My New Blog

What a great time I had last Thursday and Friday. I spent both days working with the Rhode Island Association of Realtors building a House in a Box with Habitat for Humanity. For those who did not see these on the Today Show right after Hurricane Katrina, let me explain.

A group raises around $70,000 to sponsor a house for the Gulf Coast, than builds and erect the framing in panel format at their location, the "go up" part, than they disassemble it, the "and down" part and load it into a tractor trailer for shipment to it final building spot.

The National Association of Realtors is working with over 50 local Realtor Boards to build homes.

You can see photos of the build that I participated on in Washington DC a while ago, when we built 51 homes in 4 days, by clicking on the Habitat  and Build on the Mall button on my home page or by visiting the Habitat Operation Home Delivery site.

As the Production Supervisor for South County Habitat for Humanity, I spend most Saturdays leading our volunteers in the building of future homes. Because of that experience and having worked to other House in a Box projects, I was chosen as the Supervisor for this project. It was pretty fun, amazing and a little stressful working along side my fellow Realtors, a group of people who know more about homes than the average fellow.

Also got to celebrate my 50th Birthday on Sunday.. glad at least my age keeps going up, the other option isn't so good.

After helping Nancy organize 3 rooms in the house on Saturday morning, she meationed to me that maybe it was time to start working on the "other" end of the house. Well, that got me so excited, I asked what she meant, and she told me maybe we should remove the wall between the kitchen and dining room.

That was enough permission for me, and by 2:00 most of the wall was gone. After a little fancy work to move some electric, I started the finish work, and by Sunday, we had a whole new look and feel to our kitchen.

God, I love my wife. She is the best.

I was interviewed by the Providence Journal for an article on the amount of Real Estate agents in Rhode Island. I guess being a blabber mouth helps, because the article was almost all me.

Here is the link to read it.

www.danmarantz.com/agentsfight

www.projohomes.com

As I sit writing this, it is cold, raining hard and just plain dreary. But it is a great day! One of my clients closed on a brand new condo in Westerly today, a place for mom and dad to live and be close to their grandchildren.

Habitat also just signed a contract to have the roofing done on the new duplex on Pierce Street, which means we have a shot at finishing on time. As the production supervisor, I am told when our scheduled closing should be , and than it is my job to get it done. Like everything else I do, I view a deadline as a deadline, and will do whatever it takes to make it.

Also just heard from a friend from high school who just moved into a new home in California, close to his daughters, and started a new business which is progressing quite well.

Oh, and by the way, I'm still trilled to be married to my wife (27 years), and to be blessed with 2 great sons, and 2 future daughter-in-laws that they love.

In March 2007, for Westerly, Richmond, Hopkinton,South Kingstown, Narragansett and Charlestown, the following information was taken from the Rhode Island MLS System

117 New Listings for single family and condos

28 new listings for Commercial and vacant land

53 properties had price changes

100 properties were sold

86 properties are pending sale

9 properties came back onto the market

86 properties were withdrawn form MLS

69 Listings expired

Compared to February, more properties are being listed, there are less sales pending by about the same amount that solds increased. I think that this shows some real opportunities for both buyers, lots of inventory, and sellers, because buyers are actually seeing that there is true value in the properties listed, not just shoot for the moon list prices.