Previous Home Owners Leave Valuables Behind

I visited my "Texas Mom" this week and had an interesting experience with a family friend and neighbor, Jeannee Fletcher who has a cleaning business. She cleans homes for resale. Very frequently, she finds valuables that have been left behind. Some new, some old. There was a large drawing in the corner of the office area where we were having a conversation. She mentioned to us that this large drawing had been sitting there at my Mom's home because they were going to do some research to get more information about it.

This drawing was important to them not just because it was beautiful and so detailed, but because there are significant details that had to have been true: the man in the drawing had on a military uniform; his name was inscribed, and on the back of the frame is another man's name and his social security number!

I was immediately intrigued so I Googled the information in several ways and in 10 minutes, I was able to find out the name of the man in the drawing, his date of birth and death and his mother's name. I was also privileged to find the name of the artist! We called the artist, Bonnie Shields after finding her website, www.wildhorsebooks.com and had a wonderful conversation with her. She had the original drawing and sold reprints at Cracker Barrel. At the time, about 1981, she lived in Spring Field, Tennessee and hired Mr. John H. Wells as a Furrier for her mules. We asked Ms. Shields, why mules?...she said that when she was a child, one day she literally bumped into a mule and fell in love with them. Currently, Bonnie Shields lives in Idaho and has a series of children's books, Jasper the Mule. You can visit this wonderful children's website at www.jasperthemule.com/homepage.html . Ms. Shields is also a Western Humor Card Artist for Leaning Tree.

After speaking with Ms. Shields, I thought about how amazing it is that the previous owners of this home left this picture on the wall. Were they the original owners? Did they forget it, or did they just not find value in it? No matter the answer, there is history here that brought people together, even for a small amount of time. Ms. Shields was able to get recognition of her amazing work and we had an opportunity to benefit from someone who did not know us and took the time to feed our curiosity.

John H. Wells was born on November 14th, 1918. He served in the United States Army in World War II and died on July 5th, 1989. His mother's name was Maria G. Wells who died in 1931. Mr. Wells worked for Ms. Bonnie Shields as a furrier for her mules for years before she moved to Montana. Mr. Wells died on June 5th, 1989.

Keeping up with computer passwords

In many of the classes I teach, students are required to have a username and password to access their online accounts. Imagine 12 out of 15 students at the beginning of class not knowing their usernames, password or account email address at the beginning of a 3 hour intense technology class.

So what do you have to do in a situation like this? Each student needs to select the ‘Forgot Your Password’ link and have an email sent to the email address on record to reset the password.

It gets really complicated if the student does not know the email address on record, the password to their email address to access it on the web, or how to access their email on the web! They complain that their computer knows the password and they never have to enter it.

This is frustrating not only for the technology coach but also for the student – not to mention the amount of valuable time that is lost.

Keeping up with computer passwords is not a hard thing to do. You just have to stop procrastinating and assuming that ‘everything is taken care of for you’ when signing up for a service – that nothing will happen in the future that will require you have to use another computer – it’s so convenient just to select the ‘Remember Passwords’ button…

Here is a list of ways that you can keep up with online accounts effectively.

Keep a Journal: Buy a journal. One that you will be able to find easily. Get one that has a pretty cover – you’ll have it for a long time. I believe that this is the best way to keep passwords. When placed in a safe and secure place, you can gain access to it without depending on a computer. Below you will see that I’ve given you a process how to not only create complicated passwords but how to remember them.

Purchase software for your laptop or smartphone: You can install affordable software on your computer that will log your passwords so that you don’t have to reenter passwords in accounts.

www.handypassword.com is one place to consider. You can keep passwords online and locally on your computer.

www.cp-lab.com provides several ways to keep encrypted password information.

www.securesafepro.com provides templates for passwords

Generating Passwords: http://strongpasswordgenerator.com/ will help you to create passwords and also provides a guideline.

In the long run, it’s all up to you how you manage your passwords. The more organized you are, the easier it will be for you when they are needed.

AVATARIZE YOURSELF

Drive Business To Your Website with Blogging

It is still necessary to have an updated website that reflects your real estate business. There should be only a few pages within your business website that changes infrequently - your contact information for one. Resources on available properties must always be up to date; testimonials grow; real estate statistics fluctuate; neighborhoods and subdivisions develop; entertainment events consistently change. Usually, these types of information come from another source. Your voice also needs to be heard.

Blogging - your brain online, provides you with an opportunity to share your thoughts with the world. The great thing about blogging is that all it takes is a thought. That's the seed. You talk to people every day, whether you are with a client, a prospect, your children of any age, family, neighbors, colleagues, volunteers, strangers in a department store. The cashier. You are involved in many daily tasks. Some you absolutely love - some you don't. What do you think of these tasks? Tell us. Some of us agree, some of us disagree and like to know that there are others out there that understand. Do you like to golf? What about books, do you like to read? Any thoughts about a book that you've read? Are you a master gardener, or a cook? There is a lot for us learn about subjects that we are not familiar with and would like to learn more about - from your point of view. Each subject is called a post. A history of your posts are archived and ready to be found.

I've suffered almost all my life with cluster headaches. I've only met one other person that experiences this type of agony. I wish I had an opportunity in my youth to be able to search for 'cluster headaches' in a search engine and get results from real people that experience this awful, frequent, debilitating pain. Now, I can and I do. I Google "blogs: cluster headaches" and get real people's blogs that I can relate to.

Blogging is your brain online in every day language and expression. Write about real estate, and anything else that you wish. Search engines love blogs because they are frequent. Link your website to an external blog account or use one that is built into your website. Use the tools that promote your blog; comments, sharing with other social networks, linking to other sites; inviting visitors to join your blog account for instant notification on new posts. Add videos. Make them personal videos - vlogs! They don't have to be perfect. As a matter of fact, raw, authentic, spontaneous, organic videos are the best!

HAR members already have blog accounts ready to be used. http://blogs.har.com gives you a good understanding of its great advantage. Log in at HAR and select the blog link under "my". You can also create a free online account for posting at sites such as this one - www.blogger.com - a Google product that is very easy to learn and flexible with room to grow with your editing skills. Start with just writing your blog post. Add a subject that is easy to find based on the subject of your blog post (for example, if you're going to write about growing roses in Texas, name your post "Growing Roses in Texas") Then, add a video that you've uploaded to your YouTube account simply by copying and pasting the HTML code from the uploaded video. Walk around your rose garden and explain on video how you grew your roses...what type of nutrients you used (don't ask me...I can't keep plastic plants alive!)

Oh...and have fun!

Google Wave for REALTORS, REALTOR Associations, and the Real Estate Industry

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Google Wave for REALTORS, REALTOR Associations, and the Real Estate Industry

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Get Royalty Free Music For Your Business

Royalty Free Music.com offers a comprehensive music library of production music for your various royalty free music needs including full albums, tracks and free music clips, loops, and beats available for download.

Desiree speaks at the AAREA in November, 2009

Asian American Real Estate Association Luncheon – Houston
By Wanda Gillis

The Asian American Real Estate Association Luncheon (AAREA) was held on Wednesday, November 18, 2009 with Desiree W. Savory, of Technography Solutions as featured speaker. The AAREA luncheon was sponsored by Cathay Bank and Trendmaker Development Company

Desiree. Savory offers online and onsite software coaching geared specifically for Real Estate professionals. Ms. Savory provided valuable information concerning how the latest technologies not only enhance businesses but also greatly increase visibility by virtue of its huge popularity and ever-increasing user base. Ms. Savory believes that technology, contact management, and marketing are important to the success of any business. Through a series of coaching sessions and trainings, she is able to offer the Real Estate Agent an opportunity to have a personal learning experience via a personal learning plan, the right contact management software, and marketing strategy unique to their business—plans that fits their learning style and technology that fit their budgets.

Ms. Savory emphasized the importance of being in step with and utilizing the latest social networking tools as a means of engaging your targeted audience in general as well as, real estate clients in particular. She states the use of Twitter, Flickr, Google forums, and Facebook can all be employed when advertising-- whether it is a home for sale, or an Open House event. There is freedom and control with these media sources. Generally, there is no need to have separate personal and professional accounts with Facebook, for example, says Savory, since Facebook is easily customizable and controls are easily changed. With the choice to connect to individuals or not left completely to the discretion of the user, there is remarkable freedom with its use.

Ms. Savory stated further these online media serve as the biggest shift in communication since the Industrial Revolution; therefore, it is best that business owners today make the transition to be in step with it. Some interesting facts were shared concerning the astronomical growth of social networking media. For example, Facebook reached 100 million people within only 9 months; The IPOD application received 1 billion hits within 9 months. The fastest growing age group of users of social networking media is age 55-65 years, and individuals born after 1990 consider email passé,--the old way to communicate. Ms. Savory encouraged the audience to be open to new and fast ways of communicating to enhance their businesses through gradual transition: “Don’t be afraid, take small steps at the beginning”. For more information about services offered to assist you in making an educated decision about how to plan your business and make use of the right technology, Ms. Savory offers her services at BigMamaRealEstate.com.

Social Media Statistics

HAR's Social Media Pro Designation

Google is creating an operating system