Kitchener, ON - Blog

Downtown Kitchener re-development win National Award.

dieter.turek@century21.ca — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 00:00:00 GMT

http://www.therecord.com/news/local/article/632633--king-street-reconstruction-earns-national-award

Realogy relocates

dieter.turek@century21.ca — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 00:00:00 GMT

Realogy Announces Future Headquarters Location

Residential Real Estate Leader to Relocate to an Environmentally Efficient Facility in Madison, New Jersey, by Early 2013

Press Release: Realogy Corporation – 37 minutes ago

MADISON, NJ--(Marketwire -11/28/11)- Realogy Corporation, a leading provider of real estate and relocation services, today announced its plans to move its corporate headquarters to a new facility currently under development at 175 Park Avenue in Madison, N.J. The move is expected to occur during late 2012 or early 2013. The new location is less than seven miles away from Realogy's current headquarters in Parsippany.

"We are pleased to make this long-term commitment to stay in New Jersey, and we thank Gov. Christie, Lt. Gov. Guadagno and their administration for accommodating our long-term needs," said Richard A. Smith, president and CEO of Realogy. "Madison is going to be a terrific headquarters location for us, and 175 Park Avenue is very near to the geographic epicenter of our employee population. Most important, on an annual basis the base rent for the new facility will cost us about 25% less than our current facility, and the new headquarters will better serve our short- and long-term facility needs."

The new facility will house all current Realogy corporate headquarters location employees, including the Realogy Franchise Group and its leading franchise brands -- Better Homes and Gardens® Real Estate, CENTURY 21®, Coldwell Banker®, Coldwell Banker Commercial®, ERA® and Sotheby's International Realty® -- along with the home office of Realogy's brokerage subsidiary, NRT, as well as NRT's Eastern Seaboard Support Center and its local brokerage, Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in New Jersey and Rockland County, N.Y.

Recently ranked No. 2 on the NJBIZ Top 100 List of Private Employers in New Jersey, Realogy had considered several other relocation options, including out of state. Smith said that business incentives from the New Jersey Economic Development Authority, along with the New Jersey Business Action Center's efforts, were a significant factor in Realogy's decision to remain in state.

"Since taking office, retaining and attracting top-quality businesses to the state of New Jersey has been a key part of our administration's pro-growth agenda," said Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, who oversees economic development efforts for the Christie Administration. "We are pleased that Realogy has made a commitment to keep more than 950 jobs at its new headquarters and other locations throughout the State. This sends a strong message that the New Jersey comeback has begun."

Realogy, which signed a 17-year lease, will be the sole tenant at 175 Park Avenue. The existing structure on the 15-acre site is currently being transformed into a 270,000 square foot state-of-the-art facility by The Hampshire Companies of Morristown, N.J.

The 175 Park Avenue facility will be LEED Silver Certified by the U.S. Green Building Council. The LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) designation is an internationally recognized green building certification system providing third-party verification that a building was designed and built to minimize environmental impact. Realogy's new headquarters will incorporate cutting-edge, green roof technology and state-of-the-art mechanical systems. The new Realogy headquarters building is centrally located in Morris County near the intersections of Interstate 287 and Routes 24 and 124, and approximately one mile from the NJ Transit train station in Madison.

Realogy was represented in this transaction by Global Client Solutions LLC, a Realogy subsidiary that leverages the Company's worldwide commercial resources to achieve client goals through a broad range of corporate real estate services.

About Realogy Corporation
Realogy Corporation, a global provider of real estate and relocation services, has a diversified business model that includes real estate franchising, brokerage, relocation and title services. Realogy's brands and business units include Better Homes and Gardens® Real Estate, CENTURY 21®, Coldwell Banker®, Coldwell Banker Commercial®, The Corcoran Group®, ERA®, Sotheby's International Realty®, NRT LLC, Cartus and Title Resource Group. Collectively, Realogy's franchise system members operate approximately 14,300 offices with 253,000 sales associates doing business in 100 countries and territories around the world. Realogy is owned by affiliates of Apollo Management, L.P., a subsidiary of Apollo Global Management, LLC, a leading global alternative asset manager.

Contact:

Media
Mark Panus
(973) 407-7215
mark.panus@realogy.com

How to negotiate commissions with a Realtor

roy.singh@century21.ca — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 00:00:00 GMT

How much do you charge to sell a home? This is a common question that we receive from sellers looking to sell. However, this is a very poorly phrased question because this assumes that all real estate sales people do the same thing. This question really shows how ill informed the average sellers are concerning real estate and what Realtors do.

This confusion have partially be caused by for sale by owner companies (FSBO) as they make it seem simple to sell a home and that the sellers pocket the commissions that they would normally pay a broker and that there are no cost.

First of all there is a multitude of services offered by Realtors as well as commission plans but you need to find out what services are included with each to make an educated decision.

One of the reasons that sellers use Realtors is to be able to place their home on the Multiple Listing Service (MLS), this system is designed to share information and data on people selling and encourage cooperation between Realtors and increase exposure for the property. For example, when a Realtor list a home for sale and place it on the MLS system they generally offer a commission as an incentive to any other broker or agent to bring offers. This commission if up to the seller but many offers a 2.5% commission to the cooperating broker as an encouragement to bring their buyers.

Some people may offer nothing; however, a Realtor will not likely bring their buyers if there is nothing in it for them, unless of course their buyers are willing to pay them. Sellers then run the risk of not having as much activity and showings and this defeats the purpose of using the MLS system, in addition the cooperating commission goes to the buyer’s agent not the person listing.

So far the property has been placed on the MLS system and if it sells then the cooperating broker is paid but there is nothing in it for the listing sales person as of yet. So what exactly are you expecting of your listing agent, are you just wanting your agent to place your home on the MLS system and that is it or are you expecting that they will advertise the property, take the photo graphs, build a web site specific to the property, order a virtual tour, place a for sale sign, book all showing, create a feature sheet in full colour and do a few open houses?

For the most part when I list a property for sale, I incur about $1,500.00 in hard cost over a 90 day listing. Now the question is who pays for these hard costs? Well there are two ways to handle this, the seller could agree to pay upfront for this cost and then negotiate a fair compensation if the house sells. Or alternatively the seller could go on a contingency basis where they only pay if the house sells putting all the risk on the agent’s shoulders. So if their house does not sell they do not pay, which has traditionally been a very common approach to real estate. Generally speaking, in the second scenario most sellers would prefer to pay a higher percentage commission to their agent if the home sells as this transfer all their risk over to their agent.

Now instead of asking how much commission you charge and assume that all Realtors are the same, you need add and what services do you provide for this commission?

Merger of CENTURY 21 Watson and CENTURY 21 Home Realty

roy.singh@century21.ca — Wed, 01 Jun 2011 00:00:00 GMT

Press Release

June 1, 2011

LOCAL CENTURY 21 FRANCHISES MERGE

Tom Watson, Paul Saunders and Denise Dion of CENTURY 21 Watson Realty Ltd. and Roy Singh of CENTURY 21 Home Realty Inc. announced today that their two companies will merge effective June 15, 2011. All Sales Persons will continue to work from their respective offices in Waterloo, Guelph and Cambridge and will be known as CENTURY 21 Home Realty Inc. In announcing the merger, Mr. Watson stated that this will be a great opportunity due to the progressive programs the sales people will have at their disposal. The combined force of 85 salespeople will have a Guaranteed Sale program, in-house Mortgage Financing, Property Management and Wealth Management programs to help them meet and exceed the needs of their clients. Mr. Singh is looking forward to offering a number of new programs in the future that are in the planning and near implementation stages. In addition Mr. Paul Saunders will remain as Broker of Record of the Cambridge office.

CENTURY 21 continues to be the most progressive company and is leading the industry in terms of using the internet to service their clients. A recent search of Alexa.com shows that CENTURY 21 has the highest traffic count of any Real Estate Company in Canada and its website is the MOST VISITED web site in the real estate business in Canada. Both Singh and Watson look upon this fact as being a tremendous advantage to the sales people in being able to assist their clients with the sale of their homes.

Head office is located at 560 Parkside Drive, 519-570-4663 www.century21.ca/homerealty

Contact: Roy Singh Bus: 519-570-4663 Cell: 519-574-2123