David Ormonde's Homes for Sale

If you think your day was a wreck, take a look at this!

Central Valley agents are fighting a battle that has been brewing for about five years now.  It is a battle between the way we used to do business and the way real estate business is done today.  Up until about the end of 2005 real estate was for the most part “business as usual” for thousands of real estate brokers and agents in and around the Central Valley of California.  Brokers used a variety of methods to recruit, hire, and train real estate agents.  Agents used a variety of methods to get listings and sell them to buyers, getting financing along the way from just about any source for just about any buyer.  As long as a buyer had some kind of income, credit, or assets; not necessarily any combination of the three. 

Today everything about real estate in the Central Valley has changed.  Brokers have lost thousands of agents, most of which were part time agents and agents who pretty much relied on the system to bring them business.   Recruiting agents in a business of lost opportunities has become even more challenging, and there is reduced incentive for talent from other industries.  Historically, real estate has always been particularly attractive to mothers with children and retirees because of the flexible hours. 

There is a bright spot currently in the industry for agents who can gear up for working with banks in foreclosures and pre-foreclosures (short sales).  It does take special training and different skill sets, but can be very lucrative for those who can adapt to the new rules of the game.  The foreclosure market is basically divided into two sub-markets; working directly for the banks in foreclosures, or working with homeowners prior to foreclosure to sell their house before it goes to foreclosure.   Both sub-markets require their own special and very different skill sets.