Tag

Ross Kaplan

Jumbo Shrimp, Walking Dogs & Realtor-Bloggers

“It Might Not Be a Real Blog if . . .” Sign #27 It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.” –Samuel Johnson, about a dog’s walking on its hind legs. Realtors are under no obligation to blog.  Juggling multiple clients and transactions; showings (and showing instructions!); walk-thru...
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Fran Lebowitz Calls Out her Twitter Impersonators — and Jack Dorsey

Trusting Social Media, “Big Tech” to Police Itself. Not. Fran Lebowitz: I met [Twitter Founder Jack Dorsey], and I told him that [people were impersonating me on Twitter]. And I said, “you have to fix this because it’s not fair that someone pretends to be me, and people are talking to this person or tweeting...
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2020 Edina Realty Legends

Real estate sales is a field known for notoriously high turnover, and a brutal attrition rate: something like 90% of all new agents last less than two years. So, it really says something that nearly half of all Edina Realty agents and employees have been with the company for more than 10 years, qualifying them...
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Real Estate Marketing 101: When to Acknowledge a Home Needs Updating — & When Not To

Beauty in the Eye of the Beholder Buyer When should a listing agent (representing the Seller) explicitly acknowledge in their marketing that a home “needs cosmetic updates” (or the equivalent)? Less often than you might guess. Here are my three reasons why: One. The pictures tell the story. For years, websites like EdinaRealty.com have allowed...
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“Congress Should be Able to Work Remotely” (I said, almost 30(!) years ago)

“Better Late Than Never” Dept. “Congress, Come Home: Faxes Can Do the Talking on Capitol Hill”** –Ross Kaplan, Star Tribune Op-Ed page (1993). OK, so I got the part about faxes wrong: today’s technology, including Zoom, FaceTime, and streaming video, positively blows away fax machines. And, I didn’t anticipate the health and safety reason (i.e.,...
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Realtor Prayer 2020

Passing on Overpriced Listings Everyone knows this famous passage from The Serenity Prayer: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.” —Reinhold Niebuhr Here’s my version for listing agents (Realtors representing home sellers): “God, grant me...
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