Real Estate Zealot

Get Moving on Your New Home Search

If you are looking to buy, sell or invest in a property anywhere around Denver or Aurora, then Metro Brokers, Action Jackson Realty is the right real estate company for you. Call Regina Jackson at 720-327-9050 or go online to ActionJacksonRealty.com.

Interviewer: Welcome to Metro Brokers TV, today in the studio we have Regina Jackson with Action Jackson Realty, welcome Regina.

Regina Jackson: Thank you for having me.

Interviewer: So tell me what brought you to real estate?

Regina Jackson: You know I actually went to work for a friend who was a broker at a another company, not Metro Brokers, as a broker assistant, because at the time she didnt have any, nothing was electronic, she didnt have a database, she didnt have a website, she didnt have anything, so coming out of a telecommunications company I went to help her do that.

Interviewer: Wonderful, so what is it about your experience that you think makes you different?

Regina Jackson: Well I think I have worked in lots of different areas, I came out of Corporate America as an executive, I have owned, started a non-profit and then we went to a for-profit and I come from a military background which you know we packed up and moved every 18 to 24 months, so I really get moving.

Interviewer: You know moving.

Regina Jackson: I know moving.

Interviewer: What would you say are your areas of expertise?

Regina Jackson: Well I try and focus in the Denver city and county and parts of Aurora and I really work with residential buyers and sellers and some investors, I can do some investment real estate.

Interviewer: Great, do you have any special credentials?

Regina Jackson: I'm an e-PRO certified and I'm a Certified Negotiation Expert and one of the things that I did in my corporate life is I managed a 600 person union shop so I've got negotiation down to a fine art.

Interviewer: Great, now are you involved in any organizations or activities in the metro area?

Regina Jackson: I have been very involved in non-profits, community non-profits for years; currently I'm on the board of Community Shares of Colorado. I think I'm going to be going on the Board of Metro Brokers and I've served on lots of boards over the years.

Interviewer: Great, great. So how can clients reach you?

Regina Jackson: They can reach me on my website, www.actionjacksonrealty.com or they can call me at 720-327-9050.

Interviewer: Great Regina, thank you so much for joining me today.

Regina Jackson: Thank you for having me.

Interviewer: For more real estate related videos please go to metrobrokerstv.com.

Brian Wess of Metro Brokers is experienced with Military Relocations

Metro Broker, Brian Wess of Infinite Realty specializes in Military relocations, HUD, bank-owned properties and short sales. His experience in Colorado Springs and El Paso County will help you find the home you are looking for.

Interviewer: Hi, I am Kathy Soltero with metrobrokerstv.com and today we are joined in the studio with Brian Wess, he is with Infinite Horizons Realty in Colorado Springs, welcome.

Brian Wess: Hi, how are you doing?

Interviewer: Good, tell me a little bit about your business, where you are at and what you are doing?

Brian Wess: Well I'm located down at Colorado Springs; I handle the entire Colorado Springs community and pretty much most of the, the western El Paso County area; deal mostly with relocations, military relocations, I'm also a specialist in, in HUD foreclosed bank owned properties and short sales as well, so.

Interviewer: Right, well Brian how long have you been with Metro Brokers?

Brian Wess: I've been with Metro Brokers since 2004, and just recently opened my own office down in Colorado Springs.

Interviewer: And that is Infinite...

Brian Wess: Infinite Horizons Realty, yeah.

Interviewer: Okay, and what brought you to Metro Brokers?

Brian Wess: The talented people that work with Metro! Tony Marietta, who is, just a great friend of mine and a couple of other people who I had tremendous respect for in the industry, I discovered one day that they were all Metro Brokers and so I did a little bit of research and I found that the most experienced and most talented brokers in Colorado were Metro Brokers. So that's what caused me to come over and I joined up with, originally, with Pat Newell who is down in Colorado Springs.

Interviewer: Do you find that there are certain areas of Metro Brokers that are really helping you in your business?

Brian Wess: Yeah, the search tool is something that I use heavily for my clients, to attract business and to be quite honest just the name recognition, the signs, you know whenever somebody sees that stop sign on the yellow background, it catches their eye and they know right away that that's somebody that they can trust and know that they can deal with.

Interviewer: Do you have any certifications other than your real estate license?

Brian Wess: Actually, yeah it's funny you ask, I have a whole list of, as a matter of fact, a lot of people always go, what is all this alphabet soup after your name? I'll go down the list for you, I'm a Certified Residential Specialist, CRS; I'm also an ABR, Accredited Buyer Representative; I also have my GRI, which is a Graduate Realtor Institute and then I have Short Sale Foreclosure Resource Certification from NAR, and Certified Sellers Representative, Accredited Seller Representative, Certified Neighborhood Specialist and e-PRO technology certified.

Interviewer: Wow! So really what all of that means is that you have had a lot of education.

Brian Wess: Yeah I believe education is the key; it has always been the key to any job I've worked in. The knowledge that you have to have nowadays to do real estate properly is extensive and you have to keep updating it. I attend at least one class a month to do that and I feel it's important that I treat it as a profession, so that when people come to me they know that like when they go to their doctor or when they go to their accountant or their CPA, they are getting somebody who is knowledgeable and up to date on what is going on to advise them.

Interviewer: Correct, absolutely. Well Brian thank you very much for joining us today...

Brian Wess: Thank you.

Interviewer: In the studio and congratulations and keep up the good work.

Brian Wess: Thank you so much.

Interviewer: And for more real estate related videos like this one, be sure to tune into metrobrokerstv.com.

Join the 4th Annual Defenders of Freedom Veterans Recognition Ride

Veteran and Metro Broker, Brian Wess, invites you to join him at the 4^th Annual Defenders of Freedom Veterans Recognition Ride on Sunday May 22^nd to benefit the Wounded Warriors Project.

Interviewer: Hi, I am Kathy Soltero with metrobrokerstv.com, and today we have in our studio Brian Wess with Infinite Horizons Realty in Colorado Springs. And Brian instead of talking about real estate today you have a very important event that's coming up that you want to talk to us about?

Brian Wess: Yes I do, the 4th Annual Defenders of Freedom Veterans Recognition Ride to benefit the Wounded Warrior Project.

Interviewer: And you have been doing this how long?

Brian Wess: Since 2008, started organizing the event.

Interviewer: How did it get started?

Brian Wess: I'm a veteran myself and I wanted to do something for our disabled veterans coming back from the global war on terror in Afghanistan and Iraq. One night I just happened to be watching Bill O'Reilly and he and Tony Snow mentioned the Wounded Warrior Project, so I did a little bit of research on it, found out it was a great organization, that almost all of the funds that are donated go directly to helping the wounded warriors, so their administrative costs are very thin.

Interviewer: Well tell me about it, I mean what's a day like for this event?

Brian Wess: Well it starts off in the morning, one of our sponsors Lockheed Martin, a great, great group of people there, they jumped in right away the first year to help us and, and lent us their parking lot to stage for the event. So we start by getting people signed up and, and they pay their registration donation and we give them a pin for having ridden in the event, and then we line the bikes up and about 10:30, we have a ceremony where we have a presentation of colors by one of the local military installations, at 11 o'clock we ride out behind police escort, it's a 40 mile ride...

Interviewer: Wow!

Brian Wess: ...yeah, the longest one in Colorado.

Interviewer: Oh that's awesome, how many people would you say have participated in it?

Brian Wess: Well over the years, our first year we had about 215, second year we were up over 400, last year we were up over 500.

Interviewer: Oh that's fabulous, so what do you expect this year?

Brian Wess: I'm expecting again between 500 and 600 riders; one of the things that I'm most proud of is, in the three years that we've had it so far, we've collected just under $14,000...

Interviewer: Oh that's fabulous.

Brian Wess...and all that, every dollar goes directly to the Wounded Warrior Project, thanks to our sponsors.

Interviewer: Is that money that stays locally or does it go nationally or is it...

Brian Wess: It actually...

Interviewer: ...goes into a big national pool?

Brian Wess: Yeah it goes, it goes to the National Wounded Warrior Project and they handle it but because Colorado Springs has five military bases and we actually have at Fort Carson: a Wounded Warrior Recovery Center, a lot of that money does end up coming back to the folks in Colorado Springs.

Interviewer: Well give us the particulars, the when, where, how you can get involved in it?

Brian Wess: Well this year it's going to be armed forces weekend again like we do it every year, Sunday May 22^nd. We start registrations about 9:00 a.m. in the morning out at Lockheed Martin there on Highway 83 and you know right off of Northgate in that area, and I have a website, I'm also on Facebook this year too, it was kind of something kind of new we started, but on my website on brianwess.com we have a "Veterans Ride" page where they can go right to it and that gives them the details about not only who our sponsors are, but details about the ride, where the route is and all that good stuff. You come the day of, we only register on site, we sign you up, you pay your $15.00 if you are a single rider, $20.00 if you are a couple on the same bike and we give you your pin, you get lined up, there is some music usually you know sometimes there are some refreshments that are donated and things like that.

Interviewer: Wonderful and then at the end of the ride what happens, people just...?

Brian Wess: There is an after party.

Interviewer: Okay, okay well we had to let everybody know there is something to go along with it.

Brian Wess: Absolutely we, we actually end up out at Frankie's Too! and Poblano's in Falcon and you know, we stop and there is food and drinks specials and we hang out and socialize and you know it's just been, it's been a great day.

Interviewer: Well Brian thank you very much for telling us all about that. I think hopefully this year it will be as great a success as always.

Brian Wess: I hope so too, thank you.

Interviewer: You bet. And for more real estate related videos tune into metrobrokerstv.com.

Military Family Tax Credit Still in Effect

Doug DeWitt of Metro Brokers tells us the details of the $8,000 tax credit still in effect for active duty Military families.

Interviewer: Hi, I am Scott Shields, Director of Marketing for Metro Brokers and we are down here at the Broadmoor at the 2010 Colorado Association of Realtors State Convention. I am joined here today with Doug DeWitt. Doug, thank you for coming down.

Doug DeWitt: Thank you Scott for having me.

Interviewer: So Doug, tell us about you, you are an officer for Metro Brokers, but where exactly is your office located?

Doug DeWitt: Our office is downtown Colorado Springs. We are located at 325 North Tejon Street, right in between Platte and Boulder. Our office phone number is (719) 599-8070 and you can always catch us online at www.theproteamonline.com.

Interviewer: Thats a great location I hear. Especially being in Colorado Springs, I know there is a lot of military families down here. And I know that you have something that you have been working with down here as far as a tax credit for the military and families. Can you give us more information about that?

Doug DeWitt: Yeah Scott. I mean, what we are trying to do is make people aware of this $8,000 tax credit that was implemented back in 2009 by the federal government. It is a credit; it is not a deduction on your taxes, you really get $8,000 back. And the details are, if you are in active duty military and you have been deployed for more than 90 days, basically, anytime during 2009 all the way through May 1st of this year for 90 days or more, you are still eligible for that $8,000.

Interviewer: So the end date is the end of this year, or is it continuing to next year?

Doug DeWitt: So what you have to do, if you were deployed during that time, you have until June 30, 2011 to actually close on a home. So youve got, they still have plenty of time and what we have is several clients out there right now, where they have been deployed for this last year, hadnt had a chance to buy a home, so when they get back at the end of this year in December, we still have plenty of time to get them into a home by that June 30th deadline.

Interviewer: I think thats a great benefit for our armed services that are active and in duty right now. Tell us more about what you see in Colorado Springs as far as the market down here?

Doug DeWitt: Again the market down here is really being driven by the military. So, with an influx of approximately 20,000 active duty soldiers coming back from overseas over the next two years, thats really whats sparking our industry. We are doing quite well down here in Colorado Springs with an average medium price right now, right around $160,000.

Interviewer: Well Doug, thank you for taking this time to come by the Broadmoor and see us here, so that you can tell us more about that military tax credit. For more great stories, check out www.metrobrokerstv.com.