February 23, 2007

Applied second coat of poly on the floors on the Miami property. They took longer to dry than expected. I did not have the heat on because I thought it would be too dangerous (fumes/explosion), but the directions said that as long as there was no open flames it should be alright. The fumes aren't that bad on this new poly. I left the heat on and cracked windows. Hopefully it will be dry tomorrow, and I may put a third coat on.

Going to the annual Home and Garden Show tonight at the America's Center and Edward Jones Dome. Kim & Gary are going with us. I always come away from the show with some great ideas.

Figures for this weeks closed/sold single properties in area two (South City) of St. Louis from the MLS listings:

3950 Schiller - 659767 - 47,000

4324 Connecticut - 681138 - 70,000

4707 Tesson - 705397 - 74,000

4753 Dahlia - 676813 - 80,000

4146 Beethoven- 681369 - 85,000

3843 Eiler - 670472 - 100,000

3937 Eileer - 677178 - 101,000

3617 Lawn - 671477 - 104,000

5441 Nottingham - 683775 - 106,500

4162 Oleatha - 661126 -- 108,500

7429 Parkwood - 704479 - 124,000

5238 Sunshine - 647512 - 127,000

3635 French - 702762 - 129,900

6605 Tholozan - 682037 - 140,000

3171 Leola - 646510 - 145,000

4167 weber - 702551 - 149,900

5610 Walsh - 666239 - 160,000

6415 Potomac - 666407 - 162,500

5921 Marwinette - 701814 - 170,000

5738 Finkman - 661000 - 178,000

3822 Hartford - 679672 - 184,000

5525 Walsh - 642308 - 187,000

3814 Lindern Tree Lane - 659785 - 300,875

Today' Quote: "Laughter is the shortest distance between two people." Victor Borge

I've included a pic I wanted to share: It is of the CHIHULY, Glass in the Garden exhibit that was at our world famous St Louis Botanical Garden. I took this when a friend and I visited the exhibit last fall. I thought the exhibit was very well done.

February 22, 2007

What beautiful weather we're having. So much warmer and sunnier than last week. I hope it continues.

Norma called last night. Uncle Bill is home. I don't think I will make it down home to see him this time, though.

Talked with David McCabe today. His dad passed away last night. David told us that "Poo Bear" also passed this week. He had been battling cancer for some time. It's been a very bad week for David. He made the arrangements today; tomorrow is visitation for his dad; Saturday is the funeral.

Dennis spent last night with his Mom. They don't want her to spend nights alone for a while until she improves some more. He will be home tonight.

Applied the first coat of polyurethane on the floors of the apartment on Miami. It took me two hours to do. I went over this afternoon to put the second coat on, but it was still tacky in places. Hopefully, tomorrow I can get the second coat on. I wanted to do three coats, but as long as it's taking to dry, I will probably just do two. The first coat did look pretty good.

Went to drinks and dinner at Clementines with Ed Smith last night. He was in town meeting with the person who is helping him put his book together for the publisher. He's been working on this book for years, and he's excited it's finally coming to fruition. It's a book detailing his experiences teaching art to children in the many countries he's visited over the years of his teaching career.

Had building inspection today on the Chippewa property. It went pretty well; it was a gut rehabb, so there shouldn't have been too much wrong.

At the Keller Williams office meeting yesterday morning, we discussed the Art of Selling. This session was about turning questions into results - finding out your buyer's and seller's motivation through the use of questions. Some highlights:

For a seller who has to sell their present home before buying the new one: "Do you feel comfortable making two house payments?" They should list their present home first and if they do receive a contract quickly, make the contract contingent upon them finding an acceptable property within a certain amount of time (2-3 weeks, etc).

Open ended question: "Tell me about; describe for me; telll me about the home you'll buy."
Modified question: Client answers more directly. Answers the 5 W questions (who, what, when, where, why).
Close ended question: "Is that what you are saying? Is that correct?"
Tagline question: "What does a large yard mean to you? What does a quiet neighborhood mean to you?"

Use: "The market indicates" instead of "I think"

Today's Quote: "Have an attitude of gratitude."

February 19, 2007

The Bancroft house went under contract today!

Statistics - Single Family Homes Sold in Past Week - Area 2 - South City - St Louis MLS

656956 - 6121 Alabama - 20,000
639361 - 3939 California - 33,000
673222 - 3954 Delor - 60,000
677535 - 6515 Morgaford - 75,000
671477 - 3617 Lawn - 104,000
680092 - 5305 Robert - 108,000
700134 - 3961 Tholozan - 120,000
656557 - 6821 Bradley - 120,500
647512 - 5238 Sunshine - 127,000
702762 - 3635 French - 129,900
702551 - 4167 Weber - 149,900
682348 - 6220 Fyler - 160,000
701814 - 5921 Marwinette - 170,000
661000 - 5738 Finkman - 178,000
641221 - 5977 Columbia - 197,000
677551 - 3140 Harlequin - 229,000

We started sanding the floors on the downstairs unit at 3904 Miami. We should be finished sanding tomorrow evening. I am planning to apply the first coat of sealer on Wednesday. I would like to have this unit rented by the end of February.

Today's Quote: People become really quite remarkable when they start thinking that they can do things. When they believe in themselves they have the first secret of success." --Norman Vincent Peale

February 18,2007

Dennis' mom came home from the hospital today. They will still monitor her blood pressure and her kidneys. She is very glad to be home.

Weather today was sunny and above freezing. We are expecting nice weather for a few days.

I was going through old computer disks - 3.5 floppys - to see if I could open any of them. They contain the small young adult novel and short stories I had written while in my 20s. I cannot get any of them to open. I had a word processor at the time, and my computer will not recognize the disks and keeps wanting to format them. I've been thinking about rewriting the book again, so I will probably have to retype the entire thing. I hope I have a hard copy in the attic...

I was able to open one disk and found a short bio I had composed, probably for one of my college classes. It was 16 years ago. Here it is:

"My name is Tim Tanz, and I am 24 years old. I am the oldest of four. My twin sisters are 23 years old, and my brother is 18 years old. I am a returning student who commutes from Uniontown, a small town about a half hour north from Cape Girardeau. I live in a two-story house with my brother and parents; both sisters are married. I have lived there my entire life, but I intend to be moving to Cape within the next couple of months. This is my first college course since the fall of 1987, when I withdrew from the university. I had been working toward a degree in commercial art at the time, but had to withdraw for personal reasons. I have now decided to work toward a two-year degree in printing technology/graphic arts. In the last two years, I have been concentrating on getting a novel I have written published. It is a small novel, only 117 pages in length, and was written for a young-adult reading audience. It took me about a year to finish the book, and I have rewritten it twice since then. I have had it at countless publishers with little success, receiving as many as five rejections a day. I have begun work on two more novels, second and third in the series, but have shelved them until I get the first novel published. My short stories have also gone relatively unnoticed. I have also been trying to get galleries and art publishers to look at my work. I have been interested in art for as long as I can remember, but it has only been the last couple of years since I have become serious at it. I have met with some success. Recently I won awards with two of my acrylic paintings in a regional competition. Janet Dailey, a novelist who resides in Branson, MO owns one of my paintings. Although I have approached galleries across the United States, none have shown interest in my work. I have met with as much success with the fine art publishers. For some time, this really bothered me. Daily rejections have a way of causing one to lose their self confidence, and mine was about shot. Here I had planned on making a career of writing and illustrating, and no one would even take notice of my work. I thought that if all these people were rejecting my work, it surely couldn't be any good. I would never be a writer or artist. I gave up, sinking into a deep depression that seemed to last for several months. Then, earlier this year, I decided to change my perspective. Little by little, day by day, I pulled myself out of the depression. I decided to return to school and receive a degree. I did not want to continue with the commercial art program. I know the kind of art work I want to do, and I can do that on my own time. I decided to work for a degree in printing so that I can gain the knowledge to someday publish my own work. My ultimate goal is to turn out one or two books a year, as well as limited-edition prints of my paintings. I have a feeling it's going to happen, maybe not in the next couple of years, but someday I will be published. "

I'm trying to decide how I feel after reading that bio. First of all, I feel really old. Where did those years go, and what happened to my dream? I haven't written and I haven't painted. I've thought about getting back into it over the years, but I haven't been able to focus. Am I that lazy? Or did I just lose the dream?

February 17, 2007

It's a true winter day in St. Louis. It's snowing lightly and the winds are pretty fierce. The main roads are clear, but side roads are still covered. Driving is not a problem. Today is the annual Mardi Gras parade. I believe we have the third largest Mardi Gras celebration in the country (we might be number two on the list by now). I'm sure there's a huge crowd in Soulard, but we are not going to go and stand in that cold wind to watch the parade. I'm sure most of the spectators and paradees have enough anti-freeze in them to stay warm....

We did go to a Mardi Gras house party last night. About 10 people there. Had Hurricanes and good food. Also watched a movie called Sordid Lives. Delta Burke, Olivia Newton John, Beau Bridges were some of actors in it. I thought it was hilarious, and the movie hit rather close to home... It could have been filmed in Southeast Missouri; we recognized several relatives in the movie's characters, I'm sorry to say.

Dennis' mom is still in the hospital. She was admitted on Monday to St. Francis Hospital in Cape Girardeau. Her blood pressure kept dropping and she was passing out. We went down on Monday and spent the day with her. She had a really bad night on Wednesday, so we went back down there on Thursday morning. They put a pace-maker in that afternoon and she started doing much better. Then, the readings on her kidney functions was abnormal, so yesterday they did an ultrasound on her kidneys (everything looked fine) and a 24 hour urine test. Her catheter will be removed this afternoon, and if everything looks fine with that, she may be able to go home tomorrow. It's been a long week for everyone.

Presented the second contract to the sellers on Bancroft today. I hope we get this one negotiated and accepted. It's been a slow winter for me, so a sale would be nice right about now....

Today's Quote: "There are two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle." Albert Einstein

February 14, 2007

I really don't know where to begin, or how to begin, so I guess I will just jump in. My name is Tim Tanz, and I live in St Louis, Missouri with my partner, Dennis. This coming April 19th, we will have been together for 16 years. Wow, it's hard to believe how time flies.

I am a realtor by profession, licensed since 1997. Dennis & I also have several investment properties. We are rehabbing two two-family flats, doing most of the work ourselves, so it's taking quite a while to finish them. Our other two-family flat is fully rented. We also own two single-family homes in addition to our personal residence. Our goal originally was to acquire two investment properties a year, but we are running behind. We cannot financially swing another purchase until the buildings are finished and rented.

Our house is 98 percent finished. We did a gut rehabb, converting a two-family to a single family home in Tower Grove South. What a long process, and one I don't recommend for everyone. We started the demolition in 2001, and we're still working on it. I don't think we will ever be completely finished; we always find something else we want to add to it. In January, I spent 5 days tiling the master bath tub surround. As of yet, I haven't gotten the tile grouted. The week before Christmas we finished the stair railing. It was a two week process, installing the two newell posts, railing, ballusters, etc. Our Christmas party was on December 15, and on Dec 14 we were staining the railing... All-in-all, I am very proud of our work, and it has turned out to be a beautiful home. I have learned alot through the process.

I wanted to close today with a quote. I find I need constant motivation, and find these quotes helpful. Today's quote:

"The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams"
by Eleanor Roosevelt.