There is definitely a change taking place right now in the Memphis real estate market.  Like the picture above, the fog is lifting and the city is starting to come alive again with real estate transactions starting to show improvement in many areas.  The change can be seen very clearly in both the residential retail market and the residential investment market.  The Memphis Area Association of Realtors (MAAR) has reported some very interesting numbers over the last two months.  Sales are up.  Pricing is up and properties are moving quicker.  All of those are good signs for the Memphis market.

This may be a first for us.  We are printing a response we received to an article we wrote on our blog.  Not to mention, we hardly ever print articles written by other people.  But this one is different.  This response was emailed to me from a very valued relationship we have in the lending community.  Kathleen Kramer, of RPM Mortgage, has been a trusted confidant for the past two years and has assisted with private money programs for our company. Kathleen also has reviewed and advised us on our procedures and processes and visited our offices here in Memphis.  We have tremendous confidence in her knowledge of the lending industry, so when she sends us an email response to our recent blog article...well, we listen!  

Memphis Invest, GP was on the Inc. Magazine FastestGrowing Companies list for the second year in a row moving up to #303 in 2013 from #1320 in 2012.  This is a tremendous honor as Memphis Invest, GP joins a prestigious - and exclusive - list of companies that has included Zappos, Microsoft, Jamba Juice, Under Armour, Oracle, Clif Bar, and Otterbox, just to name a few.  This is an impressive list and is an incredible distinction for the Memphis real estate investment company.

What does Quality mean?  I am not talking about the qualities of a company - the description that people use to describe the company.  I am talking about Quality as THE description of a companies work.  The way clients and competitors alike describe their work, their craftsmanship and their processes.  All real estate investment companies have qualities, but not all real estate investment companies have Quality.

When my fourth child was born I picked up a comment card at the hospital on our way out.  It had a picture of 4 circles on it and the words "Service ~ Teamwork ~ Quality ~ Integrity" printed around the circles.  The card opened up and there was their Mission Statement and a few questions and lines for comments.  I grabbed two cards.  One so I could respond with how impressed I was with the level of care they showed and the other I kept as a reminder that these were absolutely four characteristics of our company.  These were four areas that not just the owners, but every single person at Memphis Invest had committed to work to improve on every day.  I saved it for a day just like today.

Real estate is a fickle beast. There are ebbs and flows, ups and downs, and...well, you catch my drift. Real estate investing is not like buying a car or a computer or a new refrigerator where you can point to a certain day on the calendar and know what something will cost on that day.  Real estate investing is all about trends and the key is to be able to recognize trends. Is it a buyer's market or a seller's market? Is it a market that's in transition from one to the other? If so, how rapidly is the market changing?  More importantly, is the information I am watching actually telling me something or is the trend a very subtle one meaning that even as it moves - in either direction - the timing is still good for buying real estate.