Ivanette Free's Blog

I spent almost 22 years observing students in our Real Estate School and I could predict with great accuracy who would be successful and who would fail within the first year.   We would attract students from all occupational backgrounds.  Many of the students that struggled w...

Is it ethical to walk away from an obligation just because the market changes? This economy has forced a lot of good people into default because of a hardship such as loss of job, divorce, medical bills, loss of ability to obtain credit and loss of income.  There is a safety ...

I have found a great training site that I would like to share with you.  Grove.com has courses and video on a number of different subjects but the ones that I have found to very helpful is the training on Social Media. The site is user friendly and is free. In addition to Soc...

Theater manager John Kempe announced that The Grand Theatre at Pier Park will be getting  IMAX at one of their screens in Pier Park. The technicians are busy installing the equipment. The retrofitted theatre will seat approximately 350 movie fans. The new screen will be wall ...

Any of you that have worked Short Sales with some of the Major Banks will identify with this problem. It is a game of hurry up and wait. The lender will often let us wait for weeks without giving us an update on the Short Sale. Then they will give us an order to produce a doc...

The Internet is a wonderful tool. I can remember when we had walk around with our MLS book in our hand. Now we have access to all the listing on our smart phone or pad. We can even click on an app and all the listings in that geographic area will be at your fingertips. We can...

After Red Lining Florida’s Condo market for the past several years with their ridicules guidelines. Fannie Mae has approved three complexes in Panama City Beach. Hopefully they are beginning to relax their guidelines. They will not buy mortgages in the secondary market if the...

On July 1, 2010 the Florida Distressed Condominium Relief Act became law. This could be the very tool that is bringing the market back. Condo HOAs were in a downward spiral and it did not look like they could recover. Many of their owners were unable or unwilling to pay their...

The former CEO of Taylor Bean was sentenced to 40 months in prison for his part in a $3 Billion Fraud case that cost thousands on jobs in his own company. The sixth largest bank failure in US History with the collapse of Alabama based Colonial Bank that bought hundreds of mil...

A lot of our visitors are overcome by the beauty of Gulf Coast and forget about safety. This week we lost a 15-year-old girl visiting from Georgia. She went on what she thought was an innocent stroll down the beach with a young man barley out of his teens. A few hours later h...