Terra Incogito

Do you ask yourself sometimes, “What could they have been thinking?” Sometimes this happens when the other person is just in a different place. I recall a conversation I had with a friend who was a businessman, and another who was a whitewater river guide / college student. We were talking about how deforestation in […]

I am a member of a Facebook group of real estate agents. We talk about all sorts of stuff, and lately, there has been lots of talk about how most Millenials are renters rather than buyers. There are many reasons for this, but a big one is that they grew up during the housing crash […]

There are a few inexpensive things that we can do to make our homes look nice. Recently, I bought a set of landscape lights from Amazon. I got the cheaper ones. They are nice, they have four bulbs, and they use regular old incandescent lamps. The lamps look like this: These are bright, and they […]

Now that more of the rules of this Act have taken effect (January 10th, 2014 was the magic day), we all have questions about seller financing. Aside from the draconian rules implemented to damage the weak housing market further (see previous post) , some rules went into effect regarding seller financing of residential properties. I […]

I’ve been thinking a bit about all the ramifications of the recent revelations that Amazon and UPS are talking about “smart” drone package delivery to a consumer’s doorstep. Presumably, autonomous unmanned aircraft are not far behind. I love technology. Still, in thinking about these aircraft in densely urbanized locations, my head starts to spin. UAVs […]

Just a quick note, we will be teaching a couple of short (one hour) classes, one on the home buying process, one on the home selling process. We’ll also provide up-to-date market information for the Phoenix market. The home buyer class will answer questions like – – How do I know how much I can […]

Each year for the past few, I have had the privilege of supporting Tony Robbins’ event, Date With Destiny. And every year, I try to find words to describe what these events are about — and every year I fail. Are they about motivation? Not really. Are they huge money makers for Robbins? Yes, but […]

  I have previously written about a property I have been working on (for much too long), that involved a note purchase, then a foreclosure, then eviction of squatters. It has gotten even more interesting. When I evicted the squatters, they bought or somehow obtained a small camper, and they moved into it, along with […]

Most legislation is created to solve a problem; for example, if there are too many people drowning on a beach, then a law might be passed to increase the number of lifeguards, or the hours of operation might be restricted, or some other action taken to address the problem. Most legislation includes the problem, the […]