Cleveland City workers freedom to move elsewhere

I suppose if I have a Cleveland Real Estate Blog I should put my two cents in on the latest news regarding city employees having the right to live where they choose. Just that sentence alone puts it kind of in perspective in my book. Isn't that the idea of being an American and living in The United States? The right to live where you want to? The reality is that you probably want to live somewhere else but you can only aspire to live on the lake or in San Francisco etc. That is what our country is made of Aspirations, Goals, and Dreams. The consensus is that now that the city workers some 8000 I hear can move anywhere they would like to, the city might implode! Well out of my last five sales in Cleveland on one of them "had to live in the city". The family that "had to live in the city " would of bought there anyway. They are members of a church in a community of people that draws them there. The other four sales three of them were in the medical field and they wanted to be closer to work and save on the extra taxes you pay when you work outside the city you live in. The fourth one just happened to find the house he liked best in Cleveland. No matter what you say or how you spin it. You still get a lot for your money in the city. Cleveland has pocket neighborhoods some stronger than others. Westpark,Tremont,Old Brooklyn and Ohio City are examples of areas that continue to thrive. When you travel to different cities in other towns I have found that the successful ones have these little niche places. China Town and Little Italy (which we have)can be found in New York,Toronto, and even Detroit Michigan. Taking our common interests and letting them shine attracts more attention,business and economic development. Whether it is culture,art, or religion focusing on what makes an area tick is what will keep these communities strong. Rules to make people live in certain locations may have an small impact on value but I believe it will even out. As long as you get more bang for your buck people are still going to live in the City.(picture by Hector M. Vega)

The state of our Health Care

I recently had the opportunity to see first hand how our medical system is doing.
Since the first time buyer market has been so alive I am running as fast as I can trying to be everything to all and get every possible sale. We don't know what the future holds here in Ohio . Well I guess I over did it a bit. About a week ago I had chest pains. So I took and aspirin and a very nice glass of scotch and settled into a nice hot bath. This worked very well. Then a week later I had the same feeling chest pains anxiety, sweaty shaky feeling. I just read an article in More magazine (magazine for 40 an up)about women and heart attacks and how the symptoms are tricky. Jack my fiance and Lynn my girlfriend who works for the clinic talked me into driving to the hospital. I was really scared. I started to cry. I called me oldest son just in case he was around. When he answered the phone (which is rare) My little voice came out. You now when you try to talk normal and you sound pathetic! He was at work and said he would be right there. Of course I told Jack to stay at work because we don't want him to lose his job. Sometimes when I look back at the way I think I find it strange. Amazing my loved ones hang in there with me.
Once I got to the hospital I kind of felt stupid. Here I am dressed for work in a skirt and high heels. When I went to park they asked me why I was there . To get past the guard arm and into the parking lot I had to tell the guard that I am bringing myself to the emergency room. That was just weird. If it was someone else who said I AM TAKING HER TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM! It just seems okay then. I get in there and have to wait for triage. I am standing there thinking I might faint! If I do will I split my head open too! Finally someone comes out of the door to talk with a man and I say excuse me I think I am having a heart attack!
She says come with me so I follow her her thinking this is strange. My legs are shaky, I am a nervous wreck and I think I might cry. She drops me in front of a desk of nurses and doctors and says to them can you take this she thinks she is having a heart attack. One guy says follow me. So I do and my legs are still there they haven't gone out from under me yet. I am shaking but no one really seems to care. He gets to a room and he says to me to wait outside he needs to clean it up. Great. No one offers a chair. I am still shaking and my chest feels tighter and I am now crying
My phone is ringing Oh, I have a business call, I let it go to voice mail. In fact I just turn it off at this point.I am feeling like I might just sit on the floor right there in the emergency room, high heels skirt and all. I am a germ Phoebe though and the thought of what is on that floor keeps my head busy enough to keep me standing. Finally they put me in the room and I sit down with relief that I am not going to crash down on the floor. These people act like I know my part here. Finally this guy says we need you to take off you shirt and bra, we have to hook you up. Oh okay and that's when their little party started! I am a real scared cat when it comes to needles. Before I know it I have a needle in one arm electrodes all over me. They had me aspirin. Give me Nitro. Shoot my belly with something that really hurts. I have oxygen. My blood pressure is very very high. They keep asking questions about is this normal for me. Of course not!My son gets there and shortly after that Jack arrives. They are concerned. It takes a few hours to get me blood pressure down. I have my blood drawn every three hours always from a different source. They admit me it takes hours to get a room. I am going to share a room with a ninety year old lady. She looks very nice and excited about the company. Oh no this isn't good at all. They tell me they are going to keep me for observation.I tell them that's okay I can go now I feel fine. The tell me that I am not allowed to leave on my own free will. I have been admitted which really means committed. I have lost all free will. They poke and prod and draw blood. The room next door sounds as though there is a party going on. People talk in loud voices at 2 am nobody is allowed to sleep. What happened to those lovely nuns who tiptoed down the hallway shushing people to be quiet and the gentle touch of a caring person. I am a human pin cushion. I haven't had a drink of water,or food for over twelve hours. Jack tells me I am not a good patient. He gets me a Walkman so I can plug my ears and not appear to be unfriendly. he brings me a book and recharges my phone/blackberry. What a wonderful man I have found! He takes really good care of me. Now it is my goal to get out of there. They schedule me for a Sono gram of my heart. Finally it is my turn for this test. I pass with flying colors. I talk to this very charming heart specialist with a beautiful accent. I tell him that I liked my scotch treatment a lot better then his. He laughs and schedules me for an out patient stress test and thankfully releases me from that mad house. The sweet roommate of mine is sad to see me leave as I can't get out of there fast enough. I get home and sleep until the next day. This whole time I have manged to do business via blackberry. The first day back I am up and running like a hamster on the wheel all over again. Lucky for me Memorial Day is coming and I can get a little break! Never once while I was in that hospital did anyone ask me my preference of treatment. They didn't care if I was a vegetarian or if I wanted holistic care. It was drug upon drug upon drug. The nurses would show up and administer what the doctor told them. The doctor spoke to me maybe 3 minutes total once I was admitted. The emergency room nurses and doctors seemed more human to me. The emergency staff talked to me like I am a person. I will never go to the hospital again unless I am carried in or kicking and screaming. That is an ordeal that I hope I am lucky enough to avoid. There needs to be changes to this system beyond billing and giving available care. We need to bring some peace and comfort through those doors. I felt like I was trapped in a horrible medical experiment. It is very clear to me that these nurses are overworked. The stress on their faces were apparent. There was a big management meeting the day I was there and everyone was talking about it. I think they have too many Chiefs and not enough Indians. Everyone seemed fearful of losing their jobs. I gotta say the place was packed they certainly were working at full capacity from my standpoint. Somethings gotta give. Unless you are a big money donor to the hospital the care is comparable to flying coach. They squeeze as many in, offer few choices and cut the staff to bare bones. Not my idea a quality care!

Spring Market

As soon as The Obama $8k credit was issued the market thawed. I have been running seven days a week showing houses like it was 1985!! Thank you I am thrilled to be working hard again and selling property. It is still a tough market. The prices are still down and the homes that sell are either a rock bottom price fixer upper or the best priced and in the best condition. This goes across the board. All neighborhoods and prices ranges. The buyers out there wants a deal. If you find yourself thinking about selling the sooner you realize that you are going to take a hit on your price and make it up on the other end the faster you will get your home sold. I have seen pristine homes priced what seemed to be fair just sit there. If you are listed for sale and you are not getting showings the market is telling you that you are priced too high. I recently got engaged. My Fiance is getting ready to list his house. We have redecorated every room in the house. Added new carpet and a new roof. 10k later we are ready to put it up. Some guys don't get this( I'm lucky Mr Right got it) so I always tell them if you were going to sell a car what would you do? The first thing they say is clean it and shine it up. Well that is what you have to do to sell a house too. Remember when your house is on the market you are showing it, living in it is what you do when you are not showing it!

Stimulus plan and the current real estate market

I am feeling optimistic for the first time in two years. Since Obama passed the stimulus plan I have been showing houses like the old days! I am working a 7 day work week happily. Whether you agree with this new president or this stimulus plan, I have to admit my phone is ringing. I feel like the market is picking up and that I may actually have a good year. This feels so much better than the downward spiral my business was experiencing. The good news is that all the pencil sharpening I have done will help expedite my recovery.

I don't know if the worst is over yet. I do know that I have seen some changes in the real estate industry since this downturn began. Gone are the days when an agent would run a contract to close it at midnight. Brokers opens that used to be packed with agents looking to see the latest listings, have become an outdated method of selling. Along with Thank Goodness! Open houses. Yes, you still can get a few buyers through and yes you can still sell a house through an open house. Open houses also have a bad side in that it invites complete strangers into your home to wander through, and depending how busy it is sometimes unattended. If the home is vacant it puts the agent in danger as we have just seen two attacks on Realtors in the recent news. The Internet has made it easier to view listings on line helping to eliminate a lot of homes that just would not do.

The biggest change is the way the agents are doing business. They have also lost that urgency. It used to be you would write a contract and get it presented usually in person. Now you fax it off or email it to the listing agent and wait to hear the outcome. With the invent of cellphones, email,text messaging,scanning the real estate agent can handle the contracts anywhere. In the past I have missed my sons second birthday party, Left a dinner party or a picnic, that I was giving, cancelled a date with friends all just to close a deal. Because when that buyer decided to write an offer it wasn't closed until delivery. Delivery meant that like superman I would drive through a snow storm to get an initial on a contract(which I have done).No wonder I've been divorced twice! Now we simply email it off and fax it forward. This is good news.

With all this technology we have also gotten some lazy Realtors out there. This past weekend I was denied 5 showings! With all the news about how hard it is to sell a house in this market you would think that you would at least be flexible about getting people in to see your home. I talked with several other agents and they have complained about the same thing. Some of these homes have been on the market for over 300 days. Maybe they are just tired of showing it. One was removing wallpaper so we rescheduled. There are still some many houses on the market that you don't always get a second chance. If I try to show it a second time and they can't accommodate me I just take it off the list. One agent I talked with said, oh well my buyers wrote on something this weekend(lucky her) so whoever denied a showing lost out.

There have been big changes over the last ten years. I think that this market has made me a stronger agent. The thought of a seller having to write a check at closing to get their home sold used to be unfathomable. After losing money myself and taking the hit I can only sympathize. It just is, what it is! I have watched people pay off their credit cards with the equity of their home and live large off the equity and expect to sell with no consequence. I find myself saying frequently I am no magician! Hopefully this stimulus will get buyers not only out there but buying. That will help get things moving such as the banker and the title company, the movers and the carpet industry. When people buy new homes thry spend more money in decorating, and landscaping ect. Hopefully this will employ more people which starts the cycle moving round and round instead of plunging further down. I am no economist. I do believe if people are buying homes, that means people are spending money on other things related to their home purchase.
I'd love to hear your comments! Sandymaline@gmail.com

Our Political system

Is everybody crazy out there? I am so appalled by the corporate and political greed. There is no shame in what we used to call white collar crime. Not only have these large corporations robbed their companies blind but it as if they are raising the bar on white collar crime. They even have the audacity to ask our government to bail them out!! Then we vote in a new president whose entire campaign was around stimulating the jobs of the middle class. The republicans stood on the podium and took pieces and parts of the bill and made jokes about it. For instance there was some money appropriated toward wetlands in California. Part of this project was to get a certain rodent that is good for that environment back to a healthy number. This senator (I don't remember which one) called it a 3 billion dollar bill for rodents! That is not what it was but if you are a senator and don't feel like reading the 1000 page bill all through the night you might have believed him. This is not fair or healthy politics. I would hope that they would sit down and go over line by line of this 1000 page bill together and work out what is best for all of us. Instead they stood on podiums and picked things apart so that the truth and the problems were too hard to see. I don't believe this is what our fore fathers had in mind. I believe when Barack Obama talked about partisanship he meant working together. This wasn't working together on either side. How can you work with someone when they are taking pieces and parts of a bill and making a mockery of it. Maybe it is time for the common man to start having the opportunity to hear all these bills that are to be passed by the government. It is the computer age! Why can't we put a copy of this bill in front of the senate out there for all to read. Why can't we update it as things are negotiated. Why can't we cast an Internet vote about how we feel about these things. We are the ones paying for it after all! Let me know what you think! Sandymaline@gmail.com

My experience with prejudice

There will be a positive impact against race and prejudice with the next President being the first black man to fill this role. My own experience with prejudice was in elementary school in the 60's. Back then your ethnic background your religious choice were what defined you. I am a mix of Polish,Dutch,and German. My mother was a rejected Catholic and my Dad a Methodist ( I thought). Turns out he was raised Lutheran but referred to himself as just spiritual. The reason I thought I was a Methodist is, my grandparents would take me to church once in a while. That church was a Methodist church at the corner of their street, so that is where I went. My family as it turns out were kind of ahead of everyone else in understanding that all the Christians were really in the same group or at least focused on the same goal! My mother was rejected from the Catholic church because she married a Lutheran. This had a huge impact on her and it carried over to the way she raised her three daughters. I was brought up to have a curiosity about all religions and view them as an outsider. My Catholic friends would take me to church. They would try to teach me their prayers. They always reminded me that "you know you are going to hell because you are not a Catholic". As a child that can really give you nightmares! Growing up in a primarily Irish/Italian Catholic neighborhood was to say the least a challenge on my self esteem. They were the majority while I was the minority. The most negative thing that I had going for me was that out of all three ethnic backgrounds somehow I was The Pollock in the neighborhood.I don't know how this happened because my name didn't end with "ski". Back then one of the first things people would ask you was what your ethnic background was, then what religion. I must of innocently answered the question to someone and it stuck. My mother was pure Polish. Whenever I would come home and tell her how the kids called me a Pollock she would say, be proud! We are good and strong people that have suffered great indignities. (sounds like the Jewish people,African Americans,Chinese ect.)Well everything changed for me in elementary school when the Italian Pope died and they elected to every ones surprise a Polish Pope. Even though I wasn't Catholic this meant so much to me. How can you pick on me for being Polish when the Pope is Polish I would say. I would say we are good people!I didn't even grow up with other Poles or speak the language and here I am speaking on their behalf. This Pope turned out to be a great leader. Thank God!! His leadership gave me self esteem and pride. My group had a place in this Society because we had one of us in a great leadership role. I wasn't less than the others or the dumb Pollack anymore. I was still going to hell but now I could do it with pride! I think about this and see Barack Obama as this same kind of leader for not only the black community, but all those that have felt less than because they aren't white. As time has gone on, my lack of religious affiliation isn't important anymore. I think Pope Paul did that too. He brought his brand of religion together with the other Christians. Most important, he also reached out to all the other religions beyond Christianity. He stood for people to be good to one another no matter what their views were.He stood for Humanity and civility. My school mates that picked on me didn't do this because they were exceptionally mean children . They did it because they didn't know any better. Raising the consciousness of how our actions have a negative impact no only on us but the people around us should be our priority. We stand for Freedom and Democracy, doesn't it begin here with simple humanitarianism! I have high hopes that Obama can do this too for our culture to make us one people as we should be. My experience is nothing of what the Black American has struggled through. They had to raise themselves from slavery over two hundred years of struggle. In 1863 when President Lincoln signed the Bill of Emancipation giving them freedom they rejoiced. Their rejoice came to an end as they were held down by lack of education,employment and the simple right to vote. I will never compare my simple ethnic and religious struggle to the plight of the Black American. This is a monumental moment for them. I do understand from my little experience with prejudice the pride that they are feeling. They have a great role model in Barack Obama along with many others like Colin Powell and Condolessa Rice. I hope this can be a new beginning in a more civilized America. With that said I will talk about being a women in a male society during to 60's and 70's another day. You can contact me at sandymaline@gmail.com

Political Excitement

I can't remember an election that held so much excitement, enthusiasm and interest. My 23 year old son called me from Nevada at eleven o'clock (my time) with such excitement to tell me the news about the new President. His enthusiasm is just an example of what this election has done for the American public. My son was a voter but really didn't feel that his vote counted. This election brought hope and tears of joy and relief. After placing my vote I found myself getting all choked up as I left the voting booth. This is the first time in my life that I watched every debate and stayed up to watch the final vote and the speeches from the candidates. John McCain showed his best side as a hero full of grace in his speech last night. It takes a strong and dignified man of character to stand in front of the public and gracefully take defeat. I hope that in the coming year that Obama will find a position for John Mc Cain to help in our struggle to over come the obstacles ahead.
I had such fears for our future if Mr. Mc Cain was to be elected. Even though he has fought congress and the senate for change I still felt he stood for the "Old Guard". We need to make greed a thing to be ashamed of. The current culture in the white house seems to celebrate greed and deceit. I was afraid for women's rights with the Rowe versus Wade act. I fear too much religion in politics. It is going to take a lot of work on behalf of all of us to keep this momentum moving forward. It is time to stand up against corruption in all facets of our lives. I remember when I was a little girl and John Kennedy was president. I loved him. I remember when the president made a television announcement we all watched with great anticipation of what he had to say. This was on a black and white television with really poor reception by the way. As a six year old child I would listen to his speeches and repeat different slogans like "It is not what our country can do for us but what we can do for our country". I feel the same excitement now! I have hope that we can rebuild and make this the great country that we all love. I also like to the idea of not being afraid to criticize something about our country. That we should be in a constructive state of mind. The past few years you were afraid to speak out against certain things. I was even afraid to speak out loud that I was voting for Obama because "Old Guard" was so guarded and made you feel like a communist, socialist, or a liberal. I have to say I just couldn't take it anymore! My business has been trampled by the economy, my lifestyle diminished but most important my hopes and dreams had been shattered. I have new hope that maybe I will get to retire someday. That I might even pay off my bills and mortgage. That health care isn't out of reach for me. That my retirement account could come back to what it once was! I sell real estate for a living and have for the past 24 years. Hopefully the market will start to rebuild it self starting with one step at a time. At least we are moving forward now!! you can contact me at sandymaline@gmail.com