February 19, 2007
Blog party | A talk with BlueCurrent's Franz Honer on the benefits of blogging about Maine's real estate market
By Taylor Smith
Try asking a real estate agent how the market's doing these days, and you're bound to get a perspective pitched somewhere between sunny and rose-colored. Fact is, real estate agents aren't always the best barometers of the real estate market.
But that's the appeal of Franz Honer's online journal ˆ BlueCurrent Real Estate Blog ˆ which last month celebrated its one-year anniversary. Honer, the 23-year-old co-owner of Scarborough-based real estate agency BlueCurrent, has spent the last year blogging about local development issues, the state of the southern Maine real estate market and his take on hot-button issues like Gov. John Baldacci's plan to freeze property taxes.
And best of all, Honer doesn't mind skewering a few sacred cows in the process. A recent post, for example, pictured a real estate decoder ring to interpret Realtor speak. According to the ring, an agent who says "cozy" really means "tiny," and a motivated seller is actually a desperate seller.
Honer's online real estate journal, linked through BlueCurrent's website, isn't tearing up the blogosphere. The site during its lifetime has logged just 1,500 page views ˆ a far cry from the 3,000 or so hits a day for HousingPanic, one of the most popular real estate blogs. But the traffic counts don't concern Honer. Instead, he sees the blog as a good way to keep in touch with BlueCurrent customers ˆ current, former and future ˆ as well as a podium for an insider to speak candidly about the real estate industry.
Mainebiz caught up with Honer for a chat about what sparked the BlueCurrent Real Estate Blog, his take on the housing bubble and the mysterious swamp coolers. The following is an edited transcript.
Mainebiz: What was the impetus behind your blog?
Franz Honer: I started last year with a couple of goals. One was to give people that we know ˆ past clients, current clients ˆ a way to stay up to date with what's going on without being in their face.
What do they need to be up to date with?
The laws are constantly changing in our business. For example, a few weeks ago the radon guidelines were changed, which in Maine is a big thing. The only way that I knew about it is that I have a newsletter that comes to us as Realtors that detailed the change. But even the state agency sites haven't updated their stuff to reflect the new guidelines. So to have a place where we can post all of that information is nice.
Also, we can post new features we put on the website. We don't put our listings on the blog because we have a separate space for that. When you look at most real estate agents that have a successful blogs, they tend to stay away from blatant self promotion.
Who's your typical reader?
I would say that maybe a quarter of the readers are clients, and another quarter are potential clients. The other half is people that will probably never result in business for us ˆ maybe people across the country in other markets. I email back and forth with a lot of other real estate agents that have their own blogs and talk with them about what's going on in the market.
Is it helpful to understand what's going on in other markets?
It's interesting because you find a lot of the same issues wherever you go. They'll tell war stories about things that happened to them ˆ things that got messed up or interesting learning experiences.
What have you heard?
I didn't know what swamp coolers were. I found out they're used in places that are hot and dry ˆ they're not air conditioners, but they use evaporative cooling to cool a house. I've never seen one, but the first time you see that written somewhere, you say, "gee, what's that?" The other side, and what I mostly read when I read other blogs, a lot of real estate agents write to other real estate agents about how we do business, and that's really interesting, too.
How you do business? Like what?
Recently, there was a guy out in Ohio who posted listing agreements, and he was using a three-month term for a listing agreement. That's something we've been doing since we started a couple of years ago. Traditionally, people use six-month listing agreements. Three months is fair for the customer, and it lessens the risk that they'll list with someone they don't like. It also keeps us on our toes, because we don't sit on the listing for six months when nothing happens.
This guy basically wrote about the same thing and said the same things that I'd found. To see what what's working for other people is really important. You wouldn't really get that around here because you probably wouldn't have that much of an open discussion with other agents ˆ they're your competition, even if you're on good terms with them.
Right. Real estate agents aren't well known for being candid about the business. Was it difficult to open up and be casual on your blog?
I find you do have a lot of freedom. We get to do whatever we want. We can poke fun, we can editorialize, and that's pretty fun. But for me, I'm pretty serious ˆ I try to give everyone a fair shake and not say anything too biased. But I think I've loosened up as I've learned about the format. Now, I'm not afraid to say my opinion on something, as long as it makes sense.
What was your last opinionated post about?
The last thing I've written about is the tax freeze proposal that [Gov. John] Baldacci has talked about. Anytime you get into anything political, you're on thin ice. But I think [the plan] is an awful idea. I probably haven't said it quite that strongly, but if you read any of my posts on it, you'd know that I think it's a bad idea.
But it's a matter of choosing who you quote and making a case for why this thing doesn't make sense. I don't think I've gone too far over the edge. You wouldn't be able to say which political party I'm in just by reading my blog, which is probably the way it should be for a real estate agent.
Do you think anyone has been turned off by your blog? Has it offended any potential customers?
I think we tend to attract like-minded people. The people who would be offended probably wouldn't be too excited to do business with us anyway. But I don't think it scares people away. I don't think I've said anything so offensive that people have said, "No way, you're nuts."
How many people read your blog?
We get about 30 to 40 people a day reading the blog. For any other medium, that would be a pitiful audience. But for a blog, it's not bad. It's about number 100 in the real estate category on BlogTopSites.com.
The top-ranked blog is Housing Panic [housingpanic.blogspot.com]. They've had 213,000 unique visitors. There are a lot of blogs about the housing bubble, what's going to happen and all that doom and gloom.
What's the consensus in the blogosphere?
There's sharp debate. I read a lot of real estate blogs where I respect the writers and think they're pretty smart people. And to see the difference of opinion between them on the whole spectrum ˆ everywhere from this is the bottom, it's going to be a soft landing and things are going to get much better, to people saying things are going to get a lot worse. I would say the real estate agents are mostly on the positive side, and personally I think that's a matter of being in the profession. You want things to be good ˆ it's in our own self interest. We see the positive things and tend to ignore the negative.
Where do you think the greater Portland residential market is headed?
I think in the greater Portland market we have an affordability problem. I think we have high taxes and, except for the fact that interest rates have remained so low, which is why people are still able to afford things, I think it's almost impossible to predict what's going to happen because there are so many factors that are beyond this local market. If interest rates are up to 14% like they were when my parents bought their home in 1979, will these prices work? No way. If that happens, we could all be in a boatload of trouble.
I think it's still going to slow down a lot even in the best-case scenario. My money is on a slow two to three years. Eventually, it'll pick up long-term. After all, real estate is still a good investment.
Have you had any local reaction to the blog?
I haven't talked to a lot of people about the blog. In fact, I don't think many real estate agents in this area are online reading blogs. I don't think they're really aware of what's going on. I think if they were, there'd be a number of blogs in southern Maine.
There's one other one, David Whitten [of Gorham-based Whitten Properties], who has Maine Real Estate Blog [www.mainerealestateblog.com]. He's a very smart guy and forward thinking about technology, but he hasn't kept up his posting. To have something that people are going to come back and read, you have to post at least once or twice a week. If you go a month or more without posting, then it pretty much dies.
The real estate industry has seen a lot of changes in the past few years. Now, I can go house hunting using Google Maps. Are real estate agents pretty adaptable when it comes to technology?
Most traditional agents are scared to death of technology because they think it's going to put them out of business. They call it disintermediation. They want to control what information the buyer gets ˆ like on Realtor.com, which doesn't give out property addresses. Our philosophy is different than most. We want to give [buyers] information, and we want people to come to us because they want our expertise, our knowledge, our advice, our experience. But not because coming to us is the only way to find out where a house is. That's silly.
So there probably isn't going to be a flood of real estate blogs in southern Maine anytime soon?
There's a lot of resistance. I think if you surveyed most real estate agents, either they don't know what's going on with blogs and don't pay any attention, or they're kind of scared at all the implications of everyone going online when they really want to keep people offline and talking to them.
But that's the appeal of Franz Honer's online journal ˆ BlueCurrent Real Estate Blog ˆ which last month celebrated its one-year anniversary. Honer, the 23-year-old co-owner of Scarborough-based real estate agency BlueCurrent, has spent the last year blogging about local development issues, the state of the southern Maine real estate market and his take on hot-button issues like Gov. John Baldacci's plan to freeze property taxes.
And best of all, Honer doesn't mind skewering a few sacred cows in the process. A recent post, for example, pictured a real estate decoder ring to interpret Realtor speak. According to the ring, an agent who says "cozy" really means "tiny," and a motivated seller is actually a desperate seller.
Honer's online real estate journal, linked through BlueCurrent's website, isn't tearing up the blogosphere. The site during its lifetime has logged just 1,500 page views ˆ a far cry from the 3,000 or so hits a day for HousingPanic, one of the most popular real estate blogs. But the traffic counts don't concern Honer. Instead, he sees the blog as a good way to keep in touch with BlueCurrent customers ˆ current, former and future ˆ as well as a podium for an insider to speak candidly about the real estate industry.
Mainebiz caught up with Honer for a chat about what sparked the BlueCurrent Real Estate Blog, his take on the housing bubble and the mysterious swamp coolers. The following is an edited transcript.
Mainebiz: What was the impetus behind your blog?
Franz Honer: I started last year with a couple of goals. One was to give people that we know ˆ past clients, current clients ˆ a way to stay up to date with what's going on without being in their face.
What do they need to be up to date with?
The laws are constantly changing in our business. For example, a few weeks ago the radon guidelines were changed, which in Maine is a big thing. The only way that I knew about it is that I have a newsletter that comes to us as Realtors that detailed the change. But even the state agency sites haven't updated their stuff to reflect the new guidelines. So to have a place where we can post all of that information is nice.
Also, we can post new features we put on the website. We don't put our listings on the blog because we have a separate space for that. When you look at most real estate agents that have a successful blogs, they tend to stay away from blatant self promotion.
Who's your typical reader?
I would say that maybe a quarter of the readers are clients, and another quarter are potential clients. The other half is people that will probably never result in business for us ˆ maybe people across the country in other markets. I email back and forth with a lot of other real estate agents that have their own blogs and talk with them about what's going on in the market.
Is it helpful to understand what's going on in other markets?
It's interesting because you find a lot of the same issues wherever you go. They'll tell war stories about things that happened to them ˆ things that got messed up or interesting learning experiences.
What have you heard?
I didn't know what swamp coolers were. I found out they're used in places that are hot and dry ˆ they're not air conditioners, but they use evaporative cooling to cool a house. I've never seen one, but the first time you see that written somewhere, you say, "gee, what's that?" The other side, and what I mostly read when I read other blogs, a lot of real estate agents write to other real estate agents about how we do business, and that's really interesting, too.
How you do business? Like what?
Recently, there was a guy out in Ohio who posted listing agreements, and he was using a three-month term for a listing agreement. That's something we've been doing since we started a couple of years ago. Traditionally, people use six-month listing agreements. Three months is fair for the customer, and it lessens the risk that they'll list with someone they don't like. It also keeps us on our toes, because we don't sit on the listing for six months when nothing happens.
This guy basically wrote about the same thing and said the same things that I'd found. To see what what's working for other people is really important. You wouldn't really get that around here because you probably wouldn't have that much of an open discussion with other agents ˆ they're your competition, even if you're on good terms with them.
Right. Real estate agents aren't well known for being candid about the business. Was it difficult to open up and be casual on your blog?
I find you do have a lot of freedom. We get to do whatever we want. We can poke fun, we can editorialize, and that's pretty fun. But for me, I'm pretty serious ˆ I try to give everyone a fair shake and not say anything too biased. But I think I've loosened up as I've learned about the format. Now, I'm not afraid to say my opinion on something, as long as it makes sense.
What was your last opinionated post about?
The last thing I've written about is the tax freeze proposal that [Gov. John] Baldacci has talked about. Anytime you get into anything political, you're on thin ice. But I think [the plan] is an awful idea. I probably haven't said it quite that strongly, but if you read any of my posts on it, you'd know that I think it's a bad idea.
But it's a matter of choosing who you quote and making a case for why this thing doesn't make sense. I don't think I've gone too far over the edge. You wouldn't be able to say which political party I'm in just by reading my blog, which is probably the way it should be for a real estate agent.
Do you think anyone has been turned off by your blog? Has it offended any potential customers?
I think we tend to attract like-minded people. The people who would be offended probably wouldn't be too excited to do business with us anyway. But I don't think it scares people away. I don't think I've said anything so offensive that people have said, "No way, you're nuts."
How many people read your blog?
We get about 30 to 40 people a day reading the blog. For any other medium, that would be a pitiful audience. But for a blog, it's not bad. It's about number 100 in the real estate category on BlogTopSites.com.
The top-ranked blog is Housing Panic [housingpanic.blogspot.com]. They've had 213,000 unique visitors. There are a lot of blogs about the housing bubble, what's going to happen and all that doom and gloom.
What's the consensus in the blogosphere?
There's sharp debate. I read a lot of real estate blogs where I respect the writers and think they're pretty smart people. And to see the difference of opinion between them on the whole spectrum ˆ everywhere from this is the bottom, it's going to be a soft landing and things are going to get much better, to people saying things are going to get a lot worse. I would say the real estate agents are mostly on the positive side, and personally I think that's a matter of being in the profession. You want things to be good ˆ it's in our own self interest. We see the positive things and tend to ignore the negative.
Where do you think the greater Portland residential market is headed?
I think in the greater Portland market we have an affordability problem. I think we have high taxes and, except for the fact that interest rates have remained so low, which is why people are still able to afford things, I think it's almost impossible to predict what's going to happen because there are so many factors that are beyond this local market. If interest rates are up to 14% like they were when my parents bought their home in 1979, will these prices work? No way. If that happens, we could all be in a boatload of trouble.
I think it's still going to slow down a lot even in the best-case scenario. My money is on a slow two to three years. Eventually, it'll pick up long-term. After all, real estate is still a good investment.
Have you had any local reaction to the blog?
I haven't talked to a lot of people about the blog. In fact, I don't think many real estate agents in this area are online reading blogs. I don't think they're really aware of what's going on. I think if they were, there'd be a number of blogs in southern Maine.
There's one other one, David Whitten [of Gorham-based Whitten Properties], who has Maine Real Estate Blog [www.mainerealestateblog.com]. He's a very smart guy and forward thinking about technology, but he hasn't kept up his posting. To have something that people are going to come back and read, you have to post at least once or twice a week. If you go a month or more without posting, then it pretty much dies.
The real estate industry has seen a lot of changes in the past few years. Now, I can go house hunting using Google Maps. Are real estate agents pretty adaptable when it comes to technology?
Most traditional agents are scared to death of technology because they think it's going to put them out of business. They call it disintermediation. They want to control what information the buyer gets ˆ like on Realtor.com, which doesn't give out property addresses. Our philosophy is different than most. We want to give [buyers] information, and we want people to come to us because they want our expertise, our knowledge, our advice, our experience. But not because coming to us is the only way to find out where a house is. That's silly.
So there probably isn't going to be a flood of real estate blogs in southern Maine anytime soon?
There's a lot of resistance. I think if you surveyed most real estate agents, either they don't know what's going on with blogs and don't pay any attention, or they're kind of scared at all the implications of everyone going online when they really want to keep people offline and talking to them.
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