Carl Setzer

Working in Real Estate, I'm currently dealing with a distinctly frustrating lender issue. The other agent (we represent the sellers) has been great. Also, the lender's mortgage staff have been great and responsive. But we have an appraiser who the descriptor "slow" is a glorious understatement. So, a few points of frustration on this. One is obvious: everything is backed up due to the sluggish progress of one individual. However, the bigger point of aggravation comes from this appraiser's routine failure to produce documentation in a timely manner. Being on-time is the rarity, as confirmed a few discussions. It's easy to be frustrated with the appraiser, however, that's not entirely fair. When routine incompetence isn't addressed, that's a management failure. I understand that banks and appraisers need to maintain an "arms-length" relationship. However, a documented pattern of failure shouldn't, well, can't be tolerated. It is t...

I just received an email with the following request: "if you service the following states, NY, NJ, PA, OH, MD, VT, MI, ME, CT and NH...". I immediately closed and deleted the email, for I'm in Washington. But then I started thinking, "why did the sender blast this out to the entire country?" Today, right now, with pretty much every CRM tool, you can refine your targets. With a few minutes of work, the sender of this email could've culled a few words from their message as well as targeted her message. Too many irrelevant emails and you find yourself in the spam box. This ability to customize your message makes it significantly more relevant to your customers, to your audience. It makes you look more professional, and more knowledgeable. Powerful traits if you're trying to build an audience, or come across as an influencer. Or, if you simply don't want to waste your customer's time. Which is good thing to desire. So, the data is (or should be)...

I posted this on my other blog a few weeks back, then thought it would be more relevant over here. So, without further adieu... Reading this at Venture Beat just annoyed the crap out of me: GlassUp raised $100K on Indiegogo — but PayPal is refusing to pay up . This isn’t the first time PayPal has dealt with similar issues, even to the point where their president publicly intervened in a resolution . This troubles me regarding PayPal’s future.  These rules need to significant repair if PayPal wants to remain relevant in this space. StartUps, heck, any business CANNOT operate with random and inconsistent access to funds. I think PayPal’s growth as a purchase transaction processor might be the root of these aggravations. At a brief glance, I see vigorous efforts to protect buyers from fraud. Noble, but hampering these transactions that vary from that model. Policies need to evolve with market changes. Especially market shifts that reflect your company’s goals and objectives. Da...