dalparadise

I called balderdash (not my first word choice) because we had more showings and at least two offers after his contract expired when we relisted with a new agent.

Mrs. Chang's track record speaks for itself. I am confident she can get it sold, it's just going to take some time.

Not to defend the peckerhead, but relisting the house did have the effect of putting it in the "new listings" category on the report that other Realtors pull for their clients. That's why all houses have a hot period early in their listing that drops off gradually.

That said, a thorough price analysis and expert pricing strategy upfront could have saved you a lot of time and possibly earned you some money. Your attitude is exactly right -- every house will sell at the right price and the right time. I don't do real estate anymore, but when I did, I intuitively understood this. Plus, I was mentored by a very good Realtor. I used to approach my listings with a 30-60-90 day strategy -- giving pricing strategy that I expected would move the house in various timeframes, based on comps and recent sales and their time on the market. After 90 days a listing is pretty stale and the only showings you get are low-ballers and tire-kickers.

Granted, I did real estate in a much better market than today. The fundamentals should be somewhat similar, though. there are still buyers in your price range. The key is timing and strategy for reaching them. Good luck.

What about Burj Dubai?

Time to get a new fluffy bunny....unless you're asking too much.

You're hilarious. The link is to an HAR listing. So, either the poster is a Realtor or (s)he is represented by one.

Too bad, I guess you had been waiting to show how clever you could be with that tired old line for weeks.

And they'll never come back. HD-2 and HD-3 stations aren't real radio -- they're automated jukeboxes. You might as well listen to an iPod. There isn't one station in America running a full staff of jocks on their secondary or tertiary signals. In fact, it was only last month that WHTZ-HD-2 in Newark, New Jersey (New York market) sold the very first commercial on an HD-2 station in America (to Verizon). It was a big deal in the trades.

If only one station is running only one ad, how many DJs do you think that pays for? I'm guessing zero. And we're back to the iPod again.

HD radio won't be a success until the radio companies take the secondary channels seriously. But since most don't even take the primary channels seriously, I have little hope.

Absolutely. HD Radio is the AM Stereo of this era. Remember how well AM Stereo went over? Didn't think so.

Otherwise, it is another hotel in downtown H-town that will allow convention-goers a place to stay at far more reasonable rates than Hyatt or Hilton or Four Seasons, etc..... Please point me to the posts that "tout" this with the Victory W hotel inDallas. Thank you.

That's all I said in my original post-- that it would offer affordable rooms to conventioners and not much else. No big deal really.

I think you misunderstood my post about the Dallas thing. I surely didn't want to get involved in that, which is why I also won't try to drag up the HP vs. Victory nonsense. But, in that childish argument, I remember someone comparing the developments and paralleling the La Quinta (and the rest of the developments) to the Victory development, which really did seem silly and added fuel to that childish fire.

I do not wish to play in that, else I would have gotten involved before that thread was locked.

BTW -- My name on here is not meant to be ironic or oxymoronic or to have anything to do with Dallas at all. It's a play on Sal Paradise, Jack Kerouac's protagonist in On the Road -- just FYI.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sal_Paradise

Wow. Just wow. The Chronicle is reporting that there were 74 foreclosures out of 76 units were foreclosed in 2007 alone. Perhaps HCAD hasn't kept up with all the ownership changes. That's a mind blowing figure. People really are voting with their feet.

Chronicle forclosure data: http://www.chron.com/business/2007_foreclosures.html

bpe3

It's still shocking, but there is a disclaimer on the foreclosure map that states those are foreclosures on mortgages, not units. Some, if not all of the units were, no doubt, financed with two mortgages, which would register two foreclosures on a single unit.

Still pretty dismal, though.

I tuned in to the stunting mix for about 15 minutes in my car, then I listened at 3:00 for the change. Both really reinforced my decision to get XM several years ago. This "new" format of theirs sucks worse that the Yanni mix they used to play. I didn't think that was possible.

I call this one more nail in the coffin of terrestrial radio in Houston.

Most here would probably say that I am. I wasn't bragging, though. I was just pointing out that it's a little odd to care about a La Quinta opening in your town. I don't think locals use hotels like this, aside from putting up family over the holidays or something like that. Who would go to a La Quinta in his own town? Would you eat at the restaurant? Drink at the bar? Stay in a room for a weekend?

I'd be interested in a cool new hotel that offered something for locals. This one will never see any Houstonians who don't work there in low-paying jobs.

In other posts, people were touting this opening as proof that our Downtown revitalization was on-par with Victory in Dallas, where the W opened. I found that odd.

Nothing wrong with that. When buying our first home, my wife and I looked at about 50. Our Realtor was comfortable with investing that much time in us because she was smart enough to have us sign an exclusive Buyers Representation Agreement, and to have us get pre approved for a loan. In other words, she was a Professional.

CyKat

I also had Buyer's Rep agreements and pre-approvals for all my buyers. I never asked any of them for a retainer, though. I do recall one buyer client who asked to be released from my BRA, when he found a house and cut a side deal with the seller. Rather than fight him or be a jerk about it, I just let him out of it and moved on. I had as much business in that year as I could handle and I was most concerned with doing a good job for people. Was I less of a professional for that?

for the record, I never suggested "giving SWA a pass" if it was an oversight. I did suggest that judging them in the media and amongst our Internet forum, before the facts were in was unfair.

That said, I don't understand the language "falsely accepted".

I do understand the Dallas paper's report to say that SWA flew aircraft they knew were in violation of the ADs listed. That's bad.

Had it been an oversight and they had caught the error and self-reported -- okay, fine them an amount to send a message that sticks. The fact that they are now being shown to be dishonest and reckless with people's lives tells me they can't be trusted to self-regulate. If the FAA lacks the teeth to do some serious punitive damage to SWA, perhaps this bad PR will do the job.

I can't believe they'd be so stupid to do something like this. It's just as I said earlier -- sooner or later, a mechanic or someone with an FAA certification was going to realize that this company policy was putting his hard-earned and expensive certificate in jeopardy and blow the whistle.

So, you are saying that you wouldn't be reasonable and accept 2% instead of 2.5% to appease a realtor who was obviously an idiot, and didn't know how to read a listing ? Sounds like YOU risked losing a buyer for your client instead of him losing a house for his client.

Why would I be interested in appeasing that Realtor? He had already submitted an offer on his client's behalf. The commission amount was clearly listed in the agreement. He had no recourse to rescind that offer. To do so would betray his client's interests. Why would I re-negotiate my commission after his offer was already submitted on my terms? Because he didn't read the listing?

You sell cars, right? After the deal's signed by both parties, is it common practice to re-negotiate your commission because your sales manager decides he wants a bigger piece of the action?

For what it's worth, I was passing the 1% entirely on to my client who was forced to sell in a position of very little equity in a neighborhood where he was overpriced. We reduced his asking price by that amount and got a buyer for him in a quick turnaround, allowing him to move out of state without any worries. I was trying to cut the guy a break. If it had taken my scaling back to 2% to get the thing sold and still offer 3% to the buyers agent, yeah, I would have done that. We decided to test that 2.5% split first, though.

He really seemed to appreciate the work I was doing for him and was even apologetic about asking me to reduce my commission. when I presented him with the 2.5% per side idea, he said it sounded like a great idea.

What are you looking for here?

One more thing: I was only a Realtor for about a year, while my industry (advertising) recovered. I sold 9 houses (4 as listing agent) and did quite well at it. I only discounted my commission that one time, for the reasons listed. I did do other things, like help clients fix rotten wood on their garages and re-do flowerbeds to help get houses ready to sell. Bottom line -- my responsibility was to that seller. I figured out a way to get his deal done quickly. I took care of my client and he was grateful.

And another thing -- had the buyer been forced to cover that 1/2% because of her Realtor's incompetence and I had found out about it, I would have gladly dropped my commission to 2%. I wasn't trying to put anything over on anyone. I worked harder at that job than anybody else I knew in my office. I was really trying to do a good job, because I didn't know how long it would take to get another job in advertising.

As we all learned in flight school it's the "Human Factor". The relationship between man and machine in flight also translates to back office operations.

A&Ps "are only human".

Agreed, but A&Ps, not actually the FAA, are the the public's only line of defense in this instance. They put their certification on the line when they sign off an inspection. the FAA regulations depend on them to be enforced. In my mind, they're held to an incredibly high standard. Still human, but high.

The more of this story that comes out, the more I'm swayed to the idea that someone's being dishonest here.

I'm guessing you're looking at "For Sale By Owner" properties or a lot of foreclosures if your Realtor wants a retainer. Either that, or (s)he doubts your qualifications to buy and wants to secure some kind of payment if a deal falls through because you cant get a loan.

In a standard transaction between two Realtors, the commission will be paid by the seller. The rate may not be the 3% your Realtor wants, but that information is plainly disclosed in the seller's agreement. So, if (s)he doesn't read it when you're researching the property, too bad.

As a former Realtor, I once sold a home (listing agent) on which I had only listed 5% commission -- 2.5% per side. I got an offer from an older Realtor representing a first-time buyer who loved the property and put in a full-price bid to lock it down. When I corrected the old guy's expected commission (he had expected 3% and we were well into the deal at this point) he accused me of being unscrupulous and said, "if I had seen that earlier, I never would have brought my client to you."

That's sad, but true. The only way I was able to get the listing price where it would sell quickly, was to reduce mine and the buyer's agent's commission. This put the home squarely into this first-time buyer's price range, which she eagerly bought. For 1/2% this other crotchety Realtor was willing to keep this home from his client, who loved it so much, she didn't even want to haggle on the price.

Talk about unscrupulous.

If you can't see a hole in the plane, it doesn't exist, right?

Actually, if these new allegations hold up, it crosses the line into the scenario I portrayed as crazy for Southwest to attempt, because there was no way to get away with it. And thus, they got caught.

I can only assume the person(s) who made the decision to keep flying the planes after they were found to be in violation of the ADs had little experience dealing with the FAA and thought it really wasn't that big of a deal. It was a very big deal. Nobody familiar with FAA regs or how that agency deals with non-compliance would take such a risk. This is the kind of thing that could cost them their brand name, once it's all done.

I'm just a lowly private pilot. I invested $6000-$7000 into obtaining my certificate and hate to think of giving the FAA a reason to take it away. Can you imagine what kind of idiocy it takes for SWA to risk the $billions in their operation over something like this? Even if they're just held to the $10 million, or a portion thereof, that's a serious case of stupidity.

I've gotten up in the air and realized I had forgotten to set my transponder to "altitude," which allows ATC to know my altitude on their radar screens. Though this is a very common occurrence, I was so afraid of an FAA call that I self-reported the incident. After doing a little reading on the subject, it turns out that this has happened so often that modern radar has been updated to handle the quirks of transponders' old technology, so there's really not a reason to turn them off of "altitude" in the vast majority of cases, as we're all instructed to do on the ground. It's safer just to leave it on and that is now the prevailing opinion. Well, my reporting, and that of thousands of others is leading to this safety measure becoming common practice. I've flown with my transponder properly set since.

That's how the system's supposed to work.

This sheds some new light on the subject:

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dw...b2e20a.html?npc

It's not looking good for Southwest now.

No question that non-compliance with an AD is a serious matter for an airline and the FAA has zero tolerance for it. I do think "intent" should play a role in assigning punishment, however. That said, would you rather fly a dishonest airline, or a negligent one?

I honestly don't think SWA is either, but do not wish to be an apologist for them. I don't really even particularly like them.

When I first read the story, it seemed as if the reporter was trying to chum the water with the word "unsafe" and to depict the scenario as the airline being dishonest. While that may actually be the case, it is not clear at this point. The reporting seemed a bit naive. Plus, it was provoking responses like "they put profits ahead of passenger safety" which is unfair without knowing the full story.

Like I said -- it may be the case, but if you really look at it, it seems like a real oversimplification of the situation and one that would not benefit the airline in the long run. They'd be crazy to do this. It would cost them millions in regard to their fleet over time and there is NO POSSIBLE WAY TO GET AWAY WITH IT. Anybody with any knowledge of how the FAA works would know this. That's why they self-reported.

Pilots do the same thing. FAA regulations are complicated and constantly changing. Pilots violate them all the time. There is a self-reporting Web site for describing your infraction when you do. If your infraction generates an investigation, you are generally let off easy if you self-reported. The goal is safety, not punishment. The system wants to create an atmosphere where a company like SWA will self-report, knowing it may cost them millions, in order to stay safe. It's worked very well for many years and is an effective check against unreasonable power imposed by the FAA and unsafe practices by the aviation community.

The FAA doesn't ground individual airplanes. They can ground an aircraft type for investigation into a crash, but when it comes to enforcement against individuals or companies, they can levy fines, suspend or pull certificates and that's about it. It's up to SWA to self-impose grounding and to self-police inspection regimens in order to stay in compliance.

And there's the issue. The FAA did not "permit" SWA to fly those airplanes without inspections. Whether SWA did so KNOWINGLY or not is exactly the question.

The ADs involved might have been two- or three-year inspections, not part of the annual. We don't know. So, if the inspection was a 36-month AD and the records mistakenly showed the planes had been inspected, that might explain how a plane could go 30 months out of date before it was caught.

SWAs entire fleet is 737s. They'd have no reason to make exceptions in their regimen for these few aircraft. Seems like an error, to me. It doesn't make it right, but it might shed some light on an honest mistake that's being portrayed as sinister by a reporter who doesn't seem to understand the meaning of "airworthy".

We agree almost completely. In your edit, you seem to come around to my point. SWA did not put their profits ahead of safety as you describe, because they CANNOT do so as you describe. Ultimately, breaking the cycle of inspections on those airplanes would render them useless. They could not perform repairs or upgrades without signoffs on their logs. Their entire staff of mechanics in airfields across the country would have to be in on the scam and be willing to put their certifications on the line every time they serviced the plane. This is not to mention the independent mechanics who serviced the plane.

This seems like a clerical error that was caught and SWA volunteered the info to protect their standing with the FAA. The FAA only ALLEGES purposeful wrongdoing. But you make it seem like SWA had some motive in passing on inspections to save money. It would cost them millions in ultimate loss of aircraft flying time because repairs couldn't be completed without current ADs and inspection compliance when a plane broke -- which happens very frequently. It would put them out of business if a part failed and the plane crashed. It's too easy to check the logs and see what the maintenance history is.

To imply they knowingly tried to get around FAA inspections is ludicrous. They screwed up, missed a date, closed the wrong books or something. It wasn't an effort to deceive. That just doesn't make sense.

The interior of the place is spectacular. The outside, not so much.

I think it'll help round out the convention schedule downtown, offering more budget accommodations to convention travelers. Other than that, I couldn't care less about this. It will affect me exactly zero. When I like to splurge on a weekend being a tourist in my own city, or spend New Year's Eve, or eat a great restaurant, I like posh hotels.

I'll never set foot in this place and don't care that it's coming here.

An aircraft that is not airworthy is not safe, by definition, and per FAA regulations cannot take to the air. Period.

No, an aircraft that is deemed not airworthy cannot LEGALLY take to the air, but is not necessarily unsafe. That's the only point I was making. Plenty of planes out there are out of annual inspection and not flying, but are perfectly safe.

I was not trying to condone SWA's shoddy maintenance record keeping. I was merely trying to temper what I believe was a reporter's misunderstanding of a definition.

Airplanes receive airworthiness certificates that DO NOT EXPIRE, with the provision that they are inspected regularly. The day after the last day of the month of its inspection, if the plane hasn't passed the inspection, it is no longer airworthy, or legal to fly. The safety of the plane to fly is not determined, absent that inspection.

Most likely this was a bookkeeping oversight, as there is nothing to gain by cutting corners with your FAA inspections. They'd either get caught in the following year's inspection, or when a part failed and they were sued after a crash, causing them to have to go out of business. Even if they just wanted to modify or update the planes in the next few months, they'd have to go to the log books with an inspector present, who would catch that the planes were out of inspection and be unable to do the work until they were brought up to speed. This would render their multi-million dollar aircraft useless.

They were not "caught with their pants down" trying to get around the FAA. They probably made an error in their airframe logs and missed pulling the planes in question out of service for their inspections. Yes, it was wrong. But, I still contend that the amount of maintenance attention an SWA plane receives just as a matter of course in protecting their $millions invested in their fleet is far greater than their obligatory FAA inspection would render.

In other words, if the plane surpassed its inspection date on August 31, 2007, it is highly unlikely that it was any less safe to fly on September 1, 2007 than it was on August 30, 2007. It's a matter of definitions and the FAA plays strictly by the book -- as they should.

That's no comfort. Without inspections there's no way to tell how safe or unsafe the planes are.

Agreed, and being lax with the FAA is never a good thing. However, the idea that SWA was flying planes that were "not airworthy" was the issue. By definition, that was true. By evaluation of the planes -- albeit in absence of said evaluation -- that wasn't the case...yet.

Keep in mind that the FAA doesn't inspect planes. Airframe and Engine inspectors inspect the planes -- just like the hundreds of ones SWA has on staff maintaining the fleet every day. The absence of an official inspection is not an indication of a plane not receiving maintenance to keep it airworthy. In fact, much, if not all of this could be a simple bookkeeping error, which in itself is still a violation, but not an indication the airplanes were unsafe, just that they were not airworthy.

The airplanes become "not airworthy" the day they go past their annual inspection without receiving it. It is not an indication of the safety of the aircraft to fly. It is an indication that SWA did not comply with its mandated inspection regimen. Whether that is an indication of the airline's approach to safety, per se, is debatable. Airliners' self-imposed maintenance regimens far exceed the requirements of the FAA. It's a matter of protecting their investment in multi-million-dollar aircraft and avoiding legal actions resulting from dead passengers. In other words, it's just good business.

Of course, FAA compliance is also good business. Without it, they can't fly.

Most planes in SWA's fleet are 15 years old or older and undergo the stresses of pressurization much more often than most carriers because their flights are relatively short. So, the FAA's inspections are probably more pertinent to SWA than to others and I would feel better if they stuck to their obligation to have their planes inspected. However, an oversight like this does not make me question their safety, so long as it does not become practice.

I think this is a case of the media not understanding the definition of "not airworthy".

I worry about developers who want to put up condo towers with units that start around $1,000,000, but don't know how to market themselves very well. Turnberry doesn't even seem to know the market into which they are coming.

Their tower does seem luxurious, but their materials are terrible.

Points:

Their ad in the Playbill for the Houston Ballet has a typo. They need to inspire confidence that they pay attention to details when asking for millions of dollars from potential customers.

The Flash presentation on the site inexplicably opens with a couple of shots of cattle -- hardly the image I associate with high-rise living in a major city -- but exactly the image I associate with someone's perception of this town who has never been here. That may be fine for marketing to out-of-towners who, perhaps, share this perception. But, what about Houstonians who might be in the market? Do you really want to give the impression you know nothing about this city?

They go to the "everything's bigger in Texas" tired old routine. Sigh.

They use stock photography from the 80s to show what kind of ladies might live here. Seriously, I think the one in the silver dress was Kelly LeBrock from the Weird Science days. There's also one by the pool, where the model is sneering at the pool boy as if to say, "leave the towels, you insignificant piece of feces." It's pretty amusing how hard it's trying to show pretentious luxury, while I think the shot was actually meant to be comical or ironic in nature.

In the location tab, they acknowledge Galleria I,II and III being just a block away, but fail to point out that Galleria IV is right across the street! They show Nordstrom as just some anonymous building right next door to the site. Does the marketing team know their own site? Is it stronger to represent your location as a 5-minute walk away from The Galleria (with entry via a not very pedestrian-friendly area across busy streets and through massive parking garages, by the way) or as having access to the street level entrance to Nordstrom right outside your front door?

Looking at the Flash presentation, I'd assume Turnberry Tower was Williams Tower. They say it is "rising to the sky" with a shot of Williams. They offer its location as prime, with a shot of Williams. They circle Williams Tower from the air. I understand the limitations using stock photography puts on creativity, but again, it makes Turnberry seem like they don't know what they're talking about.

They represent Uptown as the place for the ballet and symphony, calling it the city's premiere entertainment district. Well, I was in The Galleria Friday evening and went to the ballet. With traffic and a stop at the Pulse machine, plus parking downtown, I was able to make the curtain by just 10 minutes, leaving 55 minutes before. Again, I don't think Turnberry knows where they are. Great shopping, yes. Entertainment? Culture? Performing arts? That's a different neighborhood.

These seem like small gripes, I'll agree. But, together, they paint a picture of a developer that's out of touch with the location and stereotypical of his view of Houston. In the past, that hasn't been a good sign for the success of business of any kind in this town.

I'd recommend they spend some more time here, or at least hire some local marketing experts to help them get it right, before perception becomes reality.

I'd have to disagree. You'd think they could build a better design. It looks nothing more than a few boxes glued together. I mean, they couldn't have even put a pool on the huge expanse of roof. ugh.

INSIDE. Inside it's one of the nicest places in town. There's a Bellagio meets W quality to it that clearly makes it a Hilton flagship.