Here’s To A Glass Half Full, Genuinely Prosperous New Year

 2012 is shaping up to be an UNusual year, and the prognosticators are out in full force with the usual blood and guts headlines about falling home prices and foreclosure activity. I say we skip those and in the tradition of Pollyanna Whittier see what we can conjure up with a round of “The Glad Game”. The game consists of finding something to be glad about in every situation. It originated in an incident one Christmas when Pollyanna who was hoping for a doll in the missionary barrel, found only a pair of crutches inside. Making the game up on the spot, Pollyanna’s father taught her to look at the good side of things–in this case, to be glad about the crutches because “we didn’t need to use them!” –Wikipedia

For starters, the grass in our front yard has started to grow again. With a high of 52 degrees predicted for New Year’s Day, we may just skip winter all together this year. That may be bad news for snow boarders and ski hills, but it’s very good news for the State snowplow budget and home heating bills!

 Now that you’ve got the hang of it, here are my optimistic observations for Minnesota Real Estate Sales in 2012.

Put your jogging shoes on and get ready to run. With less inventory to choose from, and no snow to contend with, buyers gulped the last of their Christmas dinner and headed back out in full force on Monday. Since they all got cash cards for Christmas, they skipped the return lines at local retailers and went shopping for a house instead. The numbers would suggest that we have moved to a balanced market. Multiple offers are popping up on “the good stuff”. If you consider that part of the meager 5.7 months of inventory available is in rougher shape than a long tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs, then the choice stuff is going to go faster and at a higher price. According to the Minneapolis Association of Realtors McSkinny report from 3 days ago, here are the stats:  

In the Twin Cities region, for the week ending December 17:

• New Listings decreased 16.9% to 799
• Pending Sales increased 50.1% to 749
• Inventory decreased 23.9% to 19,066
• In November, the Months Supply of Inventory decreased 30.0% to 5.7 months

According to the Joint Center of Housing at Harvard University,
“…low interest rates and weak prices have made homeownership more affordable than in decades.  Several strong months of private sector job growth in early 2011 provide encouraging signs of a housing market rebound.  With inventories of new homes at historic lows, a turnaround in demand could quickly result in tighter markets.  Over the longer term, the number of younger households is set to rise sharply, supporting growth in the population that fuels growth in both new renters and first-time buyers.”

The 1st time buyers I’m talking to are sounding a familiar theme.  “We don’t want to be enslaved to pay off a mortgage.”  They will buy on their terms.  They are very well qualified and likely to resist the urge to buy at capacity making for stronger transactions that make it all of the way to closing. 

They will account for the majority of home sales in the next 6 months and it is important to note that they don’t want to repeat the mistakes that got us to the ‘Meltdown’.  Their message is clear.  “Listen to us.  We are the change you want to see in the world.”

One of the key lessons for success in the New Year was written many years ago but bears repeating.  The Cluetrain Manifesto, written in 1999, said it best:
“A powerful global conversation has begun.  Through the Internet, people are discovering and inventing new ways to share relevant knowledge with blinding speed.  As a direct result, markets are getting smarter–and getting smarter faster than most companies.

These markets are conversations.  Their members communicate in language that is natural, open, honest, direct, funny and often shocking.  Whether explaining or complaining, joking or serious, the human voice is unmistakably genuine.  It can’t be faked.

Most corporations, on the other hand, only know how to talk in the soothing, humorless monotone of the mission statement, marketing brochure, and your-call-is-important-to-us busy signal.  Same old tone, same old lies.  No wonder networked markets have no respect for companies unable or unwilling to speak as they do.

But learning to speak in a human voice is not  some trick, nor will corporations convince us they are human with lip service about “listening to customers.”  They will only sound human when they empower real human beings to speak on their behalf.”

http://www.cluetrain.com/book/introductions.html

Be yourself and be the advocate that your clients are looking for.  Here’s to a glass half full, genuinely prosperous New Year!

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