Real Estate Investing - What's a Good Deal?

Investing in Real Estate - What is a "Good Deal?" Zillow Blog - Real Estate Market Stats, Celebrity Real Estate, and Zillow News

This Blog Post by Internet Giant Zillow takes a look at real estate investing. A chart included in the article discusses Cash on Cash Returns.

Run the numbers, do the math, is it a good deal? You tell me.

Message from Karen

The Humorist Ogden Nash penned, “You’re gonna miss me when I’m gone,” and it comes to mind this morning as I’m trying to think of a way to tell you what you already know.

Steve Crowley, owner of The Real Estate Book and I have come to a mutual decision. It’s time for us to part company. We work together just swell, it’s nothing like that; it’s just this sluggish economy. It’s not that we wouldn’t like to continue our work together; it’s that the time has come to face facts. Things aren’t going to turn around suddenly this winter. Therefore we have to do what we have to do.

Steve will take over the book and I’ll throw myself fully into real estate and we’ll move forward together. I’ll introduce him to the few of you he doesn’t already know. He’ll take over The Real Estate Book accounts and I’ll come around in a week or two with my new business cards. With Steve at the helm it’ll be smooth sailing. And as always, if I may be of service, you just let me know. I’ve enjoyed working with you. I’ll miss bringing your books around, and I’ll miss you.

But let’s dig in and hang on. Just this week Robert Kiyosaki of “Rich Dad Poor Dad” held a live seminar on Facebook and his advice is: Invest your money in real estate – right now – right now! He says, You can’t afford to wait. Millions will be made by savvy investors. Take your money out of the systems that are not paying you and invest in property that will pay you There has NEVER been a better time to buy.

Robert Kiyosaki leads the field and I’m betting things are going to turn around. Hang in there. Make the tough decisions, do what you have to do. We’ll pull through this and pull through it better together than apart.

Shooting the Moon

Night Photography Lesson - Shooting the Moon I stumbled upon this fantastic website when I googled night photography. The other night I drove up Biggerstaff Mountain in the boo dark, dodging deer and unidentified green and yellow eyes on the road-side. I had a carload of revelers with me, coming home from Tracy's birthday party dinner at Tuscany, she, Mary, Angela and I were full of pasta and I had to be careful on the curves.

When we got to the top and parked the car in the middle of the road on Mountain Lookout, I fetched my Sony Cybershot from the back of the Explorer, set up and took a few pictures. Man it was beautiful, the valley was filled with soft moonlight, a few sparse lights twinkled in the valley, Lissenberry Mountain looked purplish and ethereal against the skyline. I shot several pictures and saw clouds scuttling across the sky, I waited, with the valley in the foreground, the mountain in the background, the full moon glowing in the night sky and clouds! It was the shot of a lifetime. Too bad I hadn't set my camera properly.

Next time I'll be prepared.

Organizing, Editing, Sharing Photos

One of the many challenges today's real estate practitioner faces is how to organize, manage and share all of those pictures da-da-dah-dah enter Zoner.com Zoner Photo Studio PRO This presents some serious options for the serious amateur photographer. Not quite up to Photoshop, but need some of the features? For less than $100.00, Zoner may have the fixes and shareware you need.

Geo-tagging support for mapping, also supports GPS map data.

Zillow Widgets for your Blog or Webpage

The really cool thing about Zillow Widgets is, you can co-brand them. Not to mention their ease of use. Don't know how to add a widget? Get thy self to Zillow Accademy or Active Rain University and learn how, now. http://www.zillow.com/webtools/widgets/

There's some really cool stuff available - get yours.

Deficiency Judgments: State by State Guide | How To Avoid a Judgment

Tim and Julie Harris of Harris Real Estate University are all over the Internet with their articles on short sales and foreclosures. This article about Deficiency Judgments: State by State Guide How To Avoid a Judgment explains that in North Carolina deficiency judgments are not allowed in non-judicial procedures. Furthermore, in judicial cases the deficiency may be limited to fair market value. Note the non-committal word "may" as in -- may be limited.

So, what's the deal? In all seriousness, each bank has their own foreclosure process, each lender has their own legal staff, and will seek what remedy is available under the law. For the time being, we're all left guessing.

‪Virtual Desktops‬‏ - YouTube

Why would you want more than one desktop? What if you wanted to keep your Real Fast Forms open while you popped back over to the MLS to get some numbers? With Windows 7 this is easy enough to do by opening two programs on one desktop, but supposing you've working with two monitors and you want to keep the whole desktop with your set up?

Chris Pirillo, the lockergnome, shows you how. I'm always comfortable opening Pirillo videos, He mentions Spaces and Beryl, but there's one he doesn't mention, Dexpot, free for non-cometcial use.