Pam O'Connor

Gosh, Jay, you misunderstood. My point was that there needs to be a convergence of 'less space/overhead' with 'company culture/teamwork' that is difficult to build when there is no physical way to interact; i.e., an office. Look at many of our members - @properties comes to mind in Chicago - who have done a fabulous job of bridging this gap of getting away from huge offices you could shoot a cannon through, but still creating a vibrant, energizing (cost-effective) place where agents can come, congregate, and benefit from each other even if they do the lion's share of their work from a home office or out with clients. That balance is what I was talking about, and it's very difficult if not impossible for purely virtual companies to provide that. The other point is that a presentable office does play a role -in my opinion - in establishing credibility with consumers. If I'm entrusting a major transaction to a professional, I kinda want to know they have some corporate stability. The office helps tell that story as opposed to meeting with an agent in his or her extra bedroom-turned-home-office.

Great points, Bernice! Ten years from now, people will be sitting around the dinner table saying "we shoulda bought that house in 2010!" It's up to us to help them make it happen.

I believe Arthur Sterbcow, president of Latter & Blum Inc. Realtors in New Orleans, was among the first - if not the first - to post a for-sale home listing on the Internet back in August of 1988. He said people actually yelled and screamed at him for "misusing" the Internet for commercial purposes. Clearly, he was a little ahead of everyone!