Wine, Web 2.0, Financial Woes and the Future
Highlights from Real Estate Connect NYC 2009
By Matt Carter, Glenn Roberts Jr. and Alison Rogers
The 2009 Real Estate Connect conference, held Jan. 7-9 in New York City, featured a wine and Web 2.0 expert; the economist behind the Case-Shiller home-price indices and author of "Irrational Exuberance"; the man behind the global empire of community sites that is craigslist; the top economist for the National Association of Realtors; and a New York Times financial news reporter, among other industry luminaries.
Gary Vaynerchuk, an entrepreneur who rebranded a family liquor store as Wine Library and has pumped up the new brand using Web 2.0 marketing techniques, lifted the audience with energetic straight talk about marketing strategies and successes. Vaynerchuk is well known for his daily video blog, Wine Library TV.
Robert J. Shiller, author of "Irrational Exuberance" and "The Subprime Solution" and co-creator of the home-price trends research technique that is at the center of the monthly Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller home-price data, detailed some scary parallels between the Great Depression days and the latest financial meltdown — as well as some unparalleled events that are occurring now — in his "Finding a Fix for the Housing Market" presentation. Shiller is known for his discussion of bubbles and the irrational psychological and behavioral causes of instability in financial markets.
Craig Newmark, the founder and customer service representative for the San Francisco-based craigslist network of sites and a popular regular at the conference, talked about politics, technology and his hopes for restoring the economy through mass volunteerism. And Andrew Ross Sorkin, a Wall Street insider who reports on mergers and acquisitions for the New York Times, engaged Real Estate Connect attendees in a session titled, "What to Expect from the Financial Markets in 2009."
Real estate industry experts also discussed the current state of the market and major changes they expect to set the industry on course for recovery. A "Bulls vs. Bears" session featured a powerhouse lineup of industry participant and a timely topic: "The Great Housing Market Collapse." Carter Murdoch, a Bank of America executive; NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun; financial markets expert Barry Ritholz; and UrbandDigs.com blogger Noah Rosenblatt shared the stage during that session.
And David Charron, the president and CEO of Metropolitan Regional Information Systems, a heavyweight regional Multiple Listing Service in the Washington, D.C., joined Bud Fogel, CEO of Midwest Real Estate Data LLC; and Scott Kucirek, the co-founder of ZipRealty who is helping to lead a statewide MLS initiative in California, in a separate conference session that delved into the future form and function of MLSs.
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