Project VRM - User contributions [en]

User talk:RealEstateCafe

2009-10-11T23:50:52Z

RealEstateCafe:

Doc,

Thanks for launching real estate as a session topic at VRooM Boston 2009. Iâd like to use this comment to get some ideas started in response to your question, sent to me privately, about consumer-centric real estate business models.

Based on my limited understanding of fourth party vs user-driven services, my response is that the âideal real estate business, at least for buyers,â is not a business but a network of âfourth partyâ organizations, or home buyer clubs both public / non-profit and private / for profit. Think of an AARP or AAA model but with LOCAL home buyer clubs that aggregate âuser-drivenâ services and savings opportunities by local housing market, from both local and national vendors.

After the meltdown of the housing market, mortgage requirements have tightened and home buyers once again have to save real money, up to 20% down for their first home or condo. That has contributed to the slowdown in the housing market. Home buyer clubs could expedite that time frame by reducing transaction costs and delivering savings from four or five segments of the marketplace:

1. Lenders,

2. Developers / sellers,

3. Brokers, and

4. Product and service vendors.

5. Optional: Government subsidies and incentives, local and national

Trends at a recent real estate technology conference in San Francisco lead me to believe that home buyer clubs and an MLS of buyers could emerge as new players in the housing marketplace. Some of us have talked about those ideas for years, drafted business plans, even experimented with local organizations, like the Mass. Homebuyers Club (1990-1995).

If you google âhome buyers club,â you will see that there are already a variety of initiatives across the country. My goal would be to create a digital tool chest so that local organizations, public and private, can assemble their own home buyer clubs to enable real estate consumers to save billions of dollars annually. (In 1998, McKinsey & Co. first estimated that home buyers and sellers could save $30 billion annually by harnessing the money-saving power of the internet.)

Where should we start? Can we inventory best of breed new consumer centric businesses and VRM tools, and update this old business plan to co-author a real estate and VRM manifesto (or something else)?

HomeSearchID: Executive Summary (2000-2002ish)
https://realestatecafe.pbworks.com/HomeSearchID

Key VRM-like pull quote from link above:

How can HomeSearchID make money doing this? HomeSearchID has two major revenue streams:

1. A ladder of referrals, beginning with a $50 match fee from buyers and sellers to a 20 percent referral fee to traditional listing agents and buyer brokers (see Exhibit X); and

2. Micro-payments or affiliate marketing payments from product and service vendors using a distributed transaction manager â¦

Substitute âVRM platformâ in sentence above for âtransaction manager,â and continue to conversation online before we get to the VRooM Session Monday?

ââ

âThe next major revolution in real estate will be fee based services replacing the blanket commission pricing that has dominated the industry for so long.â
Former Chief Economist, National Association of Realtors

Bill Wendel

The Real Estate Cafe

Serving a menu of money-saving services since 1995

97a Garden St.

Cambridge, MA 02138

617-661-4046 office / cell

realestatecafe@gmail.com

http://twitter.com/realestatecafe

http://www.realestatecafe.squarespace.com

User talk:RealEstateCafe

2009-10-11T18:39:21Z

RealEstateCafe: New page: Doc, Thanks for launching real estate as a session topic at VRoom Boston 2009. Iâd like to use this comment to get some ideas started in response to your question, sent to me privately,...

Doc,

Thanks for launching real estate as a session topic at VRoom Boston 2009. Iâd like to use this comment to get some ideas started in response to your question, sent to me privately, about consumer-centric real estate business models.

Based on my limited understanding of fourth party vs user-driven services, my response is that the âideal real estate business, at least for buyers,â is not a business but a network of âfourth partyâ organizations, or home buyer clubs both public / non-profit and private / for profit. Think of an AARP or AAA model but with LOCAL home buyer clubs that aggregate âuser-drivenâ services and savings opportunities by local housing market, from both local and national vendors.

After the meltdown of the housing market, mortgage requirements have tightened and home buyers once again have to save real money, up to 20% down for their first home or condo. That has contributed to the slowdown in the housing market. Home buyer clubs could expedite that time frame by reducing transaction costs and delivering savings from four or five segments of the marketplace:

1. Lenders,

2. Developers / sellers,

3. Brokers, and

4. Product and service vendors.

5. Optional: Government subsidies and incentives, local and national

Trends at a recent real estate technology conference in San Francisco lead me to believe that home buyer clubs and an MLS of buyers could emerge as new players in the housing marketplace. Some of us have talked about those ideas for years, drafted business plans, even experimented with local organizations, like the Mass. Homebuyers Club (1990-1995).

If you google âhome buyers club,â you will see that there are already a variety of initiatives across the country. My goal would be to create a digital tool chest so that local organizations, public and private, can assemble their own home buyer clubs to enable real estate consumers to save billions of dollars annually. (In 1998, McKinsey & Co. first estimated that home buyers and sellers could save $30 billion annually by harnessing the money-saving power of the internet.)

Where should we start? Can we inventory best of breed new consumer centric businesses and VRM tools, and update this old business plan to co-author a real estate and VRM manifesto (or something else)?

HomeSearchID: Executive Summary (2000-2002ish)
https://realestatecafe.pbworks.com/HomeSearchID

Key VRM-like pull quote from link above:

How can HomeSearchID make money doing this? HomeSearchID has two major revenue streams:

1. A ladder of referrals, beginning with a $50 match fee from buyers and sellers to a 20 percent referral fee to traditional listing agents and buyer brokers (see Exhibit X); and

2. Micro-payments or affiliate marketing payments from product and service vendors using a distributed transaction manager â¦

Substitute âVRM platformâ in sentence above for âtransaction manager,â and continue to conversation online before we get to the VRooM Session Monday?

ââ

âThe next major revolution in real estate will be fee based services replacing the blanket commission pricing that has dominated the industry for so long.â
Former Chief Economist, National Association of Realtors

Bill Wendel

The Real Estate Cafe

Serving a menu of money-saving services since 1995

97a Garden St.

Cambridge, MA 02138

617-661-4046 office / cell

realestatecafe@gmail.com

http://twitter.com/realestatecafe

http://www.realestatecafe.squarespace.com

VRooM Boston 2009

2009-10-11T18:32:22Z

RealEstateCafe: /* Possible Topics for sessions / discussion */

[[Image:vroomboston2009_small.png|200px|thumb|left]]VRooM Boston 2009 will be hosted by ProjectVRM and the [http://cyber.law.harvard.edu Berkman Center] in the John Chipman Gray Room in Pound Hall at [http://law.harvard.edu Harvard Law School], on Monday-Tuesday 12-13 October, 2009. The event will go from 9AM to 5:30 on both days. There will be a no-host dinner on Monday evening.

As with earlier workshops, the purpose is to bring people together and make progress on any number of VRM topics and projects. Most of the workshop will be an "unconference" on the open space model, which means session topics will be chosen by participants. ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Space_Technology Here is the Wikipedia page on open space.]) The one exception will be [http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/projectvrm/VRooM_Boston_2009#Panel:_Getting_Personal_With_Data:_How_Users_Get_Control_and_What_They_Do_With_It ''Getting Personal With Data: How Users Get Control and What They Do With It''], described below.

== Registration ==

The workshop is free. You can register through [http://vrmeastcoast2009.eventbrite.com/ this EventBrite link].

== Possible Topics for sessions / discussion ==

(These are just suggestions. The topics can be anything.)

* VRM and Health Care
* VRM hacks, so far
* User-initiated terms of service
* Where Personal informatics / self-tracking aligns with VRM (User control of data.)
* Existing technologies and protocols VRM can use
* [http://kantarainitiative.org/confluence/display/infosharing/Home Information Sharing Workgroup] (Kantara initiative) (Previously Volunteered Personal Information Workgroup)
* The Mine! Project
* MINT
* VRM and search
* Personal Data Stores
* VRM and open source
* Scanaroo (and turning loyalty cards inside-out)
* ListenLog
* Emancipay
* VRM and Identity (Information Cards, OpenID...)
* VRM and Mobile
* Personal RFPs
* VRM evangelism
* VRM and search
* VRM and Real Estate

== Open Space format ==

In open space workshops, topics are suggested by participants in the Agenda making session, which is attended by everybody. Participants write the title of their topic on a sheet of paper with a bold marker, add their name, then describe the topic to the group and post it on a large "spreadsheet" of times and session locations, which will be posted on the side of the room.

One person in each session will take notes, either directly (or eventually) on the workshop wiki. At the end of each day somebody from each discussion session will report progress to the group. At the end of the second day everybody will discuss progress made and next steps.

== Schedule ==

=== Monday ===

==== Setup and Sessions ====

''''Greetings and VRM overview by Doc Searls''''

''''Suggesting and choosing the day's session topics''''

(Wiki note takers will fill in the sessions below.)

'''''Session 1'''''
* '''A:'''
* '''B:'''
* '''C:'''
* '''D:'''

'''''Session 2'''''
* '''A:'''
* '''B:'''
* '''C:'''
* '''D:'''

'''''Session 3'''''
* '''A:'''
* '''B:'''
* '''C:'''
* '''D:'''

'''''Session 4'''''
* '''A:'''
* '''B:'''
* '''C:'''
* '''D:'''

'''''Session 5'''''
* '''A:'''
* '''B:'''
* '''C:'''
* '''D:'''

''''' Reports from group sessions '''''

==== Dinner on Monday Night ====
Put your name here if you hope to join us Monday night for dinner so we can make reservations. It will be a few blocks from Pound Hall near Harvard Square.

* Doc Searls
* Keith Hopper
* Dean Landsman
* John Eckman

=== Tuesday ===

==== Panel: Getting Personal With Data: How Users Get Control and What They Do With It ====
[http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=self-tracking '''Self-tracking'''] and [http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=personal+informatics '''personal informatics'''] are hot [http://www.selftracking.net/ new] new development categories, driven by the growing sense that primary responsibility for gathering personal data, integrating it, and putting it to use, belongs to individuals -- not to companies, governments or other organizations. Together these tools help individuals become both the [http://blog.joeandrieu.com/2007/06/14/vrm-the-user-as-point-of-integration/ ''point of integration''] for their own data, and the ''primary authority'' for what gets done with that data.

''Self-tracking'' is how individuals collect data about themselves, while ''personal informatics'' is how individuals organize that data and put it to use. Together these tools inform individuals' relationships with themselves, with their social networks, with the organizations to which they belong -- and with sellers of all kinds.

Tools for self-tracking and personal informatics are new, already becoming popular, and in need of much thinkig about how personal data is gathered, stored and shared -- concerns that are near and dear to those who follow VRM.

Each panelist is either developing tools in these categories or has experience with new tools and the issues involved. Doc Searls, of the Berkman Center and ProjectVRM, will moderate the panel, and we expect discussion with participants (there will be no "audience" here) to be lively and informative.

==== Moderator ====
'''Doc Searls''' - [http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/ Berkman Center]

==== Panelists & Their Projects ====
'''Ben Rubin''' - [http://myzeo.com Zeo]

Ben is the co-founder and CTO of Zeo Inc. Zeo has created and recently launched the world's first personal sleep coach.

'''Adriana Lukas''' - [http://themineproject.org/ The Mine! Project]

'''Tim Hwang''' - [http://www.webecologyproject.org Web Ecology Project]

In addition to the Web Ecology Project, Tim Founded [http://roflcon.org ROFLCon] and [http://awesomefoundation.org The Awesome Foundation], and [http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/2171174/ Information Superhighway]. He is working on a book on the mechanics of web culture and memes online.

'''Keith Hopper''' - [http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/projectvrm/ListenLog ListenLog]

Keith works on digital product strategy for [http://npr.org NPR]. He is the creator of [http://keithhopper.com/blog/nprbackstory NPRbackstory], was a contributing author for the book [http://www.amazon.com/Collective-Intelligence-Creating-Prosperous-World/dp/097156616X/ref=pd_bbs_sr_4?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1208206490&sr=8-4 Collective Intelligence], and has done some [http://keithhopper.com/about other fun stuff].

==== Sesions ====

(Wiki note takers will fill in the sessions below. The canonical session outline will be on the wall of the room during the workshop.)

'''''Session 1'''''
* '''A:'''
* '''B:'''
* '''C:'''
* '''D:'''

'''''Session 2'''''
* '''A:'''
* '''B:'''
* '''C:'''
* '''D:'''

'''''Session 3'''''
* '''A:'''
* '''B:'''
* '''C:'''
* '''D:'''

'''''Session 4'''''
* '''A:'''
* '''B:'''
* '''C:'''
* '''D:'''

'''''Research possibilities'''''

ProjectVRM is classifed as a ''research'' project by the Berkman Center, and conducting research of some kind is part of ProjectVRM's charter. So we have a brief session near the end of the day to talk about the possibilities here, based on discussion during the last two days.

''''' Reports from group sessions '''''

''''' Wrap-up and next steps '''''

==Space/Location==

We have a the John Chipman Gray Room in Pound Hall (on the second floor) in Harvard Law School booked for both days. (Among other things, [http://thinkexist.com/quotes/john_chipman_gray/ Gray said], "âIt is a step for further advance to see what has been won from chaos already.") The room is the one over the bike racks on the south side of Pound Hall, which is on Massachusetts Avenue ("Mass Ave") next to the big construction project.

The room will have plenty of chairs and tables for group sessions.

Note: Parking is scarce and expensive in Cambridge. Public Transportation is best.

[http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/projectvrm/Image:Grayroom.jpg Here is a map] of Harvard Law School, with the John Chipman Gray room highlighted.

== Name ==

The first workshop, also at Harvard, was called just [[VRMWorkshop]], then [[VRM Workshop 2008]]. The second was called [[VRM West Coast Workshop 2009]]. We chose "VRM East Coast Workshop 2009" as a way to stay sort-of in compliance with that poor naming convention. The name "VRooM" was chosen by suggestion from the ProjectVRM mailing list.

The new workshop naming convention will be VRooM (location) (year). Until we come up with something else.