The Times They Are A-Changing - There's No Place Like Home

Last week I went to Boston and New York.  We visited with my daughter, a junior at Boston University and enjoyed touring Boston and showing my other kids the sites and remarkable history. After a few days in Boston we took a memorable (not in a good way) bus ride to NYC on Veteran’s Day and visited the 9/11 Memorial. It was incredibly moving. Seeing the thousands of names of those who lost their lives that fateful day was emotionally searing. The rest of the weekend we were able to enjoy typical tourist activity in New York and the gorgeous fall weather. 

Whenever I go to another city I usually can't resist taking a look at the local real estate print ads. I searched the Boston Globe, New York Times and The New York Post. While it may not be interesting to others, advertising sales was my career for 10 years out of college and local residential real estate has been my business for the past 10 years so I am often curious about other markets and how real estate firms advertise their listings and their brands.  In nearly every newspaper there was very little real estate advertising.  Actually there was very little advertising of any type of products or services. Newspaper advertising is simply disappearing. Total newspaper ad revenue is down 63% from its all-time high in 1988.  Advertisers are simply investing their marketing dollars online.  This is true in the real estate world as well.  Online advertising for real estate makes more sense and is certainly more practical. The real estate market is a live market where prices of homes for sale change and inventory fluctuates and varies.  It is much easier and more effective to reflect these changes for interested consumers online than in print.  While riding the T in Boston or the subway in New York, many more people were reading on their Kindles, iPads and smart phones than reading newspapers.  The same is true in airports.  We live in an electronic world with electronic advertising.

When we returned home there were a few newspapers in the driveway.  They went directly into the recycle bin. 

Please feel free to contact me at smolitor@koenigstrey.com with any comments or questions.