BoiseBlog Celebrates 10th Anniversary!

BoiseBlog Celebrates!

 
Last Thursday quietly marked BoiseBlog’s 1oth anniversary.
When BoiseBlog went on the air 10 years ago, few knew what a blog was and blogging was in its infancy.
In fact, some thought the word “blog” was some sort of dirty word!
I began blogging as a way to explain my approach to real estate ~ working personally with just a few clients at a time vs. striving to be a mega agent with massive transaction volumes and impersonal service.
I saw blogging as a platform that allowed me to inform the public and prospective clients about how real estate really works vs. how it appears to work.
Little did I know, when I put up my first blog post on 9/16/06, that I would go on to put up 2,294 posts in the following 10 years.
In fact, I remember thinking it would be remarkable if I could ever achieve 1,000 posts a few years ago.
From the beginning, I’ve focused on providing truthful, concise insights about the Boise real estate market and the inner workings of the real estate profession.
I have intentionally avoided the usual self-serving personal promotion, bragging,  guest posts, paid advertising, irrelevant links, and other common tactics found on many real estate sites.
Along the way, I’ve declined many offers of payment to be included in Phil’s Business Directory.
I’m proud to say that every word in BoiseBlog is organic and personally-written by yours truly.
Over the years, I’ve experienced considerable pushback from some of my colleagues who wished I had kept my mouth shut about some aspects of the real estate profession.
Here are a few interesting statistics about the past 10 years of BoiseBlog:

  • 2,294 posts
  • 616,274 pageviews
  • 195,726 sessions
  • 96,463 visitors
  • 375,019 words
  • 3.15 pageviews per session (also called “stickiness”)
  • 3 minutes, 27 seconds average time per visit
  • 87 sales directly attributable to BoiseBlog
  • $22,563,986 sales volume directly attributable to BoiseBlog

Perhaps most interesting?

  • 29,951 of you have visited BoiseBlog more than 100 times! (don’t you people have anything else to do ????)
  • Several people have said they’ve read every post I’ve written!
  • I’ve helped many people buy/sell homes after they followed BoiseBlog for years!

Words are inadequate to express my appreciation for all of you who have followed my real estate ramblings for the past 10 years!
Many thanks to all of my loyal followers!
 

My Home Flooding Update

I’ve learned more about home flooding over the past four weeks than I ever wanted to know.

I remain amazed at the amount of damage a few minutes’ overflowing water can cause.

It all began when our 10-year old Maytag Atlantis washer failed to shut off while filling with water.

First, there was the call to my insurance agent who called in his disaster cleanup specialists.

They arrived within two hours, pulled up flooring, removed baseboards, and set up numerous high-powered fans to begin the drying process.

It took about a week to dry things out and, wow ~ those fans are loud!

Next, I got bids from two contractors and learned much about the repair process with its myriad considerations and decisions for materials, labor, and scheduling.

Along the way, I learned that everything gets marked up at multiple levels.

After getting bids, I decided that I needed to become my own general contractor to take control of the process and the costs.

During this time, I also worked with the insurance adjustor to arrive at a settlement.

One sticking point was damaged 15-year old Red Birch hardwood.

My insurance company wanted to replace only the damaged wood and try to refinish it to match.

The contractors disagreed with that approach and thought it would be impossible to match new wood with 15-year old wood.

Ultimately, we were able to reach agreement on replacing additional hardwood and settle the claim.

When I got my settlement check, it was made payable to both myself and my lender, requiring the lender’s endorsement on the check before I could cash it.

Then, I learned that the settlement payment would include two separate checks, requiring my lender’s endorsements on both checks.

I’m still waiting to get the second check back from my lender.

To make life more interesting, the flooding occurred a few days prior to closing my refi loan.

Thankfully, the appraiser was here three days before the house flooded and my refi closed without any problems.

Now, four weeks after the flooding, most of the new flooring has been installed after enormous disruption and inconvenience.

Over the past four weeks, we’ve walked on subfloors coated with original construction dust (that’s impossible to vacuum), ground that dust into the carpets, collected a thick coating of dust throughout the house, dealt with disconnected toilets (one at a time!), and endured considerable noise while working from home.

We also had to remove the dishwasher, gas range, and refrigerator to facilitate replacing the kitchen hardwood, which meant moving those appliances into the Great Room with no way to cook at home.

The rest of the flooring will go in this week, then the final task will be replacing the baseboards that were destroyed while replacing damaged flooring.

Baseboard replacement will include buying the baseboard, having it painted, and having a finish carpenter install it.

Fortunately, we were able to apply the insurance settlement toward some upgrades that we had wanted to do anyway.

After more than a month of disruption, the house should be back to normal in the next week or two.

Lessons Learned

  • Keep a close eye on any appliance that is connected to water.
  • Never leave your home when an appliance connected to water is running.
  • Install water warning sensors near appliances connected to water (they cost around $30 and are similar to a smoke detector).

I hope you never experience what I’ve experienced in the past month!