You may have heard the now-pretty-famous story of how, by analyzing customers’ buying habits, Target is able to predict when a family is going to have a baby before the parents tell anyone.

Big Data (capitalize both words, please) is a big thing. See, "data mining" is old hat — that’s the science of finding unexpected connections between things, like "People who have more than one bumper sticker are more likely to be in a road-rage incident."

But when you have a lot of data, you can really go to town.

Target is doing that quite well.

Lots of people buy lotion, but one of [Target researcher Andrew] Pole’s colleagues noticed that women on the baby registry were buying larger quantities of unscented lotion around the beginning of their second trimester. Another analyst noted that sometime in the first 20 weeks, pregnant women loaded up on supplements like calcium, magnesium and zinc.

Many shoppers purchase soap and cotton balls, but when someone suddenly starts buying lots of scent-free soap and extra-big bags of cotton balls, in addition to hand sanitizers and washcloths, it signals they could be getting close to their delivery date.

Now there’s a company that’s claiming to do that for real estate — to be able to take data about a market and determine who there is most likely to become a seller.

SmartZip says it can figure out "which homeowners in your farm were considering to sell in the next 6-12 months" and help you market to them.

Let’s be clear here: VAR is not recommending it or saying you should avoid it. It could be an incredible tool or it could be snake oil. All I’m saying is "Gee, that’s interesting" especially in light of what Target (and Google, and Facebook) can do.

Check it out: Chase now lets you "Find and finance your new home" — the bank has an Android/iPhone app that lets you search for a home and then (of course) see about working with Chase for your mortgage.

Chase is apparently getting its listings via ListHub, which works with brokers and MLSs to syndicate listings (legally!).

Not surprisingly, seeing Chase doing the real estate thing gave rise to some interesting discussion — see at least some of it in comments on the 1000watt blog.

I’m not saying this is a good thing or a bad thing — I get enough hate mail already. But it’s certainly a reminder to brokers that, if and when you authorize your listings to be sent out into the wide, wide world (via IDX) that you keep track of where they’re actually going.

The first quarter 2013 Virginia Home Sales Report has been released and year-over-year state wide indicators show that the housing market in Virginia continues to experience steady improvement.

• Sales increased 3.35 YOY in the first quarter and are keeping pace with the rest of the US.
• Median sales price increased 8.2% YOY in the first quarter and is increasing slightly faster in Virginia than in the rest of the country.
• The volume of real estate sold in the first quarter increased by 11.3% YOY.

The graph above illustrates the dollar value of real estate sold (in millions) during each quarter over the past three years.  The volume of real estate sold in the first quarter 2013 ($5.4B) was a strong 11.3% increase from the first quarter of 2012 ($4.8B).  This measurement is an important indicator of continued market recovery.

Read more inside the full report:

Interesting story in the Financial Times about how immigrants to the U.S. have not only been key to the housing recovery, they will remain key to the market. It’s based in part on a report from Housing America and the Mortgage Bankers Association.

Some key points:

• While home ownership has been falling for native-born Americans over the last several years, it’s been increasing for immigrants.
• From 2010 to 2020 more than a third of your buyer clients will likely be immigrants — nationwide, they’re expected to account for 35.7 percent of new homeowners.
• That growth in foreign-born homeowner demand "is projected to remain strong in the nation and increase in all but two states, California and New York."
• If current non-citizens gain that citizenship, economists project it will result in  $100 billion being spent on housing.

The FT explains the attraction — it’s more than just latching on to the American Dream.

Property is also an attractive investment for non-English speakers. “Your investment opportunities are much more limited,” says [Leung Hon, a real estate agent in New York]. “You can’t play the stock market or buy bonds. A house is easy to understand and is seen as a form of savings.”

It’s not small, it’s “cozy.” It’s not in the middle of nowhere; it’s “private.” It’s not poorly insulated and falling apart; it’s “rustic.” And now, as Cindy Jones over at Virginia Real Estate Talk points out, for some developers you apparently don’t have a master bedroom — you have an “owner’s suite.” No word on what that means for rentals. Hopefully your landlord doesn’t snore.

Kudos to the Bristol Tennessee-Virginia Association of Realtors for hosting a debate forum for for City Council candidates — something the association has been doing for many years. 

Whatever your political views, it’s good for Realtors to be involved in local politics; it helps cement the idea that we are business and community leaders.

Hosting debates, running forums (fora, for you Latin speakers), and being involved in as many community activities as possible — keep up the good work.

Real estate investors have helped the market recover. But for the long-term health of the market, maybe they should stop now.

(To be clear: By “investors” I mean people and companies that buy single-family homes to turn them into rentals, not house-flippers.)

Here’s what’s worth watching: When all those foreclosures went on the market at deep discounts, investors began snapping them up. That was a good thing, because there was so much inventory out there that prices were staying low.

Once most of that distressed inventory was gone, though, conventional wisdom said that investors would ease off. Prices would go up and the great deals would be gone.

That may not be the case. Investors are still buying inventory — at least, that’s what economist Tom Lawler is seeing. With the Fed keeping interest rates low, it’s apparently still a good investment, at least for larger investors.

And that may not be good for the long-term of the market.

Investors aren’t planning to sell. Ever. The homes they’ve turned into rentals are going to stay as rentals — that’s inventory being taken out of the market. When someone is looking to move up or downsize, the pool of available homes is going to be smaller.

As economist/housing guy Bill McBride puts it (emphasis mine):

This investor buying is making it very difficult for first time buyers to find a home, and this is probably keeping some potential buyers as renters — and maybe pushing up some buyers to higher price points just to buy.

In the short run (the next few years), I don’t think these institutional buyers will have a negative impact on the market.  It seems unlikely they will be large sellers, and they will probably maintain the homes that they purchase. However this could impact the housing market in the future, especially the move-up market, since the move-up market usually needs previous first-time buyers to sell their first homes. Obviously institutional sellers will not be move-up buyers.

Even worse, potentially, is that by shrinking inventory and raising prices, investors might be creating a new housing bubble. (Click here for a Bloomberg article about that very issue.) That’s still speculation, though.

What isn’t speculation is that we’re already seeing an inventory shortage as sellers stay on the fence (possibly afraid to be selling at the bottom, or maybe they’re just underwater).

Those sellers will eventually enter the market, of course, but if too much single-family housing gets into the hands of investors, inventory shortage could be a long-term problem we’ll need to keep an eye on.

Fredericksburg Realtor Penny Traber (of 1st Choice Better Homes & Land) was named Citizen of the Year by the Fredericksburg Free-Lance Star, and is in the running to be named Virginian of the Year, an award given by the Virginia Press Association.

Sayeth the paper:

[Traber's] group also helps needy area residents repair their homes; mans the red kettle for the Salvation Army; sponsors families for holiday help through the department of social services; and collects food for the Fredericksburg Area Food Bank.

The ministry also heads to Ohio and Kentucky each year to build youth centers and hand out coats to low-income children. And each year, the church sends a team to Peru to help with an orphanage and host Vacation Bible School.

And.

Throughout the year, she makes dinners, collects food, visits nursing homes, organizes church mission trips, helps support an orphanage and volunteers with several area nonprofits.

In fact, Traber’s long list of community involvement is way to much to go into here, especially as Fredericksburg.com has it, and in plenty of detail.

We’re just proud that one our own has earned the title — congratulations, Penny!

Each year, EarthCraft Virginia presents awards in a variety of categories to builders, developers, and others throughout the region who demonstrate superior dedication to the advancement of sustainable housing. The Single Family Project of the Year went to an efficient solar home in Alexandria, VA. Patrick Fogarty, broker and co-owner of HomeFirst Realty was this year’s winner for building a new home with incredible energy saving qualities for about the same price as a typical new home.

Check it out:

For more information on what makes an EarthCraft home, visit them here.

Real estate agents have the happiest job in America, according to a new survey from CareerBliss. They — that is, you — beat out some sexy, sexy other careers such as “senior QA engineer,” “senior sales representative,” and “construction superintendent.”

The survey looked at more than 65,000 career reviews in which workers rated “several factors that contribute to job happiness, such as company culture, compensation and the work they do,” says the site.

And CareerBliss co-founder and CEO Heidi Golledge explains why:

“Right now, it is a seller’s market so the real estate agent’s cost of advertising and marketing is very low and commissions are high. Happy times.”

The least happy job? Associate attorney, with “customer service associate” and “clerk” ranked near the bottom.