On November 7th, while I was at the NAR convention in Orlando, Fidelity surprised us all by announcing that it would be acquiring LandAmerica in an all stock deal valued at $128 million. This merger would have great the largest title insurance group with about a 45% market share. In terms of the agreement Fidelity had time till today, November 21st to back out of the deal based on their due diligence. Well, last night, Friday at 8:00PM Eastern time they did exactly that. The deals off!

In an effort to reduce the combined debt of LandAmerica and Fidelity by approximately $250 million, Fidelity and LandAmerica have agreed to merger resulting in the acquisition of LandAmerica Financial Group Inc. by Fidelity National Financial Inc. Together, the companies controlled 46.3% of the title insurance market in 2007. For more information visit www.fnf.com

As I travel the country giving seminars on how to overcome prospecting and lead generation reluctance (see www.yourcalltosuccess.com), I hear a common theme from agents. Many agents believe that their market is different, that they are facing unique challenges and that selling real estate is easier or better

by Cheri Alguire

This model of business planning and goal setting for Real Estate Professionals breaks the process down to four parts and seventeen steps.

PART 1: The Big WHY
It is important to first look at who you really are and what your core values are. These things will drive you and carry thorough to your business.

After finishing my six-part series on the virtual real estate office, I received several letters, one of which I am quoting below:

 It’s been fascinating to witness developments in the home staging industry over the past few years.  For my first few years as a staging instructor I had to define and explain staging.  Nowadays it is a phenomenon that has changed the way real estate is sold.  In 2004, I

I promised you a

Benjamin Moore has gotten the thumbs up in an article from at least one of our contributing authors in the past for customer service.  Today, I add my thumbs up to Benjamin Moore in another category I’ll call customer enablement.

Let

If I had to start from scratch in a new market with no experience, I would start with only a few basic technologies, and this week I