The BVAS Connection» Real Estate News

Rich Real Estate Agent, Poor Real Estate Agent

Megan E. Barber — Sat, 12 Nov 2011 00:30:53 +0000

What separates Rich Real Estate Agents from the Poor Real Estate Agents? Check out this awesome infographic and survey from Active Rain. Lots of striking information in this, definitely worth checking out.

Posted via email from megbarberva’s posterous

Megan E. Barber is a Real Estate Virtual Assistant, and owner of Barber Virtual Assisting Solutions. With over 10 years of experience working within the real estate industry, Megan and her team Virtual Assistants provide top notch real estate support services such as marketing, lead follow-up, social media, WordPress websites, and more. Megan E Barber is also the creator and author of The BVAS Connection and VA Mommy.

Importance of REALTOR Safety

Megan E. Barber — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 22:08:45 +0000

Being a real estate agent can definitely be a difficult job at times. From managing several buyer and seller clients at once, to tracking paperwork and juggling upcoming closings. But he thought that your real estate career can present you with some dangerous situations, hardly ever enters your mind. Some scary stuff in the news lately is driving home the fact that Realtor safety should become a priority.

Realtor safety concerns are nothing new. Several years ago, when I worked in the front office for a major real estate company, the company had decided to offer self defense classes to their agents which some thought was silly. Since the subject came up, my broker then told me this story:

She was working with these first-time buyers, showing them several properties on the weekends over a few weeks. One Saturday morning, she was setting up a few showing appointments for the day, and called one particular owner-occupied home where a pleasant gentleman answered. He said it was the requested appointment was fine and he would make sure to be out of the home.

Since this was the first appointment of the day, she decided to get to the property ahead of her clients to preview it herself, open up curtains, turn on lights, etc. When she unlocked and opened the door, about 10 feet in front of her was a man sitting in a chair with a shotgun in his lap, starting straight at her. She quickly apologized for disturbing him, backed away, closed the door, and got in her car. She had her clients meet her at the next property instead.

Now that scary situation turned out to be ok for my former boss, as she was unharmed. But it has stuck in her memory and has always taken extra safety measures ever since.

The news tell us that some agents have not been so lucky.

Last year, two Realtors were found murdered in separate incidents, one found shot in a vacant home he was showing, and one found in burning home.

Back in April, an Iowa Realtor was found murdered at an at a model home open house.

In July, a Tennessee agent was attacked and robbed during a showing appointment.

Just last month, an Oregon broker was targeted in his office and shot by a revenge seeking gunman.

A few weeks ago, northern Ohio agents were warned that a man was calling female agents for evening showing appointments, to possibly lure them into vacant homes and sexually assault them.

The sad list goes on.

Real estate can be a risky industry. Agents can often find themselves traveling alone, meeting with and showing properties to people that they don’t really know well or at all. There’s worries that violence against Realtors is on the rise. And it is not just women that are victimized. (check out his report)

What can you do to keep yourself safe? Though past violent incidents don’t always have a common thread, and there is no way to prevent every crime, agents should certainly take any step necessary to protect themselves.

Take a self defense or martial arts class.
Google new prospects prior to initial meetings to sniff out anything fishy if you can.
Meet them for the first time in a public place, such as your office during business hours.
Call or text someone to let them know where you’ll be and who you’ll be with showing properties.
Use a tool such as Moby, which is a mobile app for your smartphone that can alert chosen contacts with a need for assistance and also tracks your location. And it’s FREE!

Do what you can to increase your awareness and fine tune your gut instincts. Please stay safe out there!

NARdiGras Video Contest

Megan E. Barber — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 16:36:37 +0000

Everyone loves a contest right? Since I’ve been talking about video a fair bit lately, I saw a contest for REALTORS from NAR that ties into video nicely. So you’ve been sharpening your video making skills lately, and making fantastic real estate videos, right? Well now you can put those skills into practice by entering the Win a Trip to New Orleans in the NARdiGras 2010 Video Contest.

All you have to do is submit a video that is 3 minutes or less, explaining why you should get an all-expenses paid trip to NARdiGras 2010, NAR’s annual conference and expo happening November 5-8. Looks like a fun contest and a pretty great prize as well. A few years ago I attended the NAR Conference & Expo in Vegas, had a blast, and met all sorts of industry greats.

Winner of the contest receives, full conference registration, round-trip airfare, hotel room for 3 nights, and $300 gift card for expenses. The winner’s video will also be displayed on the REALTORS® Conference & Expo home page.

Video submission deadline is August 15th, and the voting for the finalist happens August 23rd – September 13th. So get creative, show off you awesome video skills, plead your case, and be sure to include the phrase “NARdiGras 2010, the REALTORS® Conference & Expo in New Orleans.”

For more information on the contest and guidelines, check it out here.

Good Luck!

2010 Has Started With a Bang – Video

Megan E. Barber — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 22:33:28 +0000

Here we are 1/12 of the way through the year 2010 and boy has it been a busy month! Business is booming, and me and my clients have this motivational fire inside to make this the greatest year ever. So here is my latest video talking about it.

Megan Barber is a Real Estate Virtual Assistant, owner of Barber Virtual Assisting Solutions, LLC, and runs blogs, The BVAS Connection and The Virtual Perception. Megan has been in a Virtual Assistant for 5+ years and has spent over 10 years doing the “behind-the-scenes” work in the real estate industry assisting agents with their real estate marketing and transaction needs.

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NAR Makes Some Big Strides

Megan E. Barber — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:58:51 +0000

via realtor.org

Methinks that NAR is taking some great steps in the right direction. This is some exciting stuff in my opinion. I think this is badly needed and hopefully will erase the need for agents to buy into 3rd party aggregators. This should become a truly valuable NAR member benefit… Finally.

Posted via web from megbarberva’s posterous

Are You Attending the Virtual RE BarCamp? I AM!!

Megan E. Barber — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 00:16:54 +0000

In just a couple short weeks, the very first Virtual Real Estate BarCamp will be held on November 17th. I just signed up and so should you!

So what is a BarCamp anyways? According to Wikipedia – BarCamp is an international network of user generated conferences (or unconferences) – open, participatory workshop-events, whose content is provided by participants.

Why should you attend? It’s VIRTUAL! So you have little excuse not to attend. You can attend right from the comfort of your own office, and can even invite a few of your colleagues. It’s a great opportunity to learn about and share great ideas about what’s new real estate marketing, real estate technology, social media and more. And all in a informal webinar sort of way.

And did I mention that it is free? That’s right, it wont’ cost you a thing!

So go and sign up and I hope to see you there!

More info from the VREBC folks…

Educating Real Estate Agents On How To Use Modern Technologies To Better Their Business Will Never Be The Same!

On November 17th, 2009 dozens of the most respected educators in the real estate industry converge to host the first of its kind, Virtual Real Estate BarCamp.

Virtual Real Estate BarCamp is a 1-Day Learning Extravaganza.
From 9am until 4pm PST, three concurrent webinar "rooms" will each host 9 different sessions, for a total of 27 different presentations.
There is something for everyone and everything for someone, and best of all, IT IS FREE and attendance is unlimited!

Click below to:
Register.
Learn more.
See who is coming.
Check out the Session Calendar.
Get sponsorship info.

Attendance is projected to be at least 1000 agents, nationwide.
Do not miss out on being part of this ground-breaking event.

Session topics include:

Social Media Risk Management

Flickr for Real Estate

Developing Your Brand

Online Advertising Secrets

Facebook for Real Estate

WordPress Training

Daily Goal Tracking

Starting a Real Estate Blog

…and much more, with new sessions being added every day.

And if that wasn\’t cool enough, individuals from around the country are volunteering to host In-Real-Life MeetUps for after the event.
Learn all day, and then meet to have a beer with local participants. This is going to be a blast!

We hope to see you there!

Great post on Active Rain – Time To Dump The Desk??

Megan E. Barber — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 01:35:48 +0000

via activerain.com

If you want to ditch the desk and go completely mobile, here are the necessary tools to do so. This is a great post from Clint Miller on Active Rain. Follow him on Twitter too – http://twitter.com/therealclint

Posted via web from megbarberva’s posterous

BarberVASolutions.com Has a New Look!

Megan E. Barber — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 21:40:32 +0000

Have you vistited our main site, www.BarberVASolutions.com lately? Well I am excited to announce that our BVAS site now has a new look! After 4+ years of having the same website design, I thought is was time for a facelift. So after many hours of hard work, and many nights dreaming about CSS, I did it! (thanks to WordPress) With our new site, we’re also in the process of adding a few new services, products and resources. A few of the most exciting services we will be adding it the coming months:

Social Network Marketing packages and more
More graphic design services including Twitter backgrounds, custom web/blog headers and buttons

And as a celebration for our celebration of our site’s new look, I am running a New Look Special! For any new clients that sign on with us before March 31, 2009, we are offering 5% discounts on all of our retainer packages for the first 6 months of your contract. So don’t delay and contact me today for more details. Be sure to stay tuned and check back to our site frequently to see our new services, new resources and new team members we add in the coming months.

Megan Barber is a Real Estate Virtual Assistant, owner of Barber Virtual Assisting Solutions, LLC, and runs blogs, The BVAS Connection and The Virtual Perception. Megan has been in a Virtual Assistant for 4+ years and has spent 10+ years doing the “behind-the-scenes” work in the real estate industry assisting agents with their real estate marketing and transaction needs.