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I listened to a conference call about 4th Quarter Home Values from Zillow Tuesday. Dr. Stan Humphries (”Zillow’s chief Zestimator” according to Spencer Rascoff at Zillow but the press release refers to Humphries as “Zillow vice president of data and analytics.”)  Humphries ran through a lot of numbers and a lot of slides (that I could not see during the conference call…) slides are on the Zillow site…

Zillow 4th Quarter Report

“Home Values Continued Decline in Fourth Quarter, Leaving Approximately One in Three New Homeowners With Negative Equity”

If you look at the national map…(on the Zillow site) there are colored diamonds to represent the increase and decrease in value for a market (MSA.) The red (mango) color is the highest appreciation in value and the darkest blue is the most depreciation in value.

On the national map, Central Ohio (Columbus) is a yellow diamond meaning the value is even. California and Florida communitues have the most markets with the values that have declined, lots of blue, deep, deep blue.

Zoom in closer and you can see Central Ohio cities, Delaware, Dublin, Gahanna, Galena, Powell, Sunbury, Upper Arlington, Westerville, Worthington…

The diamonds look like confetti to me… they are red (good, value up) to Navy (bad value down) on the map.

Mango the red of this spectrum Home Values are Up 9%+

Powell + 11.6%
Sunbury + 9.7%

Tangerine Home Values are Up 4% to 8%

Galena +4.3%
Delaware +5.5%
Westerville +4.9%

Squash (or maybe the color of orange juice if it is natural..) Home Values are Up 1% to 3%

Grove City + 2.3%

Yellow Home Values are Unchanged

Upper Arlington +.1
Worthington -.2
Gahanna -.8

Chartreuse Home Values are Down 1% to 2 %

Columbus -1.2%
Dublin - 1.7 %

Green Home Values are Down 5%-6%

New Albany -4.1%

Aqua Home Values are Down 7 to 9%

Turquoise* Home Values are Down 7% to 9%

Reynoldsburg - 7.1%

Blue Home Values are Down 10% to 12%

Bluer Home Values are Down 13% to 16%

Bluer than blud Home Values are Down 16-19%

The Deepest Darkest Navy Blue or is it Maybe Blue…maybe blue maybe black - Home Values are Down 20% +

The Zillow map shows Ostrander… but does not show Grandview Heights, Hilliard, Lewis Center… I don’t get that..

Not areas that I work… but on the map and possibly of interest to you…Hebron, Heath and Newark are in the green to aqua spectrum…. there is nothing real blue in Central Ohio… in the whole state.

I don’t know if I understood before listening to the conference call that the Zillow looks at ALL home values (not just closed sales… as most stats do.) Duh! Of course it does… that’s what Zillow is all about.

“The Zindex home value indicator is the median Zestimate valuation for a given geographic area on a given day, and includes the value of all homes, not just those that sold in a given period. Exactly half the Zestimates for a region are below this number, and half the Zestimates are above it. It is expressed in dollars and is for a particular geographic region.”

Previously on ColumbusBestBlog.com about Zillow:

Zillow values $8.5 - $9 million home at $1.5 million?

Real Living Loves Zillow…

I found this Trulia.com widget on a friend’s blog… MiOaklandCounty.com from Maureen Francis. Actually the widget the other Maureen created for her blog had to do with her market, Metro Detroit. She did a Trulia.com widget for communities in her market…

I wish I could make a Trulia.com widget with the a graph that compares a bunch of areas… it would be a lot of little lines on a graph…. I wish I could but I can’t. Trulia will only compare two areas (two neighborhoods, or two cities, or a city vs. a neighborhood.)

The Grandview Heights community on Trulia.com has always intrigued me. The widget shows Grandview Heights as a city of Columbus neighborhood and Grandview Heights as a city. Grandview Heights is a city. The ZIP code that Grandview Heights is in includes other cities.

All of our Real Living HER listings are advertised on Trulia.com but the properties on Trulia.com are not all the properties on the market.

You can use Trulia.com to look at homes in Grandview Heights (on the bottom of the widget.) Today (2-12-2008) Trulia.com has 10 Grandview Heights listings.  Trulia.com has 41 homes today listed as in the City of Columbus in the Grandview Heights neighborhood.  You can compare pricing and inventory on the widget.

Real Living HER’s (or most any local real estate brokerages) search should be more comprehensive than Trulia.com but I certainly like the Trulia.com widget…

Searching on the Real Living HER search on my website for Grandview Heights Homes:

Search Results - 15 Properties (City listed as GH)

Search Results - 18 Properties (City listed as G or GH)

Search Results - 148 Properties Found (ZIP code that GH is in)

Search Results - 58 Properties Found (searching for “Grandview” School District)

Search Results - 33 Properties Found (houses listed as Columbus for city with GH as school district)

Search Results - 30 Properties Found (listed as G or GH as the city and G as the school district.)

Search Results - No Properties Found (homes listed as G or GH in the Columbus School District.)

Grandview Heights

Grandview Heights City School District

Village of Marble Cliff (it’s in the Grandview Heights City School District too)

Real Living HER did a video about Grandview Heights and more. The “and more” in the video is the University area, Clintonville and I suppose Marble Cliff. To see the video or videos on other Central Ohio communities go to Watch

Ubuntu

I’d never heard the African word ‘ubuntu’ until reading Columbusite KairaSturdivant Rouda’s new book ‘Real You Incorporated’  The book is published by John Wiley & Son’s Inc.

Kaira’s  personal history as a business woman and entrepreneur is the basis of the story, but it is not all about her. Partly inspiration, partly a work book for creating a business of your own, partly the history of the Real Living brand (a real estate company), Real You Incorporated is in book stores now…

I got an email asking if I wanted to read the book Real You Incorporated by Kaira Sturdivant-Rouda about  five weeks ago. Kaira is the resident of Real Living, a real estate brokerage based out of Columbus Ohio. I am a real estate agent for Real Living HER, the Central Ohio division of Real Living. I responded via email saying “yes” I wanted to read the book and that I would review the book… on on of my Columbus blogs… duh! I’ve never reviewed a book and did not have a clue how to review a book.

Could I, would I say so if I did not like the book? Kaira is my bosses, bosses boss? Or something like that.

It was difficult for me to get into the book initially… Kaira is blonde, pretty, rich, smart, connected…she “has it all” and I am the kind of person who will think about that as I read. I admit as I read the book I would say to myself “Of course they hired her” as I read about Kaira’s early jobs in the advertising industry,  in public relations,  as a writer and as an executive with a national company.  The Real Living website says:

“Rouda is a magna cum laude graduate of Vanderbilt University and a graduate of Leadership Columbus. She resides in Columbus with her husband and their four children.”

Luckily I could get beyond my mindset and learn something about creation, branding and business in reading the unedited manuscript of ‘Real You Incorporated.’

Partly inspirational Kaira wrote about sixteen women entrepreneurs including some women entrepreneurs I knew of…

Judi Sheppard Missett of Jazzercise

Jeni Britton Bauer of Jeni’s Ice Cream

Tripti Kasal broker owner of Real Living Infinity in Chicago

Sue Doody of Lindey’s who has also written a book about her business

Barbara Fergus of Mid West Auto Group (MAG)

Other names I did not recognize but their stories inspired me like Kelley McBride Quinn… a pilates and yoga instructor who developed a program for girls to deal with “female relational aggression”… that’s “girl bullying.”

“Is this woman someone from Central Ohio?” kept going through my brain as I read about the women entrepreneurs that Kaira featured in ‘Real You Incorporated.’  Some are from Central Ohio, some are from other parts of the country.

‘Real You Incorporated is about empowering women.

The subtitle is ‘8 Essential of Women Entrepreneurs.’   There are also twenty-four life lessons… and the definition of ubuntu…

Out of the blue this week I had a question in my mailbox from an out of town real estate trainer / guru… about the branding of the brokerage I am affiliated with Real Living HER.

“What does the”HER” personify in the Real Living Brand?”

Personify from Merriam-Webster.com

” personify

Main Entry:

per·son·i·fy 

Function:

transitive verb

Inflected Form(s):

per·son·i·fied; per·son·i·fy·ing

Date:

circa 1741

1 : to conceive of or represent as a person or as having human qualities or powers

2 : to be the embodiment or personification of : incarnate <a teacher who personified patience> .”

Real estate is local….. Real Living HER is Real Living in Central Ohio.

HER is a person.  HER is a man, Harley E. Rouda Sr.  HER Realtors was the number one real estate company in Central Ohio for decades before Harley E. Rouda Jr and the Aveni family of Cleveland’s Realty One formed Real Living in 2002.  Real Living HER is the number one real estate brokerage in Central Ohio now. 

The history of Real Living HER says of the 1950’s:

“In central Ohio, an important event was under way, too. A visionary, Harley E. Rouda Sr., who embodied true American entrepreneurial spirit, ventured out into the burgeoning business scene to establish his own real estate company in 1956.

Rouda started HER Realtors in the basement of his home after working three years in the residential real estate industry. With a build-a-better-mousetrap drive and determination, he created a tried-and-true real estate model that has withstood the test of time.”

HER is pronounced H. E. R. not Her.

Local Real Estate brands…

King Thompson was a person…

The two biggest Century 21 offices in town bear the founders names…

Other Real Living brands franchise and company owned  across the US include:

Cleveland is Real Living Realty One

Some of the Dayton offices are known as Real Living Realty Services, others have

Colorado is Real Living Mountain Realty

Real Living NOW is in Connecticut

Real Living Premier is in Marion Ohio

Orlando Florida is Real Estate Solutions

Real Living Helios Realty is in Chicago Illinois

Real Living Southern Homes is in Tampa Florida

The Real Living logos have the Real Living name in a big circle and the local name in a small circle.  Real Living is based in Columbus (The Real Living logo does not have a local name… one big circle that says Real Living…. all of the brands above and more are Real Living.)

HER represents Harley E. Rouda Sr.  HER represents  his family, including his son Harley Rouda Jr. I am sure to people who have worked with agents from HER Realtors or Real Living HER the past 52 years HER personifies real estate in Central Ohio.

I just got memed again… “I am challenging you to post 7 interesting things about yourself. ” wrote Wayne Long of ColumbusHomeShow.com (Columbus Georgia) Donna and Wayne Long’s meme post:

7 Interesting Things about Donna and Wayne

Sorry Wayne and Donna, my 7 things may not be interesting… I am just doing a rerun of the meme post I did just Tuesday for Lola Audu of Grand Rapids Michigan…

Curses Memed Again a synopsis:

1. I was the office Mardi Gras Queen in 2006

2. I and good at games

3. I can’t play guitar

4. I don’t eat wheat… officially

5. I cheat and eat wheat…

6. I’ve lived in a number of spots in the mid-west previously.

7. A Rose by any other name…

There are links to most of the memes I’ve been tagged with on the post Tuesday.  There are links to the bloggers I tagged this time too. I tagged mostly Columbus bloggers …

I tagged Bonnie Erickson one of my first blogging buddies and she’s done her meme too…

What is a meme? Joseph Ferrara on Sellsius°Real Estate Blog defined meme:

“A meme (rhymes with dream) is a catch phrase representing a contagious idea that spreads virally in a culture, like transparency, Web 2.0, Long Tail or maybe unzillowable. The word comes from the Greek meaning “mimic”. In the blogosphere, it’s a game of topic tag. You answer the topic question and pass it on to others to do the same. “

Or say “thanks for thinking of me … but me and my blog are done with memes for a bit…”