Another great article by my friend Joanna Dehn Beresford in the Best Of Pasadena issue of Pasadena Weekly this week.  Granted, it mentions yours truly, but it also gives some sound advice on what to look for in a Pasadena Real Estate Agent.

Buyers and sellers have good reason for hope in economic crisis

By Joanna Beresford 10/16/2008

"These are the best and worst of times for real estate," says my favorite real estate agent, Irina-the-Tsarina Netchaev. "The worst is uncertainty. Buyers wonder if it's the right time to buy.

Sellers don't know if they should sell, rent or hold. And agents have to keep up with constant changes in the industry, work a lot harder to make the same number of sales and serve their clients in the same way that they did in the past."

But even during economic tumult, Irina is no pessimist. Her family struggled to reach America, a country that her grandmother had dreamed of for years; when they arrived in the United States, Irina and her parents had left fear and despair behind them in Kiev.

"The best thing about the era we're in right now is the opportunity!" Irina says. "Opportunity for buyers to get into a home at a more affordable price. Opportunity for sellers who want to move or trade up, to exchange their present home for the home of their dreams. It's also an opportunity for savvy and creative agents who want to build their business, and position themselves for developments in the market."

I can't claim unequivocally that Irina is the best real estate agent in the San Gabriel region, because there are so many realtors in the area. Many of them are terrific, and most of them I've never even met. But I do know that Irina is among the best. I know that she delights in the artistry of her craft. I know that she's learned a great deal from her corporate experience, and also from her experience as mother to teenage children. I know that she's an avid student of life, real estate and human nature - and I know that she's not perfect.

"It's really important to have a consultation before making any decisions or commitments," says Irina, alluding to the chemistry and compatibility involved in the agent-client relationship. "I can't help everyone."

The best Pasadena real estate agent will demonstrate several, fundamental characteristics. Some of these are self evident. Like, if you're selling a home, you don't want to hire an agent who's going to nosh on your leftovers, drink out of the milk carton and indulge in a shower in the master bath during a lull in open house activity.

Second, don't mistake "top producer" for "best agent." The truly gifted agent may spend more time, therefore earning less money, to properly serve a client, than the agent who maintains a madcap momentum of million-dollar home sales and massive commissions. Often snubbing other agents in the process, which is another thing you should consider if you want the best agent in the business; find someone who cultivates friendly, supportive relationships within the real estate community.

Now more than ever, we all need each other in the course of buying, selling and living in our homes.
Most experts caution against working with a part-time agent. The full-time agent tends to be more focused, informed and dedicated than the guy who's still hanging onto his day-job.

Also, among other things, the best agent knows how to take a decent photo, write a decent description and return calls in a decent amount of time. It also helps if your realtor knows how much it costs to replace a 50-year-old furnace or rewire a converted garage.

The best real estate agent will provide you with references and comprehensive market analysis. He will negotiate effectively on your behalf. He will, according to real estate coach, broker and author Jennifer Allan, put your needs above his/her "need for a paycheck."

Obviously your agent should know the region intimately. And who wouldn't want to know Pasadena intimately?

"Where else can you find a sunny, 76-degree climate?" asks Irina. "Where can you be an hour away from skiing, 40 minutes from the ocean, surrounded by chic boutiques, theater, museums, culinary schools, academia, upscale restaurants and amazing hole-in-the-wall dives - all within a few mile radius of tree-lined streets and quiet neighborhoods? It's an amazing place to live and work!"

The thing is, the beauty of Pasadena persists through good times and bad, and the pleasures of living and working here make our community shine among the best-of-the-best idyllic regions in the world. The best real estate agents share our passion for the landscape, climate and community and their passion creates productivity.

"The example of my grandma following her dream," Irina says, "the courage that it took for my parents to leave their homeland with almost nothing and make a life in this country has instilled in me the idea that anything can be accomplished if you just dedicate yourself and are clear about your goals and passions."

Contact Joanna Dehn Beresford at truewrite@yahoo.com.

Real estate is changing.

No longer can a realtor sign a listing, update information on the Pasadena MLS (Multiple Listing Service) and sit back and wait for buyers.  When I first started selling homes, I used to go into the real estate office early each day to be the first one to look at the big (and I mean big - yellow page size) MLS book which held all the new and existing home listings.  That was the only way for a real estate agent to know what was going on in the real estate market.  Review the MLS book daily, visit broker's open houses's and network with other agents.

Boy, how things changed - thank goodness!  Today, Pasadena real estate agents and their clients get automated home notices via email as soon as new properties are listed.  Of course we still visit other broker's open houses and network with agents.  But, what is new and exciting is the advent of the internet and how the internet is changing the Pasadena real estate market place.

Most of my real estate business personally has come from referrals and repeat clients.  Recently, I've been getting a lot of phone calls and emails from people that have been referred to me by google, yahoo and msn.  What does this mean? 

Home buyers start their search for Pasadena homes on-line by searching the internet.  They put key terms like "Pasadena homes for sale" or "Pasadena real estate" or "Pasadena home listings" into the search engine of their search and then surf the web.  Once they see something they like, they email or call the real estate agent.

Personally, I have been preparing for this change for the last several years and have built a multitude of websites and blogs like www.pasadenacarealestatehomes.com, www.sanmarinoluxuryrealestate.com, www.montereyhillscarealestate.com, www.pasadenaviews.com , www.activerain.com/blogs/irina4realestate , www.irina4realstate.com,  providing buyers access to the information they crave like market reports and free home search tools.  I have featured homes on realtor.com for Pasadena and San Marino amongst a few others so that the buyers will see my seller's homes immediately - exposure = more money for the seller.

I also participate extensively in social networks like twitter, facebook, plaxo, utterly, friendfeed, linkedin and many more. 

Why is internet presence important to you as a home seller?

It's simple... this is the new face of real estate.  Real estate is not about putting your house in a local newspaper anymore!  Any real estate agent worth their salt will tell you that newspaper ads do not bring in home buyers, but they sure pacify the home sellers.  I say that home sellers are very savvy these days and understand the power of exposure via the web, of getting as many "eye balls" on their home as possible - that's how you sell homes!

So if you are thinking of selling your home, please ask your real estate agent the following questions:

1.  Does your real estate agent have a website that provides timely buyer information and MLS home search tools?

2.  Does your real estate agent have a real estate blog?  A blog is simply an interactive website.  A Pasadena real estate blog like this one allows consumers to interact with a real estate agent in a non-threatening atmosphere, learn and search for homes.  Blogs are the Web 2.0 version of a website.

3.  What kind of traffic does your realtor get on their website or real estate blog?  Remember, traffic = exposure to your home for sale which in turn creates more money for the seller and a quicker home sale.  A good real estate site should drive about 100 unique visitors a day and about 500 - 800 hits.

4.  Does your Pasadena real estate agent create a personal home website for each and every home that they are listing?  Where do they market these websites?  Will they provide you with weekly statistics on how many home buyers visit these personalized home websites. 

5.  Which social networks do they belong to and how do they use them to your "seller's" advantage to market your home for sale?  How active are they on these networks?

6.  Most importantly GOOGLE your real estate agent.  Do they have a presence on the internet.  For example - see google results for Irina Netchaev.  As you can see, there were close to 8,000 internet pages for Irina Netchaev.  That's a lot of internet presence!  Of course, my name is pretty unique.  If your realtor's name is John Smith, you'll get a lot more pages!  But, for the most part you'll get a pretty good idea of how active your real estate agent is on-line.

Another cool tool to use is www.searchme.com It is a great site that allows you to put anyone's names and actually see some of their internet presence.  For an example see Irina Netchaev's search me results.  Try putting your name in the search and see what comes up.

This post is not to brag about how many social networks I am on or how many websites I sponsor.  It is to bring light to the fact that real estate indeed is changing.  Demand the best of your realtor.  The real estate market is changing and the way the real estate is being marketed has already changed.  It's just that some real estate agents haven't figured it out yet.

Connect with Irina on the following networks:

Irina Netchaev on Twitter

Irina Netchaev on Facebook

Irina Netchaev on Flickr 

Irina Netchaev on LinkedIn

Irina Netchaev on Google

Irina Netchaev on Trulia Real Estate Voices

FriendFeed

Irina Netchaev on Utterli

Irina Netchaev on Realtor.com

Irina Netchaev on Plaxo

Irina Netchaev on Technorati

the following networks:

Irina Netchaev on Twitter

Irina Netchaev on Facebook

Irina Netchaev on Flickr 

Irina Netchaev on LinkedIn

Irina Netchaev on Google

Irina Netchaev on Trulia Real Estate Voices

FriendFeed

Irina Netchaev on Utterli

Irina Netchaev on Realtor.com

Irina Netchaev on Plaxo

Irina Netchaev on Technorati

 < >< >< ><-->

Pasadena Weekly's real estate columnist, Joanna Beresford has written another article.   Not only is it a very beautifully written story, but it also mentions a couple of quotes from yours truly.  Here it is for everyone's enjoyment.

Barefoot in the park

By Joanna Beresford 09/18/2008

Earlier this week I was walking barefoot through the streets of downtown Los Angeles. Backpack over my shoulder and head down, I carried a pair of dilapidated flip-flops in my hand - Corona blue and gold, bought for 99 cents, having traveled many miles on many feet already and deserving their rest.

The outlandish Disney Center erupts on the block between Grand and Hope streets, where the blue plastic thong wrenched itself free from one of those flip-flops. After that, I was barefoot, but I really didn't mind. The pavement was warm beneath my feet and the view was spectacular. I was looking for something and I may as well have found it with my scummy blistered toes as anywhere else.

Now I just can't remember exactly what I was looking for, except I do know that I felt sad and worried and angry about a bunch of things, most of which had to do with money and love, naturally. I thought, if I can't find some answers here, between the Disney Center and the Mark Taper Forum, these two bastions of culture, civilization and good taste, where am I gonna find  them? So I walked all the way around the soaring structure that some call a monstrosity and others call miraculous.

The light and surfaces stimulated me to the point of renewal, and that's something. But I wanted more, so I headed toward the cathedral. You know, The Cathedral. That Spaniard Jose Rafael Moneo's vision of heaven - Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels on Temple Street. I've been there pretty often. I attended Sunday morning Mass once, and I bought a coffee and sat under the trees with the sparrows, reading. I love the sunbaked adobe color and the transparent walls and everything. But I should have known that a building famous for its lack of right angles (a design element dedicated to the aura of mystery that Moneo wished to explore) wasn't exactly going to give me any solid answers. Anyway, it was late in the day, gates were closing, bells were ringing, and I kept walking. Past tourists, city employees and homeless people mostly.

"The first loss is the best loss," Irina Netchaev says.  She's a Realtor, but she's also my friend, so I believe just about every word that comes out of her mouth.

READ BAREFOOT IN THE PARK

Joanna Beresford, a Pasadena Weekly reporter, wrote an article asking the ultimate real estate question - To Buy or Not To Buy? She was kind enough to interview me to get my perspective and gave me an honorable mention. :-)

So... here's this week's, August 14, 2008, Pasadena Weekly's real estate article:

What Price is Paradise?

Now may be the best time to make that move to a new home

By Joanna Beresford 08/14/2008

To buy or not to buy? That is the question. Is it better to await the possibilities of further plummeting home values and rock-steady interest rates or, by acting now, avoid the potential effects of world affairs, federal regulations and other cosmic catastrophes? And by acting, perchance, to acquire the home of your dreams ...

Well, in a recent Los Angeles Times article, Celia Chen, director of housing economics for Moody'sEconomy.com, contends that housing prices will continue to deflate by as much as 25 percent. In the same story, Los Angeles economist Christopher Thornberg agrees (so emphatically, in fact, that he resorts to using a bad word; can you really write H-E-double toothpicks in the newspaper these days? Wow).

"There's no way in hell the house you buy now will be more expensive next year," asserts Mr. Thornberg. Or, asserted. I don't think he keeps on asserting it after the initial statement, in spite of literary convention, or unless he suffers from some form of Tourette's syndrome, or something.

Naturally, no absolute realities will provide us with a singular, satisfying response to the question.

Many experts will advise consumers: calm down, don't rush into anything, but consider MAKING A MOVE before the market turns something worse or different than upside down. So everyone scrambles to seize upon some semblance of a property, sell off the family heirlooms, scrape together a down payment, make an offer, and don't think about sleeping or eating until you get a response from homeowner or banker.

That's one way to go. But, then there's the voice of reason. First of all, the Pasadena and San Gabriel Valley region aren't equivalent to the country, the state, or even the county of Los Angeles. The region hardly comprises its own cohesive, discreet entity that can be uniformly assessed.

Enter two of my most enterprising, intelligent and doggone cute local resources. First, Martha Shanks, mortgage professional with Vesta Marketing, in Pasadena. Martha never freaks out or jumps to conclusions. Ask her about fluctuating markets and she replies with refreshing candor. "My initial response is this. I've always told people, and I've been saying until the last 30 days, that really time is on your side. You can buy or not, housing prices will probably continue to tumble. You're in a perfect position to find the house that really suits your needs."

Martha says won't be surprised if home prices in general continue to drop, but she's more likely, very recently, to consider the undulating landscape of world events, interest rates, etc. as potentially significant factors in the home-buying experience.

"It may make more sense to buy now," she concedes.

Then there's Irina Netchaev with Keller Williams Realty. I'm still toying with the idea that Irina is a beautiful Soviet-era spy, sent to the United States to report on our bad grammar, poor hygiene and other slovenly habits. She's so elegant. But she also really knows her business, so I accept her at agent/face value. Here's what Irina says about The Question.

"It is always a good time to buy real estate if you are prepared to buy real estate and have consulted with a real estate professional and lender to understand your options. For example, if a buyer has spoken with a lender, was preapproved and has a very clear understanding as to how much they can afford to pay monthly, what their closing costs will be and how much house they can afford, they are ready."

Irina also expresses some concern about the possibility of rising interest rates: "The interest rates are still very low ... If interest rates go up, even if the home prices go down, waiting could be a serious mistake."

Guess what? When the first Midwestern settlers purchased the land that would become Pasadena in 1873, they bought the property for about $6.30 per acre. Boy, it's a good thing they didn't wait for the market to turn around, eh? In spite of the seemingly low-ball price, these Hoosiers (Indiana natives, mostly) believed they had stumbled upon an unlikely expanse of paradise, and that's one thing that most of us, more than two centuries later, can agree on; so how do you put a price on that?

Joanna Dehn Beresford is a former teacher, nanny, actress, rock star, farm girl, waitress and clerk. She can be reached at truewrite@yahoo.com.

READ MORE: It's fun to be famous if only for a day!

Last week, I shared with you an article by Joanna Beresford who writes a weekly real estate column for Pasadena Weekly.

Joanna and I met last week when she contacted me about another article that she was doing about Pasadena short sales. We took a couple of hours to go out and preview some of the homes for sale and had an opportunity to get to know one another.

So without further ado and with much fanfare, here's this week's Pasadena Weekly's articles on Pasadena Short sales with a few memorable mentions of me. How fun! Enjoy!!!

History in the making

Short sales make owning a home a reality for many

By Joanna Beresford 06/26/2008

Last week's CMA Report listed 20 single-family residences available as short pay properties in the city of Pasadena, more commonly referred to as short sales. Offered at prices ranging from $279,000 to $869,000, most of those homes have been on the market for about 100 days. The newest house on the list was built in 1984; most date from the first half of the last century, and the oldest place was constructed in 1886.

I visited the latter home recently, where I swear, when I put my hands on an original door frame and closed my eyes, I could almost hear the conversations and feel the vibrations of people who've passed through those rooms for the past 122 years. This was a slightly melancholy place. The previous owners have left behind neat piles of clothing, children's toys, even family photos. I studied a picture of a mother and her two handsome boys for a while. They looked very proud and confident. Maybe they're coming back for these belongings, or maybe they had to leave them behind.

Irina Netchaev, a broker with Keller Williams Realty, guided me through several short sale properties. She's great at making lists and she offered me, at the outset of our tour, an overview of the short sale process in list format:

1. Seller contacts a Realtor for help

2. Seller completes a hardship package

3. Short sale application along with hardship
package is submitted to the bank (or banks) for review

4. Bank reviews for completeness, orders valuation and assigns to a negotiator

5. Negotiator begins the initial review and contacts Realtor and homeowner

6. Property valuation performed according to investor guidelines

7. Mortgage insurer and investor approval gained and additional liens negotiated by Realtor

8. Application decision is made and a decision letter mailed.

This list applies to sellers, obviously. Potential buyers should consult a lender and determine what they are comfortable with paying for a home. Buyers can research the market to some extent on their own and then should contact a real estate professional who can help them find the perfect home.

Many agents don't want to bother with short sale properties because, ironically, the process can be LONG and arduous, compared to a more conventional transaction. Netchaev considers it an obligation to present buyers and sellers with all options, so she's become adept at negotiating the ins and outs of the short sale procedure.

"The first question I ask a potential seller is, 'what are you trying to accomplish with this sale?'" says Irina. "And what helps me as the Realtor is education. So many of us aren't trained properly, and I've found it invaluable to me and my clients that I'm familiar with trends, listings, timing, and aspects of the community."

Here's another list and this one I made up all by myself - Five Reasons Why I Admire
Irina Netchaev:

1. She's got the most delicious Russian accent

2. She has a spiffy GPS system in her car

3. She's smart, honest and funny

4. Her husband is a former Russian hockey player and mentor
to hundreds of other athletes (not relevant, maybe, but interesting!)

5. She's pretty and extremely graceful

In 1886 (by the way, the year the oldest short sale house was built), Pasadena incorporated as a city. I've been told that the main reason residents sought incorporation was so they could get rid of the local saloon. In the next decade sewers, paved streets, and electric lighting were installed.

Educational facilities expanded, the Shakespeare Club and Grand Opera House opened, and the Pasadena Street railroad opened.

And here's this house, redolent of all that history, that just needs a little love and refurbishment. The city of Pasadena, like every community, rides the thrilling roller coaster of good times and bad, but certain universal truths prevail: we all want to go home, and somewhere out there is a home for everyone.

Joanna Dehn Beresford is a former teacher, nanny, actress, rock star, farm girl, waitress and clerk. She can be reached at truewrite@yahoo.com