By Warren McNeil,

This is like cutting off a a hand to a Realtor or any kind of business professional for that matter.  It’s amazing how much we use our phones in the car! Today I really tried not to use the phone while being in motion. I must say it was very difficult. The hunt for a good Bluetooth hands-free device begins. Our one vehicle already has a hands-free system installed which works really well. You just need to be a bit patient when initating phone calls. All the voice prompts take a bit of time to initiate and sometimes you have to repeat the number like 5 times. Voice recognition still has a little way to go.

My Blackberry has hands-free on it but I don’t like the speaker phone. It’s too hollow sounding.

Being a realtor, I rely heavily on my phone. I can’t say that I am thrilled that I can’t use my cellphone while driving but I think it was a necessary law to implement. Safety first! Obviously there must have been accidents due to cellphone usage. I think it is one thing to make a call, but people are text messaging now. I think this is extremely dangerous. I have been cutoff an numerous occasions by people who were texting while driving!

Hands-free, although a bit expesive to implement, is the right way to go. We will get used to this too! After all, we are Canadians!!!

Safe driving!

Warren & Melanie McNeil | Sales Representatives, Team McNeil | Re/Max Twin City Realty, Brokerage
( 519.579.4110 | * Click Here to Email | 8 www.TeamMcneil.com, www.ClickThatBlog.com

By Warren McNeil

This is something I have never blogged about but I thought I would post a blog on our dog Mickey. Those who know Melanie and I, know we love animals. We currently have a dog name Mickey. He is a Jack Russell.

He is a really good dog. He doesn’t really act like a Jack Russell and is more of a suck then anything. He is very lovable and does really well with kids. His favourite game is tug of war and he likes to chew whatever he can get his little chompers on. If you give him a squeeky plush toy, forget about it. His only goal is to remove the squeek.

We lost our other dog earlier this year. Her name was Winnie and she died at the age of 16 1/2 years old. We really miss her. She was a Cocker Spaniel.

Thanks for reading!

Warren & Melanie McNeil | Sales Representatives, Team McNeil | Re/Max Twin City Realty, Brokerage
( 519.579.4110 | * Click Here to Email | 8 www.clickthathouse.com, www.teammcneil.com/blog

By Warren McNeil

What a week we have had. There were several tornadoes that touched down in Vaughan and Durham region. I can imagine this was devastating for the people there. Many home were simply destroyed. I heard on the news that 100s of people had to be evacuated from there homes. Fortunately here in Waterloo region we only suffered severe thunderstorms and no tornadoes that I am aware of. I was in Cambridge showing houses at the time. I was actually a bit concerned when I was out driving during the storm. Our condolences go out to those who had there home damaged.

See http://newsdurhamregion.com/article/133855

Thanks for reading!

Warren & Melanie McNeil | Sales Representatives, Team McNeil | Re/Max Twin City Realty, Brokerage
( 519.579.4110 | * Click Here to Email | 8 www.clickthathouse.com, www.teammcneil.com/blog

So we are back at it after spending a very enjoyable holiday in beautiful PEI/Nova Scotia. We drove across several of the provinces to reach our destination (Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, PEI, Nova Scotia). A couple of highlights of our trip are the drive across the 27km confederation bridge which in my opinion is an engineering marvel. The other highligh was our trip around the Cabot Trail on Cape Breton Island. Most importantly I enjoyed spending quality time with Melanie and my in-laws. We had a terrific time and would definitely go back. PEI in itself is a beautiful province. Now, when I think PEI, all I see is bright green valleys and fields of potatoes. The iron enriched soil produces some of the worlds best quality potatoes. PEI is also know for its Mussels which I’m not a big fan of. We even drove by the Cavendish french fry place!

I have to admit, that I didn’t really look into the real estate market while I was away. The biggest thing I realized is just how large Canada is. We have so much land with nothing on it. The gaps between cities are huge. The route we took was very scenic. I am definitely not complaining. I loved it!

Now back to reality! Looks like June was another good month for real estate in the Kitchener-Waterloo area. I am going to be posting the stats for June very shortly. I see positive numbers. I read in the online paper that the Bank of Canada has decided to leave the interest rates alone. This should definitely help keep the momentum. I am continually optimistic that the downturn is going to be shortlived. We are planning to busy for the last leg of the year!

Anyways, Thanks for reading my rant!

Warren & Melanie McNeil | Sales Representatives, Team McNeil | Re/Max Twin City Realty, Brokerage
( 519.579.4110 | * Click Here to Email | 8 www.clickthathouse.com, www.teammcneil.com/blog

By Warren McNeil

What’s Happening? Quite a bit actually… Our market is up this month over the same month last year. This is good news. Things have been humming along very well lately. We are seeing some multiple offers on houses in our area and they seem to be selling quicker. This is extremely good news!

I think consumer confidence is increasing despite the news we have heard or read the past few months. First-time home buyers appear to be getting off the fence and into the market. Move-up buyers are also taking the plunge. This is good news for sellers and buyers alike. I think this added confidence will help the remaing fence-sitters to make their move. There are plenty of opportunities out there.

Sellers who are thinking that they might not make as much money as they did in a hotter market might want to reconsider. Timing could be the key in getting top dollar for your house. There could be a buyer out there right now looking for a house just like yours. The same can be said for a buyer who is waiting to find that great deal.

With the interest rates at an all time low, availability of governments incentives, I think now is a great time to buy and sell. I think that the increase we have seen this month over the same month last year is a good sign that things are looking up. I am optimistic that we will see more of the same.

Hope you found the information encouraging and helpful.

Thanks for reading!

Warren & Melanie McNeil | Sales Representatives, Team McNeil | Re/Max Twin City Realty, Brokerage
( 519.579.4110 | * Click Here to Email | 8 www.clickthathouse.com, www.teammcneil.com/blog