Start Own Business, Online Business, Entrepreneur Real Estate & Property

Real Estate Advice & Tips

2007-03-22T09:20:00.000-07:00

Getting Financially Organized

Trading Up

Before you set out to trade in your current house for a "better" one, you need to take a good look at your overall budget and determine how much more, if any, of your monthly spending can go toward increased housing costs.
How do you figure out where all your money goes each month? Get out your checkbook register, credit card statements, paycheck stub, most recent year's tax return, and anything else that documents where you've been spending your money over the past six to twelve months. You may also need to do some tracking or estimating of cash purchases that don't leave a paper trail. Estimating your housing budget.
Knowing how you spend your money now on housing and other items is only half the picture. You also need to know how much you will spend after buying your next home. The following expenses are probably going to change the most if you sell your current house and buy a new home:

Mortgage payment:

Unless you've been squirreling away extra savings while living in your current house, the total amount you're borrowing through your mortgage (and, therefore, your monthly mortgage payment) will probably increase if you trade up.

Property taxes:

In most communities, the annual property taxes you pay on your next home purchase are initially set at a percentage of the property value. To find out the property tax rate in the area where you plan to purchase your new home, simply call the local tax collector, assessor, or other taxing authority. Don't base your property tax estimate on the amount that the seller of the home you're interested in buying is currently paying or on the amount you're paying on your present house. When you trade up, the taxes on the home you buy are usually reassessed upwards.

Utilities:

If you're trading up, some of your utility bills may stay the same, whereas others will change. Until you have a specific home in mind to buy, you can't request hard numbers on utility usage. In the interim, make some educated estimates. For example, if you're planning on moving into a larger home in your area with, say, 30 percent more square footage, you can estimate that your heating and electric bills will increase by about 30 percent. However, if you're moving from an old, energy-inefficient home into a newer and more efficient one, the new home may not cost you more in utilities even if it's a bit larger.

Furniture:

If you buy a larger home, you'll have more space to fill, so you're probably going to spend more money on furnishings. Make a reasonable estimate of how much you expect to spend on new furnishings.

Maintenance:

If you're buying a more expensive home, you're probably also going to spend more on maintenance, even if the home isn't a fixer-upper. A good way to estimate your annual maintenance costs is to multiply the purchase price of the home by 1 percent (use 1.25 percent of the purchase price for older and more run-down properties).

Federal and state income taxes:

If you buy a more expensive home and have larger mortgage payments and property taxes, your income tax bill will probably go down. Mortgage interest and property taxes are deductible expenses on Schedule A of your federal income tax Form 1040 and on most state returns.

Homeowners insurance:

If you buy a more expensive home, your homeowners insurance premiums will probably increase. In the absence of a specific quote for a property you're interested in buying, you can estimate that your homeowners insurance costs will increase in proportion to the increased size (square footage) of your home. Because land isn't insured, ignore the extra land that may come with your next home.

Getting Comfortable with Trading Houses

2007-03-10T10:06:00.000-08:00

Entrusting Your Home to Strangers

Overview

So you want to trade houses but are somewhat apprehensive about entrusting your home to strangers found via the Internet.

"What if they steal our valuables? What if they break something? What if they leave our home a mess?"

In all our years involved with home exchanging we've never had a reported theft and have only had a few reports of damage.

If you speak to experienced home exchangers, you often hear them say "we've traded houses over a dozen times and have never had a bad experience".

The idea that someone would travel across the country to steal your television set is highly unlikely. After all, you know where they live! But yes, accidents happen and someone may unintentionally break that sentimental wedding gift china.

So other than taking a leap of faith, how do you get comfortable with the concept of trading house?

Experienced home exchangers will tell you that the reciprocity of the deal is all the reassurance they need. But if you are new to home exchanging you may not find that sufficiently re-assuring.

So we've compiled a list of common sense tips to help ensure that your house trading holiday is a positive experience.

Trade Properties: Tips 1 - 5

1. Get to know the family you will be exchanging with before committing. Communicate extensively via e-mail and telephone.

If you considering a long term property exchange, 6 months or more, you may want to invite the other family to visit for a few days.

2. Ask for references. You can e-mail the references but it is probably best to call.

3. Validate that the information you receive is accurate. The Internet provides an easy and accessible medium for you to validate basic information. For example, you can easily verify a person's address.

Here's a list of some popular white pages:

4. Let your insurance company know. Your insurance company may have some specific requirements such as the need to see a copy of your guest's driver's license.

Your homeowner's policy likely covers accidental damage caused by guests. In some cases, your insurer may request an additional fee - especially if it is a long term exchange. It is best to check with your insurer about the specifics of your contract.

Many property exchanges include the use of a car, and your insurer will usually cover accidents. If your policy does not cover a third party using your automobile, you may be able to add this coverage. All policies are different and vary from state to state, province to province and country to country. Most policies are subject to some type of restriction and limits. If the damage resulting from an accident exceeds those caps then you may be responsible for the excess. There may also be legal costs to consider. If you are planning to exchange your car, it is best to call your insurer to discuss the details.

5. Try to meet the family you will be exchanging with. For example, you may want to welcome them and spend a few days together in your home before leaving to stay in theirs.

Part of what makes trading homes unique is the opportunity to build relationships that you may not normally establish with a conventional holiday.

You'll often hear home exchangers talk about how they've made some great friends via a home trading holiday or how they wished they had had an opportunity to meet the people they were swapping with.

Trade Properties: Tips 6 - 11

6. If you cannot meet, have a family member, friend, or neighbour pick them up at the airport. This provides for a local contact who they have already met in case something goes wrong.

7. Have the family member, friend, or neighbour drop by occasionally (once a week is acceptable) to see how your guests are getting along. This is yet another opportunity to make sure all is well. You can also arrange for friends to take them out one night.

8. Exchange your housekeeper, especially if this is a trusted person. This allows you to have someone visit the entire house and ensure that all is well. It also has the added benefit of finding your home in the same state of cleanliness that you are accustomed to.

9. If you're uncomfortable leaving fragile belongings out, place them in an closet or cabinet that you can lock. Frequent home exchangers have learned that a note on the cupboard that says something like Please don't use these glasses is usually good enough.

10. Use e-mail and the telephone to stay in touch while you are away.

11. If you really feel there is a need, you can draw up a contract detailing who covers damages. But keep in mind that it may not be worth the time/effort/money to chase someone in Australia for $300 if you are living in the US.

And don't forget, while they're staying in your house, you're staying in theirs. They likely have the same concerns about their home as you have about yours.

Selling is Solving Problems

2006-11-29T08:10:00.000-08:00

All businesses are selling solutions to problems. If you sell doors and windows, the problem may be heat loss, lack of comfort, high air conditioning and heating bills, or simply that the customer wants his or her house to look better, or a combination of these problems. If you sell financial advice, the problem may be ensuring security after retirement, decreasing taxation, or staying ahead of inflation. If you sell web sites, the problem may be poor customer support, declining or non-existent brand awareness, an inability to expand into new markets or many other possibilities. These are general needs with available solutions in the open market. Your business can solve these needs for customers, but so can the competition. A company that focuses on solving the basic needs of customers, is in a commodity position. Price will dictate more than any other factor, whether the solution comes from your company or someone else's.

Many small businesses are unable to compete or generate a reasonable income if they hold a commodity position within the marketplace. Even though most large corporations deliver the weakest customer service and support, forget to return calls, transfer you from department to department, refuse to make a decision, and don’t care after the sale has been made, they are able to offer the best price. And for most consumers, that is the most important factor influencing their buying decision when shopping for a commodity.

So How Can Small Business Compete?
Solve Niche Problems with Customized Solutions

If you own a small business, it's essential that you offer customized, non-commodity solutions that meet your clients' specific niche needs. Niche needs are challenges faced by customers that are not readily solved in the open market. Your ability to solve niche needs is what will differentiate your company competitively while allowing you to better service and support customers. The ability to customize solutions also insulates your company from competition and allows you to charge premium prices for your products and services.

Sell Your Small Business Strengths

It is also important to play up the strength of small businesses. Make sure your clients are aware of the advantages your small business offers:

* Flexibility: Small businesses are better ability to serve customers and meet their specific needs.
* Personalized Customer Relationships: Small businesses have a genuine concern for customers and an understanding that business is about relationships.
* Customer Service: Small businesses care about their customers and have the ability to handle customer complaints and concerns immediately.
* Responsibility and Responsiveness: There is no “passing the buck” when it comes to small business. Small businesses are responsive and able to make immediate decisions to meet the requests of their clients.
It is no secret that large corporations are forever trying to design business processes that will give them the customer-service advantages they once held as small businesses.

Precision Selling

If sales people could read minds, they would easily identify the problems challenging their prospects. By knowing the problems a prospect may have and providing the specific means of resolving those problems for which they do not have a solution, the probability of making a sale is greatly increased. Since reading minds is not a viable option, the next best thing is to ask open-ended questions to uncover the answers. An open-end question cannot be answered with a simple yes or no.

The advantages of open-ended questions in sales is that they allow you to control the conversation, qualify leads, establish rapport, and build an understanding of your clients and their business. Knowing how your products and services can solve specific problems is essential in creating opportunity and making a sale.

Open-End Questions

Learn About Needs

* What kinds of challenges are you facing?
* What would you like to see improved?
* What is it that you’d like to see accomplished?
* What solutions are you looking for specifically?
* I noticed that your company is [something new company is doing that relates to what you are selling]. What challenges have you faced?
* Where is your company headed over the next year? Do you have specific targets and goals?

Product and Service Expectations

* What are your expections and requirements when working with a company such as ours?
* What concerns might you have?
* What other issues are important to you?

Decisions and Budget

* (a) How much money would you save if you could resolve [insert specific need uncovered from previous questions]?
(b)What kind of budget would be available if I could a professional and effective solution to this problem?
* What would be your timeline?
* Who else is involved in the decision-making process?

Selling is Easier with a Recognizable Brand

2006-10-15T22:17:00.000-07:00

What is a Brand?

The most important assets of any business are often intangible: your company name, brand, symbols, and slogans, and their underlying associations with customers to produce awareness and perceived quality and value.

Think about buying a cellular phone, computer, or vehicle. What brands come to mind? Why are these brands top-of-mind? How would you describe the brand value of your company and what it delivers? How would you describe the "unique selling proposition" of your company?

What do you see when you think of a particular brand? Most people recall the logo and the product associated with that logo. The graphic identity and any attached slogans or taglines are an integral part of a brand, but more importantly is the immediate perception, expectation and emotional response linked to the brand.

A brand is more about making people think thoughts or feel emotions. The essence of a brand can be captured by a logo and slogan to semantically reinforce what ad agencies like to call "the brand experience". The emotional response is developed from behaviour modification or conditioning produced by advertising, marketing and promotional campaigns.

Brand Management

Companies that are strategically smart, tactically creative and persistent in the way they manage their brand and identity are more successful.

Your brand is formed by the numerous choices your business makes, from your company name and logo to your advertising, corporate literature, and business cards all the way down to the way your frontline staff deals with customers. The promise you make to each customer combined with the customer's judgment about how well you deliver on that promise must be consistent. A successful brand becomes an emotional bond that builds customer loyalty and informs prospects on what they can expect from your products and services.

You want your company’s personality to be easily identifiable at every customer touch point and your brand experience reinforced. Everything your company is involved in, including email stationery, print stationery, collaterals, packaging, displays, presentations, ads, telephone reception, office signage, office spaces, any customer or employee touch point, should display your brand. The image should be consistent across media.

Branding Simplifies Selling

With a strong brand, you don't have to sell nearly as long or as hard. Customers know what you stand for and what they can expect from your products and services. It all comes down to selling. And selling is made easier with a corporate brand that sends a strong message about your company’s uniqueness, corporate personality and, more importantly, about what your organization essentially is and what a customer can expect.

When your brand represents quality, reliability, dependability and value and is linked to a positive emotional response you can demand higher prices for your products and services without strong opposition because customers know additional value is associated with increased cost; the price-value ratio justifies the added expense.

Graphic Identity – The Fundamental Building Block of Your Brand

You need to think of everything your company does as an exercise in building your brand. Be conscious of the way you convey a meaningful relationship between your products or services and their users. Your company’s name and graphic identity are the fundamental building blocks of your brand. An effective identity will reinforce the uniqueness and positioning of your business. The configuration of words, images, ideas and associations form an aggregate perception of value in the minds of customers, stakeholders, and the general public.

If your brand is an expression that reaches out and engages current and potential clients, it simplifies your job of selling.

Entrepreneur: Have What It Takes?

2006-10-15T22:00:00.000-07:00

Do You Have What It Takes to Be an Entrepreneur?

The Secret Formula to Success – FREE

Run, don't walk away from all of those people that offer you a "get rich formula" "easy money" and "quick way to get rich". If they had it all figured out, why would they be working to sell the "secret formula" to you? Instead, why wouldn't they just use the formula to become rich and spend the rest of their days floating on an air mattress in a pool behind their mansion drinking margaritas.

If you want the secret formula to success, here it is: confidence, drive, dedication, adaptability and hard work. And I won't charge you a single cent for it. If you want to be an entrepreneur, read on to find out if you have what it takes.

It takes confidence, drive, dedication, adaptability and hard work

A desire to be your own boss isn't enough by itself to make you a successful small business owner. Before you set up shop, you'll need to think about whether you have the confidence, social skills, temperament, leadership skills, support system, dedication and drive to be an entrepreneur.

Evaluate your strengths and weaknesses by answering these questions:

* Are you a self-starter?
It will be up to you to generate business, organize your time and follow through on details.
* Do you have the steadfast confidence to never give up?
Being able to pick yourself up when you fail to close a deal or lose a contract makes you work harder. You continue to believe in yourself and in what you have to offer prospects and clients.
* Do you learn from mistakes?
Do you evaluate your performance and adapt to improve the outcome? Being good at anything requires the ability to change your approach and behaviour to improve your success rate.
* Are you willing to invest 80 hours a week to run your business?
It takes a 24/7 commitment to run a business, particularly during the first few years.
* How good are you at making decisions?
Business owners are required to make decisions constantly, often quickly, under pressure and independently. You should be confident that you can make correct decisions under pressure.
* How well do you plan and organize?
Research indicates that many business failures could have been avoided through better planning. Good organization of financials, inventory, schedules and production can help avoid many problems.
* Is your drive strong enough to keep you motivated?
Running a business can wear you down. Some business owners feel burned out by having to carry all the responsibility on their shoulders. Strong motivation can make the business succeed and will help you survive slowdowns as well as periods of burnout. You really must love the business.
* Do you have a product or service that is in demand?
Evaluate whether the demand is long-lasting or a fad.
* Will your business have some advantage over existing firms?
It is important to know what distinguishes your business from that of its competitors.
* Who are your competitors?
Can you name all the major firms that sell your product or service locally or on the Internet? Do you know which firms are out-competing you and which firms you are out-competing.
* Are you willing to risk your savings on the business?
Entrepreneurs must do more than talk about their commitment to the business. They need to back it with their own money.
* Is your family behind you?
Starting and running a business places strict demands on your time. This commitment is shared by your family because the time you spend with your family is reduced.
* Do you have a network of friends or business associates that can help you financially?
Friends and family members, rather than banks, typically supply the loans that fund most small business startups.
* Do you have the social skills to network and build relationships?
Business owners need to develop working relationships with a variety of people to be successful.

If you haven't been able to give positive answers to many of the above questions, you may want to place your decision to run your own business on hold until you can develop the knowledge and abilities that will help ensure your success.