[ Useful News & Articles ]

Singapore Latest Launch Condo in 2012 – House Hunting

Pdf file for download – featuring the latest condo launches in Singapore for 2012.

Both “already launched” and “upcoming property launches” available – displayed on a single Singapore map (with MRT line) for easy viewing.

Also shows the number of units available, developer, location, tenure.

Download the pdf file here and stay tuned to Singapore latest condo launches 2012.

Photography Opportunities Galore @ Marina Bay Singapore

Lots of exciting events coming up at Marina Bay area – for “i Light Marina Bay 2012”

Event date from 9th March 2012 to 1st April 2012

See list of events

What’s happening?

1. Light walk trail
2. Free guided tours
3. Night carnival
4. Pets n the city
5. LED stilt walkers & twirlers, etc

Official website – http://www.ilightmarinabay.sg/home.html

And you thought Singapore’s a boring place???

Marina Bay Sands Skypark BASE Jump. Singapore 2012. from Snow R. Shai on Vimeo.

(pictorial guide) why you are having a hard time selling / renting out your property

(survey) 88 percent of buyers use the internet to find their home

A recently published data by National Association of Realtors® (NAR) in the US reported that to find their home,

• 88 percent use the internet,
• 87 percent use real estate agents,
• 55 percent yard signs,
• 45 percent attend open houses and
• 30 percent review print and newspaper ads.

And when buyers were asked where they first learned about the home they purchased,

• 40 percent said the internet,
• 35 percent from a real estate agent,
• 11 percent from a yard sign or open house,
• 6 percent from a friend or neighbour or relative,
• 2 percent from  print or newspaper and
• less than 1 percent from book or magazine.

91 percent of home buyers who used the internet to search for a home purchased through a real estate agent, as did 70 percent of non-internet users.

Home buyers thought the most important services that agents provided are helping find the right property and negotiating price and terms.

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Thinking of selling or renting your Singapore property? Engage a professional salesperson.

(article) Report on Singapore Estate Agents and Salespersons

- Source: Council for Estate Agencies

Note – % in chart has been rounded off

We recently did a tabulation of data retrieved from CEA website and found the following results to share with everyone

1. Approximately 90% of Agency (aka Estate Agents) have between 1 to 10 Salespersons
2. Slightly more than 7% have between 11 to 50 Salespersons
3. 2% have between 51 to 500 Salespersons
4. Less than 1% have more than 500 Salespersons

Out of the 90% majority (with 1 to 10 Salespersons), around half are single person operations (1 KEO).

A more detailed copy of Singapore Estate Agents & Salespersons Report 2012

• Which are the 10 agency with the most Salespersons?
• What’s the percentage of Salespersons in top 10 agency?
• How well is your agency ranked?

Singapore GDP grew 4.9% in 2011

2010 = 14.8%, 2011 = 4.9%, 2012 (forecast) = 1 to 3%

Manufacturing, Finance & Insurance grew the most.

Visitor arrivals expanded 13.1% and Consumer Price Index rose 5.2%.

- See Press Release from MTI

Based on the latest forecast for 2012, we see that the last time Singapore economy grew within the range of 1-3% was in 2008, followed by a -1.0% in 2009.

Prior to that, 2001 saw a -1.2% and 1998, -2.2%

Further back, in 1986, 1.3% and the year before, -0.6%

Now, how did the property prices perform in those years?

(for agents) getting yourself organised to improve productivity

How often do you find yourself spending time looking for a piece of paper, news article, note, that you misplaced somewhere? When you need it, you can’t find it.

Putting the correct items in the correct places is just a matter of good organisation skills.

For many people, organising and administrative work is a chore.

We all know the benefits of getting organised, but can never find the time to get down to doing it.

Perhaps, it’s because of a lack of time, perhaps it’s because of a lack of systems in place.

Now, here are some small and easy steps for you to try and get better organised.

(1) Allocate time for organising

You need to allocate a specific time for yourself to sit down and organise (or re-organise). Why? Because otherwise, you will never do it.

It doesn’t have to take up a lot of time and you will greatly appreciate the ease of finding back the items you need (especially when you need it urgently).

Everybody has 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. You don’t get a second more or less than everyone else.

Start by setting aside 30 minutes daily (just before lunch is good, so that you will stick to the schedule or go hungry) or two to three days of the work week to organise your items. During this period allocated for organising, do not engage in other activities such as emails, phones, etc. Focus on the task at hand, get it done, then forget about it and proceed to other things on your schedule.

(2) Have a system in place

There are many systems for getting organised. Some people use in-trays or folders to collect all incoming mails before sorting out. Others may like to file or throw straight away (but often get stumped when it’s neither).

Colour tabs and alpahbetical codes are also useful for easy identification and subsequent retrieval of the necessary information.

A recommended method is to consolidate all your mails / notes into a single “temporary holding area” and only clear them during the time period you allocated for organising.

This method allows you to concentrate on and finish the current tasks at hand faster and smoother (rather than having to alternate between several positions or think of several things at the same time).

You will realise that start to worry less about the “outstanding items” in your temporary holding area because you know where they are and that you will get to them very soon (during your allocated time for organising).

(3) Using the F.A.I.T.H system

FAITH – acronym for File (away), Act (now), In Progress (wait), Throw (dispose), Handover (pass it on).

During the time set aside for organising, for all the paperwork that you have, you can try out this FAITH system to “guide yourself” what to do with it.

If it’s relevant notes for a particular case, File it properly into the folder.

If it’s urgent, place it into your ACT NOW in tray (first), finish up the organising, then go on to ACT NOW folder and do what you have to do to get these items out of this tray. This tray SHOULD be kept as empty as possible.

In Progress tray (or folder) can be used to handle cases which have are not completed and you want the information close at hand. It should be a tray for office-based persons or a folder for those who are out of office most of the time.

Throw is pretty self-explanatory. Junk mails, unimportant emails, notes can all be thrown away.

Handover – there may be cases which you are working together as a team, so the information you have on hand might be useful to your teammates. The optimal method for this dissemination is to “scan and email”. This way, the information gets recorded electronically (in your own email) and multiple teammates can be informed at the same time.

(4) Maintain a daily schedule

Always have with you a schedule / appointment book. Or if you are the IT savvy type, learn how to optimise your PDAs and smartphones for organising your day. The day-week-month need to be organised in order to put the time to best use. If not, you will just find yourself being “dragged along” by things and events that don’t matter.

Many professionals these days are using smartphones (such as iphone) and also have a Gmail account. Having a Gmail account means you also have access to Google Calendars. Learn how you can synchronise information between iphone + google calendar, thus allowing you updated access to your schedule (both in front of a pc and also on the move).

The best time to schedule your upcoming day is the night before or evening before.

Allocate around 15 to 30 minutes to look through your organiser and see how your appointments are arranged and whether these appointments are placed optimally. Sometimes you can bring forward or postpone appointments if they are out of the way (saving you time in transit).

For instance, you were supposed to meet a client in the east for lunch and have a 2pm appointment with a vendor in the west before another 4pm (say document pick-up) in the north. You can check with your client to see if it’s convenient to meet somewhere central or west for lunch (he may actually prefer the change in location too). If the document pick-up is not urgent, you can delay it to another day or arrange for delivery via postal mail to you.

Having a weekly and monthly overview will help to gain a “birds eye view” of the appointments and schedules you have ahead and plan other activities alongside.

You will also probably want to have a separate TO-DO list. Yes, it should be kept separate from your schedule and not written into the schedule.

The TO-DO list will be those things that you WANT to do. Not HAVE to do. In case you haven’t realised, the “HAVE-TO-DOs” are already in your schedule. The WANT-TO are typically things that you find necessary and beneficial. So, if you want to learn a new course, attend a seminar, get in touch with some past clients, put these into the TO-DO list and while you look through your weekly and monthly schedules, allocate time-slots for the items in the TO-DO list. Make a remark in the schedule (date) to tell yourself you have blocked out time for this activity. Also, place a remark in your TO-DO item – indicating the date that you are going to do this particular activity. After a month or two, you will find yourself achieving many more things that you set out to accomplish and actually managing to complete the tasks (sense of satisfaction).

Remember – just 30 minutes a day or every two days of the work week for your work organisation and daily 30 minutes (after dinner, before bed) to plan for the next day and you will find yourself being much better at work and self-organisation.

(for agents) how to make your property photos more attractive?

Was contemplating between two titles

(1) How to make your property photos more attractive?

(2) How to take better photos for your property?

Number (1) seems more appropriate for this article

Interior photography has become quite a norm for most agents these days. Some may be using their mobile phone camera (STOP DOING THAT!), whilst others may have invested in a conventional digital camera (the smaller type) and a small group has started investing in better equipments (the DSLRs and lenses).

The discussion today will not touch on which type of camera is better or more suitable (because we find that the choice is clear).

So, for today, we will talk about how to “make” your photos more attractive.

In a sense, yes, it’s about the first step of taking the photos, but also slightly more than just that.

The interior photos should tell a story, evoke a sense of desire from the viewer and initiate a call to action. A few basic points to take note of.

(1) The property should be clean and tidy before the photo shoot – as simple as this may sound, it’s often easier said than done (especially for properties that have occupants). There’s always going to be personal belongings, trash, boxes, etc, lying all over the place. It’s advisable to inform the owners 1 week before the photoshoot and let them know what you need done, in order to achieve the best results (after all, the photos are supposed to attract viewers that translate into sales, so it’s really to their benefit (in monetary sense) if they clear things away.

(2) Time of photo shoot should be either early in the morning or just before sunset. The external (natural) lighting for these two periods of time are optimal for photography. A lot of photos have over-exposed window shots (outside of windows looking very bright), so these two periods of time will help reduce the over-exposure (in a way, balancing the lighting within the property and outside).

(3) Composition of the shot (aka framing the shot) is an important factor because this is basically how you tell the story.

Within each photo, you are trying to either show a lot, or draw focus on one thing. The shooting positions (high, low, left, right, straight on) will also affect the outcome and feel of the photo.

A high position is good as a “birds eye view / top-down plan view” type of photo, allowing the viewer to see the open complete layout.

A low position is good as a “as if you were there” type of photo, as it provides a sense of the interior as though the viewer is physically standing / sitting there. Adding to a low position, you can provide a feeling of depth by having foreground and background subjects.

Left / right skewed photos can help to give a spacious feel to the interior whilst a straight-on shot will  typically be your primary photo (the ONE featured photo) that attracts viewers to click into the webpage to see more.

(4) Having a tripod is very useful since interior photography is really considered “still photography” and there’s usually insufficient lighting within the property. You will want to allow for a low ISO (less noise), slower shutter speed (meaning – aperture opens up for longer period of time to let in more light) but not have blurry photos, so placing the camera on a tripod or alternative (chair, table, stool, etc) will prevent blur in your photos.

(5) For real estate agents, most will go for wide (or far shots) so as to cover as much of the room space as possible. It may also be good to collect a number of near shots for emphasis on particular interesting key subjects (brands, appliances, points, flooring finish, etc). Since it’s digital these days, it’s free anyway.

Are we facing the same problems as the US? (listing syndication)

Are Singapore real estate agents & agencies also facing similar problems? Have the syndications actually helped or worsened the sales results and leads generation?

In Singapore, we do have some similar MLS syndications as well. Should more be done about these?

Potential buyers and tenants are browsing through so much repeated listings online that it’s difficult to find the real listing agent anymore. Maybe there should be a sign / award / logo – given only to the original listing agent(s), and that can help consumers to differentiate between the “originals” and the “re-posters”.

Just fyi, yes … our property listings are originals =)

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