The Hamptons (Southampton, NY)
By Paula Hathaway, REALTOR, LBA, ...A Local Expert in all The Hamptons
(Douglas Elliman Real Estate)
WHEN LOCAL GOVERNMENTS START MAKING DEMANDS...Just Try To Accommodate them! A fellow agent just emailed me asking for my guidance as she is attempting to advise a homeowner in how to get approval for renting out her new home in the Town of Southampton. I have not had the bad fortune yet in taking a rental listing in the Town, especially since I do most of my real estate business in the Village of Southampton and the law does not apply here----yet! It is mind boggling as to the requirements of the new law and most homeowners are stumped by the information, the required zoning and fire codes that they need to meet to make their homes rent able. EVEN MORE MIND-NUMBING to me is the idea that we as agents are obligated, by law to tell the homeowner what to do--how to fill out the 10 page app...
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By Paula Hathaway, REALTOR, LBA, ...A Local Expert in all The Hamptons
(Douglas Elliman Real Estate)
EVER DREAM OF LIVING IN SOUTHAMPTON VILLAGE, NY?...Many People Do!!! The Head line reads: "A Walkers Guide to Home Buying" --and then the rest of the Wall Street Journal article goes on to describe the "amenities" or "places" they were referring to: Restaurants, movie theaters, drugstores, Grocery stores etc.... Small wonder then, that Southampton Village, New York is THE destination for home buyers! Buyers, looking to buy here in the Hamptons are looking for "proximity" more than anything else right now.   The article ran in the Wall Street Journal in their Real Estate Section in late 2011. It offers many good reasons why home buyers are being pulled to locations which have a "Village" feeling or at least a strip mall with all the needed stores and amenities within walking distance to ...
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By Paula Hathaway, REALTOR, LBA, ...A Local Expert in all The Hamptons
(Douglas Elliman Real Estate)
THE 5 KEYS TO SUCCESS IN REAL ESTATE TODAY; Do You Have Any Others??? THE 5 KEYS:  RAPPORT BUILDING, COMPETENCE, APTITUDE, TRUTH TELLING AND EXPERTISE. (This is a very long post because I wrote the 5 segments to be published individually but decided to put it all out there at once!) I. RAPPORT BUILDING ....Nothing else can do more for building your business!!! It is the one area that most real estate professionals neglect. Most don't understand how critical rapport building is in the early stages of a business relationship. It will make the difference between making a sale and losing one; ..will make the difference between getting that great listing or losing it to the next agent who HAS taken the time to build a rapport with their clients and customers. CHARM-- If you take a look at th...
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By Paula Hathaway, REALTOR, LBA, ...A Local Expert in all The Hamptons
(Douglas Elliman Real Estate)
FALL WEEKENDS IN SOUTHAMPTON, NEW YORK....PUMPKIN PICKING TIME!!! It is September; the end of summer--all the crowds have left the Hamptons and things return to normal! Well, that is what is supposed to happen; but for the past 18 years, things have changed and the crowds that stream into the Hamptons all summer now remain and even stay through the Holidays---Thanksgiving and Christmas are treasured here and the crowds remain for those special times too. PUMPKIN PICKING TIME IN THE HAMPTONS! Now, it is almost Pumpkin Picking Time and there is a place in Water Mill New York (just  1/2 mile East of Southampton Village)  where the young and young at heart love to come to pick out their very own pumpkin---they pick out their pumpkin and then they stay and ride the wooden, handmade rides tha...
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By Paula Hathaway, REALTOR, LBA, ...A Local Expert in all The Hamptons
(Douglas Elliman Real Estate)
THE BATAAN DEATH MARCH IS NOT Forgotten...Especially, By One Local Blue Blood Family Member! Many members of the families of the survivors of THE BATAAN DEATH MARCH, are looking forward to the release by PBS of the Home video version of the television documentary film, "The Tragedy Of Bataan" by writer/producer Jan Thompson. The series was created by Thompson after she engaged Alec Baldwin, a well known actor and a local Hamptons  resident, to narrate the film.  In a historic twist to the epic story, the home version of the film will be presented to local  high school and Junior high school students by Patricia Birks,  the daughter of one of the survivors of the Death March, over the next few months. THE BATAAN DEATH MARCH was a tragedy of epic proportions with 76,000 American and Filip...
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By Paula Hathaway, REALTOR, LBA, ...A Local Expert in all The Hamptons
(Douglas Elliman Real Estate)
Want a better way to BECOME A LOCAL EXPERT??? Over the past few years I have shared with all of you here on AR what my thinking is about being or becoming a LOCAL EXPERT. As we appear to be moving tentatively out of the depths of the Great Real Estate Recession, there are questions we need to ask our buyers and sellers. As real estate professionals. we know what is REALLY going on. We can pull this information together, USE IT FOR OUR "NEW" MARKETING and FARMING EFFORTS and we can even put it out there for our buyers and sellers too! We can actually be in a better position to serve the public in a more efficient manner.   We can, and should be, the guiding light  when working with new buyers toward home ownership and giving sellers the confidence needed to list their homes and to NOT ov...
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By Paula Hathaway, REALTOR, LBA, ...A Local Expert in all The Hamptons
(Douglas Elliman Real Estate)
What Do you Have To Lose???...How About Everything? What do you do if you can't handle a situation, a shaky deal that is about to go South? a buyer who wants a house but does not step up to the plate? A deal that is contingent on financing and is about to be rejected?  What do you do? Since we are in a very different real estate market today, it is critical that we ask for help from those who may know how to handle something that we are having difficulty with. We don't know where our next buyer or seller is coming from---so ask for help if you need it! I have talked to a few newer agents who think they have a handle on a situation and the next thing you hear is "I lost my deal because....." In one case I was very up set because I told the agent that if she needed my help, I was there fo...
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Southampton, NY Real Estate Professionals