I just returned from the California Association of Realtors Annual Convention in Anaheim where Anthony spoke and we had a booth. We met lots of great people, saw lots of speakers and toured the trade-show plus we got to go to Disney Land! The first day for us was Tech Tuesday which is our favorite part of the Expo because we love technology. Lynn Pope my inspiration for becoming a Blogger, she is also from my office-RE/Max Exces, sat on the panel for Blogging and was fabulous!
One of the hottest topics at the convention seemed to be foreclosures & short-sales. Larry Blachman at the booth next to ours did a couple of those classes and had to stay until after the trade-show closed the last 2 days because he had so much interest from the attendees. His email is larryvivi@aol.com.
All of our Money Frog, Inc. classes went over extremely well – they were well attended and we received lots of great feedback. This year Anthony taught: “Tech Tips for Top Producers”, “A Picture is Worth a Thousand Dollars: Digital Camera Class”, “Numbers & Stuff: Analyzing Income Property Using Excel” & “ACT! Like a Professional” a database software class. Everyone particularly like his Excel class because he gave a FREE download on his website for the income property analysis spreadsheet. To see his class notes and get your FREE download visit www.moneyfrog.com.
A few notable mentions were the lenders that have these loan programs that pay off your mortgage in 10 years (UFirst)- I’m not sure yet how this works but I’m going to find out. A couple of companies that offer text messaging for listings – that looked good. Another interesting and similar company was in the booth across from us - Buyer Acquire, a call capture system. We use a toll free system in our business but what interested me in buyer acquire is that the property information is taken from the MLS each night so I, as an agent, don’t have to record property descriptions. You can still record one if you want but if you get busy or forget to record a message, which I have done, your listing will still be benefiting from the service. teri@buyeracquire.com. Zillow was there but with very little coverage at their booth which surprised me.
There were several education companies from trainers/coaches (www.corcorancoaching.com) to companies that offer on-line license renewal. One of the companies I spoke with was Coni at Online Ed, www.onlineEd.com. You might also want to check out Smooth Talker, their system has business scripts for every situation, I used a similar product about 15 years ago and loved it, www.smooth-talker.com.
There were several marketing and personal promotion companies, the Wright brothers materials looked nice and affordable, www.WrightBrothers.com. www.QuantumMail.comwas also in attendance they have great products and provide direct mail and printing. I also recommend using the post office for this service, www.usps.com.
I saw a couple of companies that offer online tracking of your escrow files, the one I talked to was www.TrackMyFile.com. I met a Texas broker selling investment property he’s offering a 30% referral fee, 888-694-8287.
Other than that I saw few things that interested me personally from the 600 + vendors at the trade show. Most of it was what you’d expect: sign companies, new real estate franchises, banks, title & escrow companies, training companies & several costume jewelry vendors – I guess they realize agents like their Bling and yes I did buy some.
I was happy to see RE/Max California & Hawaii there after being gone for several years. The first C.A.R. trade-show I attended was in 1996 while I was working for RE/Max CA & HI in the franchise sales department. Overall it was a great event and we really enjoyed it.
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[...] sselfcou wrote a fantastic post today on “CAR Convention”Here’s ONLY a quick extractMost of it was what you’d expect: sign companies, new real estate franchises, banks, title & escrow companies, training companies & several costume jewelry vendors – I guess they realize agents like their Bling and yes I did buy some. … [...]