Real Estate Marketing SEO Blog

Mortgage

Do you know the latin word for mortgage?

It means Death Grip! That's probably a secret you want to keep to yourself lol.

.. from medieval times when, if one fell on hard times, one solution was to seek to mortgage a property you already owned in order to get cash.

From Websters:

mort·gage Pronunciation: \ˈmȯr-gij\ Function: noun Etymology: Middle English morgage, from Anglo-French mortgage, from mort dead (from Latin mortuus) + gage gage — more at murder Date: 15th century

From  American Heritage Dictionary:

 ETYMOLOGY: Middle English morgage, from Old French : mort, dead (from Vulgar Latin *mortus, from Latin mortuus, past participle of mor, to die + gage, pledge (of Germanic origin).

FICO Scores

Fico Scores can mess up a deal. Getting way in front of a possible frustration is just smart business. Scott Mitic from Trusted ID tells us what we can do to protect ourselves and how you can help your client not only protect her FICO score, but raise it to a better level.

Trusted ID : Chief Executive Officer Scott Mitic is an accomplished entrepreneur and national expert on identity theft and consumer credit issues. As CEO of TrustedID, Scott leads the creation of innovative new solutions that effectively eliminate the most dangerous and costly forms of identity theft. Previously, Scott was Vice President of Sales & Business Development at Fair Isaac's consumer division, myFICO, where, during his tenure, he helped millions of consumers access and manage their FICO score, the gold-standard indicator of consumer credit worthiness.  .

"Get the Odds on a Rate Cut"

Analysts predict the Fed will trim its key rate, now at 4.5 %, by one-quarter of a percentage point at that time. A few even speculate about the possibility of a half-point cut.

What are Vegas oddsmakers saying about an interest rate cut?....

Creative Financing

People want to buy but often find the financing is a roadblock. Can You Remember Creative Financing? Get out those books!

According to the 2007 National Housing Pulse Survey from October, 59% of Americans think "now is a good time to buy".

Interestingly as I wrote in the December newsletter, I see this in the hundreds of log files of real estate websites. People are consistently coming to realty websites. But, it seems that their willingness to register as a lead is down. ( I believe that can be more than just a market driven thing, but it might be the freely available listings at verticals like Edgio, Trulia and such. Even smaller players like Picky Homes offers real estate listings without registration.)

Mortgage Broker Leads

Mortgage Brokers are having a rough go of it currently in many parts of the U.S. Just like the Realtors. Mostly because of tightening of lending requirements.

I recently witnessed a couple methods that Mortgage Pros are using to ramp up their chances of landing an application.

Mortgage Marketing Sucks

Has this ever happend to you?

You are watching your favorite sports team or TV show, or banging out new brillaint posts on your blog, and the phone rings. Hoping that its your loved one, you eagerly answer. "Hello?"

This is how it usually happens to me...."Hello, Mr. Okefay (My name is O'Keefe") we are calling from..." and they go into some lie that they are giving people in my area special rates, or some gal named Mary is calling from their San Diego office, when clearly she is from India, and she is not named Mary.This despite the fact that I am on the do not call list. And is there anything more annoying than those computer calls that hang up on us? No doubt this is some way to confirm our number as live.

Well the Harris Interactive Financial Services Group released a new poll this week and I guess I am not alone the target of these aggressive tactics.

66-percent of consumers surveyed online believe marketing strategies on mortgage loans are "not credible.” And, of the 2,383 poll respondents, only 34-percent found the marketing strategies “credible," while 22-percent called them "not credible at all."

Predictions for Online Real Estate 2006

Get the insider track on 2006
....online real estate marketing predictions

Happy New Year! everyone. I just posted my predictions for the new year. Check it out.