you find some information that just might surprise you.  For calendar year 2006 Metropolitan Indianapolis Board of Realtors (MIBOR), which covers nearly all of central Indiana, reported 65,110 transactions completed, the highest number on record  (Note: one sale = two transactions).  Last year there were 46,460 transactions – down nearly 29% from the peak.  The first part of last year the market was artificially stimulated with the federal tax credit for home buyers.  In second half of last year without that stimulus the market ran at a pace of 42,500 transactions.  That may sound like bad news, but 2011 is on pace to be up 10% from that level and conditions continue to improve.  Was the second half of last year a bottom for the market?

Now for the interesting part…as of November 1^st there were just over 15,250 residential listings for sale in the MIBOR system.  That’s down 28% from the same time in 2007 and 4% below the same time in 2004!  A healthy correction of supply and demand is nearly complete.  With the number of homes available for sale on the market shrinking and the tide of sales activity rising by 10%, you may be seeing a swing from a buyers’ to a sellers’ market.   Just don’t hold your breath to see it in the headlines yet…

Wondering what things are like in your specific neighborhood?  Contact a Carpenter agent and they can provide you with statistics and insight into the value of your home.

Posted by:  Ryan Carrell

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The Housing Market is Getting Better. Consumer Confidence is the Drag.

November 8th, 2011

We’ve just published the latest edition of Carpenter Reports: The Central Indiana Real Estate Market, a quarterly review of central Indiana real estate market activity. For reasons you’ll see in the report, I’ve titled this edition “The Housing Market is Getting Better. Consumer Confidence is the Drag.”

Why? I believe this quarter’s report continues to illustrate that the central Indiana housing market is in a recovery. Any argument that now is a great time to buy a home is more compelling today and that this report supports that.

Over the last quarter almost every county in central Indiana saw lower inventories of single family homes for sale, a necessary and healthy sign of recovery. Six had double-digit declines. With that, we noted double digit increases in sales for the third quarter. With the exception of Shelby, Putnam and Madison Counties, all central Indiana counties experienced solid double digit increases. Again, evidence of a recovering market. Stabilization, and gradual improvement in the Average Sales Price of the homes sold is another key indicator. Compared to the third quarter of 2011, this quarter showed a healthy 2.7% increase in the Average Sales Price.

With these numbers, we anticipate positive comparisons for the fourth quarter of 2011 and early 2012 as the recovery continues to build momentum into Spring.

The biggest challenge to a sustained recovery in central Indiana’s housing market continues to be consumer confidence. The downward trend in the monthly Consumer Confidence Index continues to put a drag on the housing recovery. Despite favorable prices and interest rates, many prospective homebuyers simply lack the confidence in their personal situation to undertake such a major purchase.

At Carpenter, we believe there will be gradual improvement in our housing market over the next few quarters and for years to come. It won’t be a straight-line to recovery. There will be bumps along the way. It will take improving consumer confidence in what the future has to offer to assure us the sustained recovery we all need and want.

Posted by:  David Caveness

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Carpenter's new agents "get" it

September 6th, 2011

Just spent a couple of days with our latest training class. I like these guys. Most classes have a few dynamic future success stories … with a few of the opposite. Sometimes they’re death on wheels. And a few rare groups like this one give us a reason to be excited.

On Thursday, sharing the Carpenter Marketing offerings with them, they not only stayed alert (sometimes a challenge when I’m in front of a group) but it was obvious they were paying close attention. From our co-op advertising programs to details on their free CRM program and websites to a full-on discussion of the value of good photography, they proved themselves ready to get out there and make something happen. Today, reviewing out custom website options for our agents, they got it. They got the value of having a full site and the value of custom content. And they really got it when we did the hands-on, get-your-site-looking-good training. One of the easiest groups to work with from step one.

I’m looking forward to early next week when we review our CRM offerings, with contact management, drip email campaigns, neighborhood reports and more. It’s the best value and most important banana in the bunch.

It’s interesting. As a new agent, you have to figure they’re concentrating on selling homes. And we stress technique and tools. But when they understand and also get excited about the marketing opportunities we provide - helping them brand themselves, providing a full, free CRM program, offering custom websites, providing programs to offset their advertising costs – other “sit-on-your-laurels” agents at companies who don’t provide these benefits should start watching their backs.

So, newbies, if you’re reading this, thanks for a good couple of days.

Posted by:  Jim Newell

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Carpenter Realtors' Report shows a slight improvement in Indiana housing

August 16th, 2011

In the spring of 2010, the second of two Federal Tax Credits for home purchases ended. During the spring of 2011, the lingering impact was still with us.

Carpenter Realtors^® has just published the latest Carpenter Reports, a quarterly review of central Indiana’s real estate market, covering home sales, prices, price per square foot and pended sales. As we track these statistics we see the tax credit’s impact in year-over-year comparisons. But don’t be fooled by comparing today’s housing data against the distortion caused by the Tax Credit. The current housing trends are positive and the local real estate market is improving.

In Carpenter Reports we see the signs: listing Inventory continues to decline and the trending numbers in pendings and sale prices during the second quarter of 2011 are positive, off very low levels throughout the second half of 2010 and early 2011.

The national and local economy continues to improve, albeit very slowly. That slow improvement will transfer to the housing market. With consumer confidence a critical element in home sales, the combination of Japan’s earthquake and tsunami, along with the dysfunction of our government in Washington and its seeming inability to address our fiscal challenges was challenging. In April, consumer confidence showed slight improvement but suffered setbacks in May, June and July. As consumer confidence struggles to gain footing so too will the residential real estate market.

I have faith we’ll continue to see a gradual improvement in the local economy, in consumer confidence and in our real estate market. There will undoubtedly be bumps in the road but the improvement should be relatively steady going forward.

Posted by:  David Caveness

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It IS a good time to buy a home for sale - home prices are down!

July 25th, 2011

Is now the best time for you to buy a home? For many, it is. For some, it is not. But the majority of families do have the confidence in their personal situation to pursue the “American Dream” of home ownership.

Carpenter Realtors® report, The 6 Reasons Today May be the Best Time in 40 years to Buy a Home outlines why today is a great time to buy a home. We have already addressed three of those reasons. Today, I want to focus on the fact that Home Prices are Down.

Many of us are seeing local and national articles and news shows telling us home prices are up. If home prices are down, how can they be up? It is important to understand they are touting that the average prices of homes that have sold are up... not that the individual prices of specific homes are actually up. What I’m trying to say is that it’s likely the value (reflected in the price someone is willing to pay) of a specific home is flat or down a few percentage points from the value of that same home in 2006. Nationally, that could be as much as 30% from the peak.

Generally, the news reports you hear and read are simply saying the average prices of homes that are selling now are higher than the average prices of homes sold last year or in years past. Those numbers are distorted due to the mix of homes being sold.

With the actual values of homes generally being down from 2006 or 2007, it means a homebuyer can acquire more house for the dollar today. As the economy continues to recover over the coming months and years, home values are expected to rise. We believe the values of specific homes are at or near the bottom and will begin to increase as well.

If your personal situation allows you to move forward with confidence and buy a home, you don’t want to be looking back at this moment in time 6, 12 or 18 months from now wishing you had taken advantage of the opportunity. Today is the best time in 40 years to buy a home, if you’re ready.

Posted by:  David Caveness

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Improving real estate conditions

June 21st, 2011

The Indianapolis Star ran a front page story this morning with the headline “An unwelcome surprise: May home sales slip 15%.” I was perplexed by this headline because the Carpenter management team has been discussing and analyzing market statistics as we always do.  Because of this, I knew that May 2011 was a much stronger month than the previous May.  So what’s the old saying…the devil’s in the details.  Well, the first several paragraphs of the article are apparently comparing CLOSED sales.  In that case, it is not surprising at all that May 2010, the month following the end of the tax incentive, is higher than May 2011.  It is not until you turn back to page six and nearly the last paragraph of the article that you get a better picture of how the month performed.  “The number of pending sales in May was up a robust 37.7 percent in the metro area and 32.6 percent statewide compared with the same month last year.”  Down 15% vs. up 37.7%.  Wow, what a different picture…sure closings are down because most transactions take 30-45 days from contract to close and April 2010 just before the tax expiration was one of the highest contract months in years.  However, pendings, buyers and sellers coming to together and entering into contracts, are up 37.7%.  Karl Berron, chief executive of the state Realtors group, is quoted thereafter, “Realtors from around the state are reporting high interest and activity.  We are past the worst and looking to grow.”

The bottom line – headlines are fine, details are better.  Real estate transactions are being done and a recovery is in process.  It still remains the best time in decades to purchase a home.  Don’t take my word for it…search nearly all central Indiana listings on our website and see for yourself.

Posted by:  Ryan Carrell

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"Packaging" a home for sale

May 27th, 2011

It seems I’m always on the bandwagon about marketing homes for sale. About how Carpenter Realtors^® has the most effective and most comprehensive program to market homes for sale. How we consistently promote listings better than the competition.

But as a marketer, I can’t just consider promotion and take the day off. In fact, promotion is only one of marketing’s “P”s that I consider. Doesn’t the business world now has five “P”s in marketing: Price, Place, Promotion, Package and Product? (I’ve seen four, five and seven. Can’t we all just agree?) In real estate, we have input in three P's: Price, Promotion and Packaging.

Pricing a home for sale is best left to the agent, who has the knowledge and the tools to advise the homeowner on their options. A home for sale must be priced “competitively” in order to sell quickly and near list price. A good agent and cooperative homeowner will always make the right call.

Promotion. That’s what we do, what we reconsider and what we retool every day in order to stay ahead of the pack. It’s the Carpenter Home Marketing System, an exclusive package of online and offline promotional opportunities that has been shown to better expose a home for sale to more potential buyers. Ask any good marketer and they’ll tell you the key to promotion is just that: expose a product to the greatest number of potential buyers

Now for packaging. I’m not talking about a box on a shelf, or a logo on the box, or a usage claim below the logo. I’m talking about packaging a home for sale - prepping it for the best showing it can have. Can’t tell you where this came from, but I recall a study where 63% of consumers make a product purchase decision according to the packaging and decoration. You can bet that this number is much greater when it comes to buying a home.

In packaging a home for sale, consider these important points: photos; curb appeal; cleaning/clutter; paint/carpet. Too often we see agents and homeowners who ignore/forget packaging a home – the way it appears “on the shelf.”

The part of packaging I want to talk about is photos. The listing agent can control the quality of their photography. The homeowner can expect quality photography of their home. The broker can train their agents to take quality photos.

More than nine of ten homebuyers use the internet to search for their new home. By the time they even have a discussion with an agent, they’ve considered hundreds of homes. I call that process “speed dating.” A web visitor gives any home for sale a few second of consideration to decide on an “online showing.” Those few seconds, in seeing the price, reading the short description and … viewing the primary photos … makes it or breaks it. Thus the speed dating. We have a few seconds to convince a buyer to do go on a date, i.e. an online showing, which can result in a second, live showing. The primary photo is, well, primary, in their decision. Crummy photo = poor packaging = lazy agent. Quality photo – good packaging = involved, active agent.

At Carpenter, we’re always training our agents on how to take the very best listing photos possible. Training, coercing, nudging, yeah sometimes even a polite shove. All the promotion and pricing in the world can’t overcome poor packaging.

Posted by:  Jim Newell

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The Relocation- Directors Council (RDC)

May 26th, 2011

I had the privilege of attending the spring meeting of the Relocation Director’s Council last week.  RDC is a truly dynamic organization that brings together the most experienced Relocation Directors from across the US.   Relocation Directors wear many hats, but most are typically the liaison between real estate companies and corporations that need assistance in relocating existing or new hire employees.  Membership in the RDC organization is based on an individual’s experience and the recommendation of  his peers, versus any franchise or company affiliation.  The RDC website sums it up rather nicely:

Collaborate – Educate – Innovate

The meeting was well attended with over 100 leaders in relocation services sharing ideas and gathering the most recent industry information.

Many corporations and third party relocation companies prefer to utilize real estate companies whose Relocation Director is an RDC member.  At this meeting, I had the opportunity to host several round table discussions about enhancements and new ideas in training real estate agents in the niche of relocation.  The conversation was lively and the ideas superb.  Technological advances continue and relocation trained agents are often the most savvy.  Training focuses on the marriage of market knowledge and technical knowhow, all coming together to provide a faster, less stressful relocation for the transferring family.  So the next time you or one of your co-workers are relocating, be sure to call on an RDC member…you’ll be glad you did.

Posted by:  Ryan Carrell

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Putting some effort into marketing luxury homes

May 3rd, 2011

Typically, Carpenter Realtors^® is not known for having a large inventory of what would be described as luxury homes- those larger, higher-priced homes with more amenities and creature comforts. Call it geography or outdated perceptions, consumers often don’t think of Carpenter as an option to sell their luxury home. Whatever the reason, we actually put more effort into, and are more successful at, selling those McMansions.

Here’s a great example: On Sunday, the Indianapolis Star published a special homefinder real estate section. This section, called Tour of Luxury Homes,” focused on … well, luxury homes.

In that section, the editorial discussed the lifestyle and amenities of living in a luxury home. The advertising portion of the section allowed agents to promote their $275,000+ Indianapolis and central Indiana homes for sale. Now, if I were a normal agent, I’d take advantage of every opportunity to promote my clients’ higher-end luxury homes for sale. Which shows, once again, why I’m not normal.

Obviously, those brokers and agents who claim to specialize in luxury homes don’t feel the need to market those luxury homes to potential buyers. Maybe just a sign in the yard is enough? Out of all the luxury homes advertised in the Indy Star’s special section, Carpenter agents represented 23% of the advertising. Two of the hoity-toity brokers on the north side who claim to be specialists in luxury homes had 11% and 7% of the ad space purchased. In fact, Carpenter agents had as many ads as three of the supposed “top” companies in high-end properties.

Really, people – is that the best you can do for your luxury home sellers? Promoting their home to 300,000 educated newspaper subscribers isn’t good enough? Maybe you’re right. The yard sign is seen by literally dozens of people every day. Your web site generates dozens, if not hundreds of visitors a day. The newspaper can’t match those numbers.

Carpenter’s exclusive Home Marketing System is an aggressive total package to market a home for sale to the greatest number of potential buyers. From our Indy Star ads (including Home of the Day) to the best web real estate site in Indiana (including GPS HomeSearch) to our TV Showcase of Homes to … well, you get the point.

Gotta go. Time to change some old perceptions!

Posted by:  Jim Newell

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