Following are stats, stories and comments found in national media that NAA members may find interesting, valuable or insightful.
More Homes Rented
USA Today reported that, based on U.S. Census Bureau data, 34.9 percent of occupied homes were rented in 2010 compared with 33.8 percent in 2000. Among the statistical highlights USA Today noted on May 31 were that 25 cities—including Baltimore, Minneapolis, Salt Lake City and Sacramento, Calif.—swung from having more than half homeowners in 2000 to majorities of renters in 2010. Reading, Pa., had renters in 57.6 percent of its occupied homes, up from 49 percent in 2000.
How Facebook Is Like Dial-Up AOL
Funny how Facebook is becoming more and more like the old, dial-up connection version of America Online (AOL) from the 1990s. This was the sentiment from Howard Tager of Tigerlead.com, a digital real estate marketing company, who spoke during the AIM Conference in May.
You remember (unless you are way too young): It seemed like everyone had an account. Everything you needed was right there: e-mail, stock quotes, news, sports scores. Millions of consumers were happy to pay $20 per month or more for this service. Perfect!
Eventually, unique and separate websites were built that enabled “free” e-mail. Niche sites were created with breaking news specific to sports, business, entertainment and anything under the sun. Not having to pay for it, consumers jumped all over the Internet—from website to website—to “read the latest.”
Now, Tager says, we’ve come full circle. Facebook is what AOL used to be. Everyone seemingly has a Facebook account. Everyone is logged in—practically 24-7. When Osama bin Laden was killed, Facebook delivered that message to millions. One other key difference, Tager says, is that AOL was all about AOL—what it was and what it does for you. Facebook is all about the user. Its customized pages differ based on what the individual consumer wants and needs.
Nonetheless, Facebook is what AOL was: a “walled garden” that offers everything to its users. Even better, it’s free! And everyone is trying to grow there. You just have to find out how.
Mining ‘Away’ Messages
Out-of-office e-mails can lead to new leads. One sales executive recently commented in The Wall Street Journal that he finds “out-of-office” e-mails to be a potential gold mine for new leads. He said instead of simply deleting the hundreds of these that he receives each month, he reads them and in some cases may learn that the person has left the company. Their auto-responses indicate how to get in touch with the new contact person, who often is that person’s supervisor or the key decision maker—the person he was hoping to find anyway. If nothing else, he commented, it’s the chance to start a new business relationship with that company.
Rent Rates Rising
U.S. apartment rents climbed 5 percent in the 12 months through April, according to apartment research company Axiometrics Inc., as reported in the Washington Examiner. Effective rents in Q1, or what residents actually paid, rose in 75 of the 82 markets tracked by data provider Reis Inc., which said the average rent was $991 per month, up 2.5 percent from a year earlier.
Job Gain
Texas has posted stunning job-growth numbers. Some 37 percent of all net new American jobs since the recovery began were created in Texas. Using Bureau of Labor Statistics data, Dallas Fed economists reviewed state-by-state employment changes since June 2009, when the recession ended. Texas added 265,300 net jobs, out of the 722,200 nationwide, and by far outpaced every other state. New York was second with 98,200 and Pennsylvania added 93,000, reports The Wall Street Journal.
Job Pain
July marks the 763rd month since January 1948, when the Bureau of Labor Statistics began calculating the unemployment rate. And July is the 69th month since 1948 with the rate at 8 percent or higher—the 30th such month in just the past two-and-a-half years. This means that about 44 percent of the most severe unemployment in the past 63 years has occurred in the past two and a half years.
Check Your Watch
You’ll wait 138 seconds on average for an elevator in a typical 16-floor building with a conventional system.
Looking to Hire?
According to a column by career counselor Adam Friedman in The Wall Street Journal, today’s class of graduates can be challenging. He wrote that a recruiter for a Fortune 500 company recently told him, “Today’s crop of graduates is as bright and easily as accomplished as their predecessors. What’s different is their attitude about finding a job. They have a sense of entitlement that suggests that we need to impress them, not the other way around.”