S.E.C. Real Estate Observer

The Board of Directors of the S.E.C. Education Foundation has been very successful in fund raising the past few years. The society members have fulfilled their pledges and our Farley Fund Auctions have been quite beneficial. Now your Education Foundation is looking for more ways to promote the types of education that have made our [...]

I don’t mean this headline in any ominous way. In recent years the national economy has given the opportunity for most in the real estate industry to reap huge financial rewards with little downside risk. The last few years we have seen the following:

Huge amounts of cash were searching for real estate. Most attendees at [...]

Almost 30 years ago I walked into a big national marketing session at the Knickerbocker Hotel in Chicago. Over 100 brokers were marketing properties, brainstorming complicated solutions, and proposing to exchange equities to solve problems. It was exciting and new to me and at that moment I caught the “bug.”
Today marketing sessions are still a [...]

The National Marketing events that are the focus of the Society of Exchange Counselors are riding a wave of excellent attendance and productivity. Our most recent meetings in Las Vegas and Denver were again filled with well over 100 members, candidates, and invited guests representing many clients, money, and properties looking to make a successful [...]

As I assume the presidency of the Society of Exchange Counselors I am taken by the uniqueness of our organization. Typically the new President of a group is asked immediately something like “What are you going to do to improve our “member benefits”?” The members of the Society, however, already understand their most important “member [...]

The High Cost of Farm Preservation
Editor’s Note:
An article entitled “Expensive Nostalgia: The High Cost of Farm Preservation” by Claude Gruen recently appeared in the Gruen Gruen & Associates online newsletter, “Trends.” Claude and Nina Gruen are nationally recognized economists. Their firm provides real estate consulting services nationwide and can be found on the web [...]

The Society of Exchange Counselors throughout its history has been on the cutting edge of innovation in marketing properties. Most often we have been known by our members’ innovations in equity marketing and creating formulas to solve complicated real estate problems. However, two of our members also lead the industry with some practical software for [...]

As entrepreneurs and risk takers we admit that occasionally great projections and optimism fades into reality. This investment isn’t working. It is a bad deal. What should we do? How should we handle this situation? How do we save face? Save our assets? Can we save important relationships?
As many who lived through the real estate [...]

It is hard to believe that I have been attending national marketing sessions for almost 25 years. I have been involved firstly with sessions conducted by the REALTORS Land Institute (RLI), later with both RLI and CCIM groups, and for the past 10 years or so, attending the Society of Exchange Counselor meetings. I have [...]