San Antonio's Rockstar Turned Realtor®

End.  Beginning.  Beginning.  End.

Life.  Death.  Endless circles...alright, I'll cut the nonsense.  I'm here to wish you all farewell.  I'm leaving ActiveRain.  My reasons are varied, but none are earth shattering.  There is no sudden "I hate ActiveRain" swagger down here in San Antonio.  No, in fact I leave with good memories of my time here.  From meeting new friends, to learning new things, to debating with some of the best of them on the issues that our industry faces everyday.  I've loved all (well, almost all) of my time here.

I credit ActiveRain with really helping me find a voice in real estate blogging...the voice was mine, but the platform was ActiveRain (although I must credit AgentGenius for really giving me my first blogging opportunities).  I grew up a lot here in ActiveRain - figuring out who I wanted to be as a real estate agent and gained a bit of notoriety doing it.  My posts here have gained me attention in many different circles - from our industry to the press to consumers.

My leaving is not a reflection on the company (although until they remove the check photos, I will continue to have a problem with the message they are sending) and I wish them nothing but continued success, particularly as they transition to their new form without Jon.  As for the staff, past and present, I hope to meet you all somewhere down the line - some of you have been more than just the "people that work at ActiveRain" and far exceeded my expectations many times.  As for the connections with agents and others in our industry - I'll always value those and I hope you'll continue to say hello and offer your thoughts on my other blogs, Facebook, Twitter, and whatever else is yet to be invented.

There's a million places you can find me online and soon there will be more.  As I focus my energy, I truly do hope to see you all out there in the great world wide web (do they still call it that?).

I wrote my first blog here on November 3, 2008.  The title?  "A new day is dawning..."  I thought the photo I selected for my last post might make up for the lack of one in my first.  A circle if you will.  End.  Beginning.  Beginning.  End.

From that very same article, a quote:

I like to share what I know, learn what I don't, and mull over everything in between.

I think I lived up to that quote quite well and I give you my promise to continue to do so.

Epilogue.

I'm sure some people might speculate that I am leaving to pursue some project outside of real estate, but I'm not.  I'm still here, right where I've always been.  My shift in focus is designed to concentrate my activities and thoughts into a more powerful stream.  There will still be multiple blogs, but some uses of my time and brain power had to be evaluated, judged, and weighed on the scale.  RErockstar will continue on, much as it probably will for many, many years.  San Antonio Rocks will continue to be a view into the city I call home.  "I saw it in San Antonio." will continue to show bits and pieces of my life through my iPhone.  But there is more.  Some of it quietly revealed recently on Facebook, some of it merely hinted at.  I have much more to get out of this skull of mine, so expect to hear more...you'll just have to be listening in the right places.

photo courtesy of law_keven

I don't know what will happen to my posts, but I have backed them all up.  I guess after I pass the 90 day mark, my account will cease to exist and the lights will go dark.  It'll be a bit melancholy when it happens, but I'll make it just fine.

I'm happy for your success.

I love knowing when people around me, people I like, are being successful.  I love a good rags to riches success story.  I love the triumph of a person who sets their sights on success and reaches (and often surpasses) their goals.

ActiveRain success stories are always great and I've written them myself.  Recently though, I've found myself struggling with the thought of the success stories being posted on the main page.  Each story is accompanied by a smiling agent holding the check they received after their success story wrapped up.  There's everything from referral stories to blog success stories to members touting how ActiveRain expanded their business.

It's not the success that I struggle with.  It's the check.  In one photograph, an entire successful transaction is boiled down to a simple string of numbers with a dollar sign attached to it.  The entire client relationship and work put into the transaction put into dollars and sense.  ROI.  Quantified and filed away into a database.  Stamped with a "PAID" marker and cashed, deposited, invested, or spent.  I am not a number.

Now before you argue that we don't work for free...hear me out.

ActiveRain

ActiveRain is a business.  Their job is to get people to sign up and generate income for their company by selling the product and service that is ActiveRain.  In doing so, they need to show value.  A check in an agent's hand definitely holds a certain value to them as a company.  It's proof positive that there is value to spending time on ActiveRain.  Fair enough.

Here's where my thinking deviates.  ActiveRain - is it for our industry or for the consumer?  We all know there's value on both sides - or if we don't, we've at least heard the argument for one or the other or both.  So let's break it down into two sides...

...for our industry.

There's an obvious advantage to the network of real estate industry professionals here at ActiveRain.  As one of them, I look at the success stories and it compels me to continue writing, creating relationships, and building a referral base which I know I can always rely on to help my clients and perhaps send me business.  The check is the value.  It says "if you join ActiveRain, you can get business."  I like business.  I like it a lot.

...for the consumer.

To view ActiveRain from a consumer's viewpoint isn't always easy.  I'm too close to it.  I'm involved.  One of my driving forces is to look at everything in our industry from the consumer's view.  I'm not always perfect at it, but I do work hard to keep it at the forefront of everything I think and do.  So I'm a consumer looking for local information - I google away and find some great blog posts on a site (ActiveRain) I've never heard of.  What's the first thing I do?  Go to the main page.  What greets me and catches my attention first?  A photo of a smiling agent who is flashing the cash.  I'm no dummy, I know that agents get paid and don't work for free...but the first impression I have is an agent waving their check that they just earned.  Do I read the success story and see why they're holding the check?  Maybe, maybe not.

Perception as truth.

In an industry that it constantly battling with consumer opinion and public perception, the check represents everything wrong with our industry if you're already on the edge of deciding whether to place us above or below lawyers in your list of people you like least (sorry to my lawyer friends, but you have the same problems).

I know my clients are always thrilled when we close a transaction and (something I never thought would matter to them) they often ask, "hey, did you get your check yet" when we speak after closing.  They actually want to be sure I got paid.  They do want me to make money.  The difference?  They are clients.  We've built a friendship, a relationship, a trust...we are connected.

If I were a stranger, looking for an agent (and this is my personal thought) and I saw a photo of you smiling like a lottery winner, I would pass right by you.  In fact, I'd probably perceive you to be what I don't like about real estate agents.  I know from personal conversations (as an agent) that some of the agents I've seen in the success story column are good people who care for their clients.  As a consumer though?  I wouldn't give you a second thought.  The truth is they are good people and excellent agents.  The perception doesn't necessarily align with those thoughts.

But perception is truth...until it is given time to conform to the real truth.  That times time, trust, and connection.  Something you don't get with a picture of an agent holding a check.

photo curtest of Daquella manera

Please note: I'm all for celebrating our successes and don't deny that without those checks, we wouldn't be agents.  I lived in the world of rock and roll where I was expected to do everything for free (post-Napster) and although I had a passion for what I did, the truth was it had to put dinner on the table and gas in the car or it wasn't possible.  Money may not be everything or bring happiness or whatever cliched phrase you want to use, but let's face it - we need that money to continue to do what we do, passionate or not.

I'll keep my words to a minimum as I've said much of what I needed to on Facebook, Twitter, and on my own blog, but if you know Clint Miller, you'll know why posting this video means a lot to me.  I hate cancer and I want Clint and his family to know we're out here. We all know Clint is a tough one, but our support is needed.

Please, take a moment to visit the Clint Miller Benefit site and please donate what you can.  His family is bringing us reports as often as they can on Clint's condition.

Cancer is stupid.

Facebook Group - Clint Miller (@TheRealClint) Prayer Board

Twitter Hashtag - #weloveclint

Donate Now (all donations go directly to Clint's wife, Angela Miller)

There are many great blog posts being written with Clint in mind and Jay Thompson, Phoenix Real Estate Guy, is keeping track of them all on his post When Bad Things Happen to Great People. Clint Miller needs help.

Please support Clint and his family in any way you can.

It never hurts to have public discourse.

Dave Halpern, a Louisville short sale agent, wrote this post a few days ago and at first, I thought it was lacking.  Why?  Because I have a bit of a problem with the word expert at times.  The word is important and I do believe we should all strive to be experts in our field, but often I feel the word is used without a basis in logic or fact.

I (along with a few others) mentioned this in our comments to Dave's post and as you can see from his comment, he took what we said into consideration and added a paragraph to his post.  This to me, is the beauty of blogging on an open forum where we can discuss, dissect, learn, and grow.

Thanks Dave for being open to change.  I appreciate it and I'm sure your clients do too!

I'm famous in Los Angeles.

Despite my former career in the rock and roll industry, I was never very famous in Los Angeles.  I was able to sit in a bar and have no one notice me.  Same bar in Germany and I would have been signing autographs instead of drinking Pils.

Thanks to Gwen Banta, a Hollywood Hills real estate impresario, my name floats through the Los Angeles scene, even if it's in reference to real estate and not rock and roll.

I've reblogged many of Gwen's sharp-witted posts in the past and this one is a classic (as they all are).  If you've never stopped by her ActiveRain or AgentGenius blogs, now is the time - she will keep you going through the year with a smile, a laugh, and your finger on the spell check button.

PS If you've never googled Gwen, you might want to, she has a very cool "secret" past.

Well done ActiveRain.

They say milestones are important to note and mark down in the annals of history.  Your achievements should be advertised and celebrated.  You should never forget where you came from in order to focus on where you're going.

Today is a big day for ActiveRain.  For the community, the staff, the architects, and the members.

The 200,000 mark has been reached.

ActiveRain has gone through quite a few changes since I first came aboard and even when they haven't been widely cheered, ActiveRain has always worked hard to do the best for their members.  From the growing pains of new servers to the change in membership structure (introducing the paid membership), ActiveRain has taken a few lumps in their time, even from me.

With those lumps however, often came kudos and gratitude for many of the things they did that were widely seen as great ideas and innovations.  ActiveRain has always been a place of change.  It's a fluid forum for real estate industry professionals to congregate and work together to offer ideas, opinions, hugs, and cheers.  It's created many great relationships, helped bring business to the table, been an educational center, and a sounding board for people from all walks of life that share one thing in common.  Real estate.  That insane profession that we all felt called us.  Why it did varies as much as the 200,000 people on this site.  Regardless, we followed real estate's beckoning and found ourselves here at ActiveRain.

I look forward to seeing where this new plateau takes the network.  To see the new faces that come along and to hear the new ideas that are generated on these very pages.  I've enjoyed it here and look forward to celebrating the 500K mark with you all someday.

Congratulations to the ActiveRain staff - past, present, and future.  You've done a bang up job - keep it up.

photo courtesy of jasonb42882

Previously, on ActiveRain...

I wish I had thrown a date in the ActiveRain Success Story (quoted below) that I wrote.  It seems like I wrote it about fifty years ago (I haven't even been alive that long, despite what you may think), but I'm guessing it was somewhere around a year ago, maybe more.  My time at ActiveRain has been fruitful; bringing me clients, friends, and contact with all sorts of influential people in the real estate industry.  It's garnered me recognition, both as a Realtor® and a blogger/tech-geek.  It's made me money and cost me nothing (other than a few sleepless nights when I just had to get an idea written out).  I have to repeat myself - it's been great.

My time on ActiveRain has been great.  I started here with the intention of "cutting my blogging teeth" so to speak and its done wonders for me.  I've been able to learn what I like and don't like in blogs and find my style as I write more and more.  Its opened up networking opportunities (my referral network reaches far and wide now), taught me a thing or two that I didn't know, and allowed me to make friends with people I might not otherwise know.  I've learned more than I can imagine right here on these pages - from technology to changes in the laws affecting real estate to negotiating tips to staging advice to new products.  It's like a giant online classroom - with a sense of fun and humor to it as well.  Many people might gauge their success on ActiveRain in dollars and cents, but I gauge it in what its done for me...the dollars and cents will follow.  I look forward to reading this in a year's time and seeing what I have to say about it then.

But times do change...

Through my time here on ActiveRain, real estate has changed and so have I.  You've probably changed a bit to since we first met.  We all do.  Time brings about change, no matter how much we try to stop it.  I blog a little less here at ActiveRain now and my focus has shifted a bit from being all about local real estate to covering much broader topics and focusing a bit more on giving back of my experiences and thoughts.  I spend more time here talking about the real estate industry and ideas about how to do this or that.  I guess in a way, I've moved into a more educational role here at ActiveRain, but instead of educating buyers and sellers (I do plenty of that at RErockstar.com) I tend to focus on the people around me, the members of ActiveRain and other real estate bloggers.  One of the facts you may not know about me is that I once wanted to be a teacher - I have a strong desire to help others through education and the sharing of knowledge.

So with that said, I write my next ActiveRain Success Story...

As an ActiveRain Ambassador, I've been given the opportunity to talk to many new (and not so new) members and share my tech-geekiness and love of real estate technology/blogging with many of them.  I've been able to connect with consumers (and generate business), expand my referral network, and speak with many influential people in the real estate industry.  As my recognition as a Realtor® and blogger has grown, I have been able to share my experiences and knowledge with the ActiveRain network - helping them as they once helped me.  My success comes in many flavors, but it has recently shifted into the education side of real estate, something I had an interest in, and ActiveRain has allowed me to expand that side of things.  As I continue to blog here at ActiveRain, you can expect to see much more information geared towards expanding the community's use and understanding of many of the tools and technology that we have access to.

So, who thought I was leaving after they read the first few lines of this post?

photo courtesy of David Reece

When a new blogger speaks.

I've had a few conversations with Eric Michael outside of ActiveRain recently, so was happy to see his first post.  It's never easy taking that leap of faith and writing your first one, especially when you get that nagging doubt that says "who will care" and "who wants to read what I have to say?"

I applaud anyone who takes that first step, but since I've spoken to Eric, I thought I'd applaud him a little more publicly.  I think he'll be just fine...

Quiet day, time to clean.

I've been taking some time this morning to do a bit of housekeeping on several of my sites and ActiveRain is no different.  I thought I'd add a few new things, clean up a bit of code, and make a few things better.  No major surgery, just a few tiny things you probably wouldn't even notice.

New Links.

I've neglected the links in the sidebar to the right for sometime now and haven't added or updated them.  I probably haven't changed them since I first put a few up there.  I wish I could organize them into groups or something, but since I can't I just left them in alphabetical order.  The links are focused on two main groups - local San Antonio residents and the real estate industry.  I think if you look at them it's pretty clear which link is which.  Of course, I encourage you to visit all of them as they are hand picked links of places I visit, like, use, or learn from.

What's Xplode?

You might also notice the large Xplode Real Estate Technology Conference banner that was added.  I'll be talking about this more in the coming weeks, but here's the basics: Austin, February 10, be there.  They already have some great speakers lined up and I've been speaking with Matt Fagioli about the conference and it promises to be an excellent time.  Matt has given me a discount code to save you $50 on your Xplode registration as well!  (Just follow the link and the discount is applied or you can go back later and simply enter "rerockstar" as your discount code.)  You might know Matt as one of the founders of RETechSouth - so you know it's going to be good.

Schedule an appointment.

You may have noticed this little guy, hanging out over on the sidebar as well:

If you've spoken to me about technology in the last month or so, you probably know of my new-found love for Tungle.  Simply put, Tungle is the most useful technology I've seen in awhile.  It allows users to see my availability and suggest possible times for an appointment.  I then get a message, confirm the times, and everyone has the appointment on their calendar.  I use it all the time now, especially when I want to book a meeting with someone, but I don't know what their schedule looks like for the week.  Not only does it work great for me scheduling meetings, but even my clients are using it to schedule appointments with me.

photo courtesy of Rob Shenk

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope all of you have a great day and a great holiday season up ahead.  My coach, Chadi Bazzi, reminded me of something yesterday and although the actual text of the email was based on someone else's writing (and therefore I'm not going to reprint here), the message was simple.  Stop and be thankful for all the "bad" things in life too.

Be thankful for the struggles, the setbacks, and the times when you were ready to throw in the towel.  Be thankful for the failures, disasters, and mishaps that you didn't want or enjoy.  Be thankful for all those things that most people won't even think about today.

Be thankful for each of those negative energies in your life...because each one only made you better and stronger.  Each one taught you something new and left you one step closer to realizing your goals.  Each one gave you a new plan, a new way to solve the problem, or a new way of thinking.  Each one had its own purpose and although they are never fun to go through, the outcome is positive if you choose to make it.  It's not always easy and it's not always fun, but life can teach us a lot if we just stop and listen to the messages it sends.

Have a wonderful, safe, and delicious Thanksgiving everyone!

photo courtesy of JOE MARINARO