Home Prices Gain for 5th month in June: S&P

Home prices rose more than expected in June, the fifth month in a row of gains in a fresh sign of improvement in the housing market, a closely watched survey showed on Tuesday.

The S&P/Case Shiller composite index of 20 metropolitan areas gained 0.9 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis, topping economists' forecasts for 0.5 percent, according to a Reuters poll.

On a non-seasonally adjusted basis, prices were even stronger, up 2.3 percent.

"We seem to be witnessing exactly what we needed for a sustained recovery; monthly increases coupled with improving annual rates of change," David Blitzer, chairman of the index committee at Standard & Poor's, said in a statement.

"The market may have finally turned around."

Read the full article here.

Read More

5 Ways to Use Pinterest to Boost Press Results

Pinterest is taking over social media like a tsunami of college students on a pizza delivery guy. Why not? It’s fun, highly addictive and – newly announced as the 3rd most popular social network in the World – it’s creeping up on Facebook with 11+ million users.

So how can you leverage that popularity to expand the reach of your press releases? Try these tactics.

1. Add an Infographic to Your Release, Then Pin It

Including a relevant infographic with your press release is a fantastic way to give media and news outlets a visual to go with your story, plus it takes advantage of one of the most popular ways to share data.

For inspiration, try searching wire service websites like BusinessWire.com or PRNewswire.com using the keyword “infographic.” It turns up examples like these:Kronos, PayAsUGym, Ebates and BackPainRelief.

This may seem obvious – but don’t just run the infographic with your wire release, or embed it in your email. Be sure to upload it on Pinterest, then add a hyperlink back to the full release with a short summary and a few keyword hashtags.

Read the full article and view the rest of the tips here.

Read More

The Bad News Behind the Good News That Home Prices Are Rising

Doesn't it sometimes seem like every time there's good news about the economy, it comes with a big, infuriating catch? 

Take housing. Over the last few months, economists have been noticing glimmers of good news out of the real estate market - signs that home values may have finally bottomed out and are now turning a corner. There are more buyers and fewer houses sitting around on the market. And according to new stats from from Fannie Mae and CoreLogic, prices kept chugging higher through June, as illustrated in the chart below. 

  

Read the full article here.

Read More

The World Cities That Tweet the Most

More tweets come from Jakarta, Indonesia's capitol, than New York, Tokyo, London, or São Paulo, according to a recent study of Twitter's geographic footprint.

The study, released by Paris-based Semiocast, tracked the number of tweets with location info in the month of June, 2012. New York is the top U.S. city for tweets, outranking Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, Atlanta, and Houston. San Francisco, the city that the social media company calls home, doesn't make an appearance in the top 20. 

While Jakarta's high ranking might surprise some, it did not surprise my University of Toronto colleague, Barry Wellman, the leading social media sociologist and co-author of the book,Networked. "I'm not surprised, because I saw Indonesian language a lot on Twitter Trending Topics," writes Wellman in an email. "As far as U.S. cities, it looks mostly like a size effect."

Read the full article here.

Read More

Facebook - Does it Extend to CRE?

There’s been a lot of talk regarding why CRE brokers should not promote their business on Facebook. The main gist: Facebook isn’t a professional network. None of your friends are on Facebook looking for a 5,000sf office or a 10,000sf industrial warehouse.

Yes, Facebook is fairly social and personal but on the other hand, as the largest social media engine, Facebook is a perfect branding vehicle for a brokerage firm or individual broker. It’s easy to control content for the most part and is a much more visual medium than many other social media tools. The photo album feature is easy-to-use and links come with a nice preview, even when you are sharing a link from another Page. Coy Davidson and Blanchard and Calhoun Commercial are great examples of broker and brokerage pages with depth.

Read the full story here.

Read More

9 Beliefs of Remarkably Successful People

9 Beliefs of Remarkably Successful People

1. Time doesn't fill me. I fill time.

Deadlines and time frames establish parameters, but typically not in a good way. The average person who is given two weeks to complete a task will instinctively adjust his effort so it actually takes two weeks.

Forget deadlines, at least as a way to manage your activity. Tasks should only take as long as they need to take. Do everything as quickly and effectively as you can. Then use your "free" time to get other things done just as quickly and effectively.

Average people allow time to impose its will on them; remarkable people impose their will on their time.

2. The people around me are the people I chose.

Some of your employees drive you nuts. Some of your customers are obnoxious. Some of your friends are selfish, all-about-me jerks.

You chose them. If the people around you make you unhappy it's not their fault. It's your fault. They're in your professional or personal life because you drew them to you--and you let them remain.

Think about the type of people you want to work with. Think about the types of customers you would enjoy serving. Think about the friends you want to have.

Then change what you do so you can start attracting those people. Hardworking people want to work with hardworking people. Kind people like to associate with kind people. Remarkable employees want to work for remarkable bosses.

Successful people are naturally drawn to successful people.

Read on for the full list.

Read More

Rents Now Rising Faster Than Home Prices

Rents Now Rising Even Faster Than Home Prices

U.S. housing prices are up for the first time in a while, prompting a number of commentaries about how home prices may have finally begun to bounce off the bottom. As it turns out, though, rents are increasing faster.

That's according to the just released Housing and Rental Price Monitors from Trulia, developed by their chief economist and occasional Cities contributor Jed Kolko. He's calculated that in 22 of the 25 largest U.S. rental markets, rents are outpacing home prices.

Housing prices are rising the most, not surprisingly, in markets that took the biggest hits. Phoenix and Miami have seen big increases, as have Cape Coral and West Palm Beach. Housing prices have also come back up in Detroit and nearby Warren-Troy-Farmington Hills, as well as Pittsburgh. Denver and Orlando also number among the top ten, as well as San Jose – the Silicon Valley area – where housing prices did not dip that much but continue to be under pressure from the tech boom.

Read the full article.

Read More