Archive for the 'Burlington Real Estate' Category

If you haven’t already heard, Google announced another new product the other day called Buzz. It’s basically another social networking tool . Really Google? As if we aren’t already overwhelmed enough? Between Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter and email (yes, some of us still email), who has time for another one? I guess Buzz is supposed to make your life easier by linking these all together and clogging up your inbox. Perfect! Now I can find out what Peter had for breakfast and get updates on the traffic jam Allison is stuck in right in my inbox. Do stupid waste of time tweets and facebook updates go into a special Buzz SPAM folder? Now that’s a feature that would sell me on Buzz. Here’s the thing, the only buzz on Buzz is that it nobody likes it. I did a quick Twitter search to see what people are saying about it and 80% of the tweets were negative.  Is Google losing it’s edge?

What’s really puzzling about all of this is that the Real Estate community hasn’t jumped all over this thing like they did with Twitter and Facebook.   Realtors are notorious for finding a way to plug listings through any and all platforms; to get the buzz going so to speak.  I guess time will tell. Maybe people are still trying to figure out whether Twitter is helping their business or killing productivity.

Here is a screen shot of a listing on Buzz

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Image via Wikipedia

I was doing some research on the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) website and I came across a pretty cool calculator that figures how much house you can afford with an FHA loan. It’s pretty cool how it breaks everything down. Use the detailed explanation for more info. This could be particularly helpful for first time home buyers.

http://www.ginniemae.gov/2_prequal/intro_questions.asp?Section=YPTH

Thank God we don’t have anything in Burlington, Vermont that looks like that!

This is an especially exciting post for me for two reasons:

1) I have been wanting to introduce video tours into our marketing strategy for a while now. Not enough people offer it and I think it’s something that potential buyers really want and I think sellers deserve it. We are there taking pictures anyway, why not grab some video while we’re at it. The technology is there. There’s really no excuse.

2) I REALLY like this new Multi-Family listing in Downtown Burlington where I shot this trial video. If executed properly, I think this is the type of property that could really benefit from video. The reason being that there are 4 apartments in this building and it’s pretty hard to get the flow of the property (how rooms are connected, etc.) from still images. Of course you could just go see it in person. Another reason is that in a property like this there are a lot of small spaces that are extremely difficult to photograph without a wide angle lens.

Now for the disclaimer: This video wasn’t executed properly. It was more of a spur of the moment thing so don’t judge. I was walking around taking pictures, talking about how I wanted to start doing video tours. Then it occurred to me that the camera has a video function so I started shooting. As you can see from the video below, it was such an afterthought that I didn’t even think to shut the toilet seat! It’s only a couple of seconds long, it’s shaky and it’s just a small portion of one of the units in the 4-unit building.

With that said, Enjoy!

57 North Winooski Ave. Burlington, Vermont from Omega on Vimeo.

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