Mexican luxury real estate leaps forward with Las Villas De Mexico

Sep 30, 2008

By Las Villas de Mexico Las Villas de Mexico, a newly announced collection of luxury resorts spread across Mexico’s top tourist locations, is sponsoring the 13th Annual Luxury Real Estate Fall Conference, which will be hosted in Philadelphia on October 11-14, 2008 at The Ritz-Carlton, Philadelphia. Planners of Las Villas de Mexico are currently building 1,000 luxury properties in four locations: Cancun, Puerto Vallarta, Cabo San Lucas and San Jose del Cabo. Subsequent phases are expected to include other Mexican destinations such as San Miguel de Allende. The first pre-construction purchase opportunities are scheduled to be offered in the first week of December 2008. We have created a whole-ownership concept that is altogether different from anything else on the marketplace,” said Brett Sawyer, director of international sales at Las Villas de Mexico. “By purchasing a Las Villas de Mexico home, owners become part of a greater community of multiple locations throughout Mexico, all of them dedicated to the very best luxury experience, from world-class golf and spas to stunning beaches.”

Concierge, please! Total quality management in luxury real estate

Sep 26, 2008

By Jean-Yves Piton Customer service and after-sale services are perceived as differentiators in today’s business world. That is differentiating good firms from great firms. But what is Total Customer Satisfaction (TCS) you might ask? The succinct answer is: Getting your customers to buying from you by giving them total satisfaction in return – thus, generating referrals in the process. Meanwhile, as part of the Six Sigma concept focusing on Total Quality Management (TQM), total customer satisfaction is the measure of how products and services supplied by your company surpass your customers’ expectation to consistently deliver total quality.

Registration for Luxury Real Estate Fall Conference in Philadelphia still open!

Sep 25, 2008

By Brian Langhorst We have over 200 members from around the world joining us for the 13th Annual Luxury Real Estate Fall Conference in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania! The dates are October 12th through 14th at the historic Ritz-Carlton Hotel. We have members coming in from all across the United States and Canada, as well as Spain, Mexico, Australia, Argentina and Thailand! We very much hope you will join us as well! There are great room rates still available at the Ritz-Carlton. Please contact me at 206.695.4846 or BLanghorst (at) LuxuryRealEstate.com to learn more about this industry-leading referral and networking event. See you in Philly!

Australian luxury real estate agent in final four for international award

Sep 25, 2008

By Michael Marquette From his blog: Australian Real Estate Agent in Final Four for International Real Estate Award Australian Michael Marquette, founder of Marquette Turner Luxury Homes, is one of only two non-American Award Nominees at the 13th Annual Luxury Real Estate Conference to be held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA on Saturday, October 11th through Tuesday, October 14th, 2008! One of only four international real estate agents nominated in the category of Outstanding Rookie, Michael Marquette will be joined at the award’s conference at the Ritz-Carlton by fellow agency founder Simon Turner. The Who’s Who in Luxury Real Estate network is the most prestigious luxury real estate organization in the world, and its website LuxuryRealEstate.com is the most-viewed luxury real estate portal in the world. The invitation-only industry peak body is made up of almost 6,000 offices worldwide. Marquette comments that “It is such an honour to have been initially invited to be a part of the exclusive Who’s Who, so to have been nominated for an award is truly humbling.”

Credit lenders suffering from withdrawal

Sep 25, 2008

By Robert Lockard I am sorry to keep talking about sad things in my luxury real estate blog entries, but I just read an article in CNN entitled “Ex-bankers on pushing customers to rack up debt” and it once again brought up many familiar concerns to my mind on the topic of consumer debt. I wish that I could talk about happy topics. I would much prefer to discuss luxury properties or any other topic, including how getting adequate sleep can lead to more success, but, alas, I feel it much more pressing to focus on the problems upon us. I am absolutely disgusted by the state of our financial markets. It seems to me that dishonesty is rampant and the very people who are responsible for this mess are asking for a great deal of money to supposedly solve the problem. But I care about people much more than institutions. And, based upon the testimony of the two honest women in the CNN article, who both have good consciences, I see little difference between the practices of certain banks and lenders and the practices of drug pushers. Many lenders trick people into taking more money than they need, they strive to get young people addicted and they keep people in a state of dependency for extended periods of time. All of that adds up to trouble. Debt is a plague that, when handled unwisely, can lead to all sorts of problems that I think are even worse than the horrible effects of drug abuse. People can at least stop taking drugs and eventually go through a process of withdrawal and recovery. But with debt, even if a person stops going into more debt, they still have interest building up on the money they owe and they face all sorts of roadblocks on the way to recovery.

Decorati designer feature: Robert Passal, style infusion

Sep 24, 2008

By Donna Sapolin From her magazine article: Decorati Designer Feature: Robert Passal, Style Infusion Welcome to a designer feature by Decorati, the online resource for high-end interior design. In this post, we are featuring New York-based interior designer Robert Passal, who has transformed this 2,200-square-foot apartment on Manhattan’s tony upper eastside. See below for some tips that you can use for staging your next home. His mission: to diffuse the banality of new construction by administering a healthy dose of visual intrigue to heartily lived-in, white-box rooms devoid of interior architecture. Designed for a couple with two infants, his furnishings plan shuns the sort of precious, hands-off quality that some elegant schemes engender and, instead, welcomes the thrills and spills of everyday life with wear-resistant surfaces and a few colors that politely refuse to show the (sometimes grubby) touch of human hands. Passal’s design concept focused on the creation of dimension and interest through geometry and texture.

The Russians are coming to the U.K. luxury market

Sep 23, 2008

By Jason Leach From his blog: What’s the market doing? And the Russians ARE coming There are a lot of mixed signals out there and different people have different angles on the French property market at the moment. The Brits are still buying, but not in the numbers that they used to. But then again July and August are generally quiet months for the Brits to buy. On the other hand, there is still, and increasingly more so, lots more interest from the Dutch, German, Belgian, Swiss and Scandanavian countries, but more than ever it’s the French. France hasn’t really been affected by the credit crunch due to the fiscal regulations that exist. We did see some small protests when the fuel prices were increased but even that’s come down again now to a more reasonable level.

Caribbean real estate: U.S. financial crisis has created great fear throughout the islands!

Sep 22, 2008

By Jim Walberg From his blog: Caribbean Real Estate: U.S. Financial Crisis Has Created Great Fear Throughout The Islands!!! In the midst of the biggest financial meltdown since the 1930s some hard questions are being asked of Jim Walberg this week. My email box is overflowing and the phone has been ringing off the hook. The people who have an interest in the Caribbean real estate markets are afraid. They are asking some very hard questions that need to be immediately addressed by our Federal government as to how a further financial collapse can be averted. You may recall my past article about the mantra of a sailor as he sets off on a voyage – Do Not Be Fearful! Well, it is a challenge to get to that place when the walls or the U.S. financial structure seem to crumbling down before our very eyes. There is no getting around the fact it is a historic financial mess. My focus is to always get to “what is” as fast as possible, and start making lemonade out of the truck load of lemons that has just been dumped on our front porch. When I want some well-thought-out ideas on National financial issues I call my REALTOR® friend in Naples, Florida. His name is Mike Lissack. He is one of the smartest financial minds that I know. He came to real estate from a long and successful career on Wall Street where he was named by Worth Magazine as one of “Wall Street’s 25 Smartest Players”, and is one of the top 100 Americans who have influenced “how we think about money.” Before he retired from money management he directed more than $25 billion of investments, supervised their financial reporting, and assisted in the design of their risk management and investment operations. So we have been corresponding about the financial meltdown that is surrounding all of us. He has some pretty interesting ideas as to what he would do if he was in charge of the direction our Nation takes next, regarding making sure these events never happen again. I felt it was important for you to also review what he has been proposing to me. Here are his latest thoughts, given the events of the last few days. Mike’s view on the financial solutions of our current crisis is we need someone in our government to take proactive action NOW! Here are some more of his suggestions for your consideration, and those of my Caribbean friends asking some very hard questions:

Technology: State-of-the-art luxury property agencies

Sep 18, 2008

By Benjamin Pradel From his blog: [Technologie] Des agences toujours à la pointe C'est toujours avec le même souci d'innovation et de conserver une longueur d'avance que Rodolphe a fait équiper les 5 agences d'un système d'écrans plats dans les bureaux. L'équipe commerciale dispose maintenant d'un outil performant et unique pour la présentation des biens; un diaporama prenant le relais lorsque l'écran n'est pas utilisé.

Fear of falling

Sep 18, 2008

By Robert Lockard As promised in my last luxury real estate blog entry, here is my discussion of some meaty topics I’ve wanted to talk about for a little while. The past few weeks have been pretty thrilling, wouldn’t you say? Wall Street dropped an incredible 504 points on Monday and 449 points on Wednesday. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, organizations designed to create stability, have failed. Other financial institutions, once seemingly healthy and sound, are facing bankruptcy and other troubles. Think that’s bad enough? Russia’s stock market is doing considerably worse. Okay, that’s the bad news. Now let’s take a step back and switch gears a little. I am an optimist. I believe that good wins in the end. I think that right now many bad companies and practices are facing the fact that they have built upon a sandy foundation and they are in danger of falling. All of the companies that are failing are doing so because of their own greed and recklessness. Home loans were turned into investment packages and many other bad ideas were allowed to come about because of greed.
1 - 10 of 27