Flowery Prose for 13th Edition of Consumer-Focused Carnival of Real Estate

Welcome to the 13th edition of the Consumer-Focused Real Estate Carnival, whose simple mission is to publish real estate blog content that is helpful for consumers. We at Zillow divide and conquer topics that are dear to us; half of our team (OK — most of the guys), go after the business and metric-oriented side of things and the other half (OK — most of the women), like to write about the softer side of real estate. So, this Consumer-Focused Real Estate Carnival is really in my wheelhouse since I love to dish about homes and all of the heartache that goes along with it. Our thanks to Toby for coming up with the idea and getting things started.

As the host, we thought we’d use a flower and plant theme to present the carnival because, after all, it is May 1 and the start of the prime planting season. So, tie on your bonnet and get ready for a flood of flowery prose, starting with:

Blue Violet Award (Blue Violet means "Watchfulness and Faithfulness") goes to Stewart Hsu:

Stewart Hsu presents a thorough and exhaustive blog post on key concepts for the beginning real estate investor in "How to Analyze Real Estate: Single Family Homes (SFH)," which is posted at Stewart Hsu. His concluding thought is "…don’t become a victim of “analysis paralysis”. Meaning all you end up doing is analysis and by the time you’re done analyzing the deal, the opportunity has already come and gone. One common trait that ALL successful people have in common is that they take action." Well done, Stewart.   

Allium Award (Allium means "humility and patience") goes to Dan Melson:

Dan Melson presents many excellent reasons why "Buying Real Estate Without A Source of Income Or When You Are Changing Careers" for a military couple who will soon be out of active duty is not such a good idea. The couple found their dream house, but do not have a job or great credit history, so lenders won’t touch their applications. Dan wisely writes, "As much as I like putting people into houses and such, the fact of the matter is that you buying a property right now would be very likely to mess you up financially for a very long time." You can find more excellent posts by Dan on Searchlight Crusade.

Iris Award (Iris means "faith, hope and wisdom") goes to Athol Kay:

Athol Kay presents reasons why a 90-day listing contract between seller and agent is the "golden mean" in his "Real Estate Listing Contract Length" article posted at REagent in CT, saying, "There better be a good reason to sign for 180 days." As a non-sequitur, he kicks in a tip that the movie "Bedazzled" is being sold used on Amazon for $1. Good info, Athol!

Oleander Award (Oleander means "caution")

Barry Mahfood kicks in a quick post on the "Latest Hot Sheet: Searching for the Bottom," which is posted at Barry’s Real Estate News. On the one hand, life looks good if you’re a buyer and not-so-good if you’re a seller.

Cactus Award (Cactus means "bravery and endurance"):

Nigel Swaby presents his weekend experience laying tile in his master bathroom in The Challenges of Doing It Yourself posted at Salt Lake Real Estate Blog. I particularly enjoyed Nigel’s "three immutable rules to a project," which were humorous and oh so true: "1. It’s not really a project without an injury. 2. It’s not really a project without a trip to the hardware store, usually several. 3. It’s really not a project unless something goes wrong, because it always does." Nigel’s tile endeavor left me laughing since he ended the project one tile short! I can’t wait to read how this project ends.

Camellia Award (Camellia means "perfection")

Steve Leung presents a post that is so compelling, so perfect, that if I lived in Silicon Valley and needed a realtor, I would hire Steve (and believe me, I am tough). His post "Why the Perfect House Wasn’t So Perfect" at 1SiliconValley.com, discusses an incident he had with a client who thought he found the perfect house. "It’s perfect," his client said and he wondered why I (Steve) wasn’t celebrating the fact that we’d just found a house that nailed all of his requirements. As much as I advocate personal responsibility, some things in life need effective warning labels to help educate people of dangers that may not be obvious." Steve itemized disclosure packets as "…becoming so long that they literally create the haystack around the needle." Great writing. Great post. Excellent representation for your client.

This concludes this edition of the Consumer-Focused Real Estate Carnival. Submit your blog article to the next edition of consumer-focused real estate blog carnival using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.