HAR is an Inman Innovator Finalist Inman News has announced the finalists for the 2014 Innovator Awards in five categories and the Houston Association of Realtors has made the cut in the ‘Most Innovative MLS or Real Estate Trade Association’ category. About HAR, Inman News concluded: “The Houston Association of Realtors was the first MLS to sign up as a publisher through ListHub, launching a Texas-wide real estate portal allowing other Texas brokers to take advantage of HAR.com’s high traffic volume and cachet.” HAR is competing against the Austin Board of Realtors (ABoR), NAR, California Regional MLS, Inc. and several other organizations in the MLS/Association category. Winners chosen from the list of finalists will be announced during the Real Estate Connect conference in San Francisco which takes place from July For more information, please read here:

Changes Affect Auto-Population This Wednesday This Wednesday, June 25, Tempo will change how auto-population works. Instead of pulling in tax information from Stewart Tax, it will now pull it from Realist. This change will enable Tempo to auto-populate properties from all Texas counties. Slight Tax ID format changes to Galveston, Harris, and Montgomery Counties will occur making them consistent their appraisal district formats. Auto-populating by street name requires more information to find the street address. For example, in Stewart you could simply enter Park and it would return all variants of Park, like Park Maple, Park Wind, Par York, etc. Now, Realist will only return Park Rd, Park Ave, Park Blvd. If you want to find Park Maple, you must enter Park Maple. MLS Area will not be auto-populated by Realist at this time. Click here for a short video walkthrough of the changes coming next week.Click here for a short video walkthrough of the changes coming next week.

Weekly HAR Market Stat Some economists do not believe that housing has established enough upward momentum to warrant a declaration of recovery, yet many market analysts are observing the rule of The Tortoise and the Hare. Fast, energetic upward spikes in sales may be exciting, but slow and steady wins the race. This phase of stabilization will likely show itself in year-over-year comparisons that cause yawns, but this kind of race is ultimately good for the market as a whole. In the Houston region, for the week ending June 15: New Listings increased 3.4% to 2,632 Pending Sales increased 18.7% to 2,161 Closed Sales decreased 8.1% to 1,685

Questions? ext. 6 Open Your Mind to Learning Register at The Agent’s Role in the Valuation Process (BPOR) The property valuation process depends more than ever on professional expertise and competence, the best use of technology, and a commitment to approach the valuation assignment from all pertinent perspectives. This course is specifically designed to help residential real estate agents and brokers enhance their skills in creating Broker Price Opinion Resources (BPORs), reducing risk, and applying alternative valuation methods. Upon completion, you will receive an inviting you to apply online. There is a one-time application fee of $199 and an online webinar that must be completed. Also, to be enrolled in the preferred provider panel, please note that you must have been licensed for at least 2.5 years and you or your broker have an E&O policy with $250,000 minimum coverage per incident and $500,000 aggregate maximum. Date: Thursday, June 26 Time: 8:30 a.m. - 5 p.m. Location: HAR Central Investment: $99