Where Real Estate Gets Its Dirt

RIP Richard Simmons

While not the biggest news this past week the passing of Richard Simmons got me a bit nostalgic. I hired Richard Simmons to do a meet and greet at our booth at the 2004 NAR Annual Convention. This was on the heels of the NAR Annual Conference in 2003 where we had hired Fabio. But that’s another story. Fabio was a huge success and drew a huge crowd at the eNeighborhoods booth. So naturally we thought, let’s get another celebrity! After some brain-storming we settled on Richard Simmons. You can see page one of the agreement we did with the company repping him below and an ad we ran in REALTOR Magazine:

He was a lot of fun. I remember him calling our wives for a prank, “Hi Honey, guess who’s with your husband right now?!” He would also record voice mail greetings for our cell phones. “Hi this is Richard Simmons and you’ve reached Shane’s voice mail!”

Another thing I remember was how a lot of conference attendees came up and told stories about how he had motivated them to live a more healthy life. When I saw him having these conversations (sometimes he would pull them aside) you could see something in his eyes…he truly cared. Such a great legacy.

NYU bound

My son got accepted to NYU Film School. Jenn and I are extremely proud of him.

The above photo is a picture from a trip he took with his senior class in high school. He came back from that trip buzzing. He had many schools to choose from but in the end I wasn’t surprised when he chose New York City.

This week he started his adventure.

How will my heart work, when part of it is so far away?

Addresses in Japan

Japanese addresses: No street names. Block numbers.

“Mailing addresses in Japan, after naming the province and city, are a series of three numbers: district number, block number, building number. That’s how the building is found. No street names.”

Derek Sivers

I thought the nerdy readers of Vendor Alley would love this.

Like father like daughter

Did you know that Darian Woolley, daughter of my friend and co-founder Dan Woolley, just won 1st place 🏆 in Design at UCI‘s Spring Quarter Project teams!

I can’t tell you how much this brought a smile to my face. Go Darian!!

Darian is majoring in HCI Informatics at University of California Irvine (UCI). The team contest was to design an app in the Health category.

“To address the theme of Health, we designed Skintel to help users curate skin care routines and search for new products while being mindful of ingredient synergy: the way skincare ingredients work with or against each other 🧴🔍 ✅. “

Darian Woolley

Check out the video! It’s so good! 👏🥹

Trackxi adds integration with Earnnest

Trackxi partners with Earnnest

“This partnership underscores our commitment to innovation and excellence in simplifying earnest money deposits for real estate professionals and buyers. We’re crafting a new benchmark for simple, efficient transactions, with an unwavering focus on convenience.” 

– Russell Smith, President & COO, Earnnest

Great to see. Two of my favorite apps! Congrats Vijay and Russell!

Pro Tip: Order that ribeye steak

Your mileage may vary.

Delight

This is an example of what it means when your product “delights” your customers. h/t: Pomp

What a crazy week

I think this NAR Midyear will go down in the record books as one of the most memorable. For good reasons and bad. First off I want to thank everyone for showing up at the Omni Sunday night. It was a great to see everyone in one place, even though the sole bartender probably needed therapy afterwards (I tried calling to warn them but nobody picked up). And a HUGE thank you to RoomVu for picking up the tab for the first round. RoomVu CEO, Sam Mehrbod, flight got cancelled so he couldn’t make it that evening but I sure he would appreciate if you dropped him a line on LInkedIn. And it was great to have Jeff Young there to give such an heart felt toast to Kristen. Thank you Jeff.

There is so much else to cover but I’m exhausted.

Godspeed everyone.

Omni Lobby Bar – After Party – Update “First round is on us!”

I think with the news of Kristen’s passing is going to make this Sunday night at the Omni even more special.

So be there Sunday night (5/5/23) at the Omni Hotel’s Marquee Lounge. Anywhere from 9 PM to Midnight (last call). And we can raise a glass to Kristen in a place I know she would have loved to be, surrounded by her friends.

BIG UPDATE: The guys at RoomVu has generous offered to pick the tab for the “first round” so the sooner you get there the better opportunity it is to get a free drink! RoomVu is a pioneer in Video Marketing for agents. Sam Mehrbod, the co-founder of RoomVu, will be there so we will all get to thank him personally. Many thanks Sam!

Check out their site to learn more.

1000WATT’s Brand & Marketing Summit

I just wanted to make another plug for 1000WATT’s upcoming Brand & Marketing Summit. As many of you know Brian, Marc and their merry gang of creatives are legit. Having attended many of their other events I can assure you that you are in for a treat. But unlike other events this one feels like they are going to get even more strategic, and even more tactical in their agenda and content. Plus their speaker list is stacked!

Who should go? Well check out the website.

  • Executives and marketers in proptech, brokerage, franchising, mortgage, title, MLSs, and associations
  • Real estate team leaders
  • Solo agents who are eager to build market share
  • Brokerage and franchise leaders who want to lead their teams through a time of change with confidence
1000WATT

So buy a few tickets for you and your staff, mark your calendars, book the hotel rooms, buy the plane tickets and put your two stepping boots on and head to Gilleys in Dallas June 25th-June 27th.

Sponsored By Lone Wolf