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Byron Lazine and Nicole White are two agents in Connecticut who give us their thoughts on the week’s news every Friday in “The Real Word,” a weekly video column on Inman.
This week, our hosts Byron Lazine and Nicole White discuss Americans living alone, Jason Oppenheim’s Compass comments, and Left, Middle, Right.
Topic No. 1: More older Americans are living alone
According to a recent story by The New York Times, a growing percentage of Americans 50 or older — more than 30 percent — live in their own space and nearly 30 percent of the population overall live alone. While many people talk about multigenerational households as a trend, the data seems to contradict that.
Topic No. 2: Jason Oppenheim says ‘There’s no fixing Compass’
In a recent interview with Inman’s Real Tea column, Jason Oppenheim discussed his view of Compass as “unfixable.” Lazine agreed with Oppenheim’s assertion that there’s a brokerage model “race to the bottom” that’s favoring the team structure in the industry.
However, he doesn’t think that Compass is going to go away. He believes that many agents have fallen in love with the brand. Lazine believes that someone is going to have to buy the brand and elevate it.
Left, Middle, Right
Elon Musk claims Apple has threatened to remove the Twitter app
Elon Musk claims that Apple has threatened to remove the Twitter app as part of its moderation review process, though Apple has not confirmed this.
Lazine says, however, that if Musk continues to fight Apple, Twitter can’t survive due to its market dominance. Similarly, real estate agents need to engage with Zillow, which has a monopoly on consumer attention.
Maine lobsterman urges Whole Foods to ‘do more homework’ before pulling lobsters from stores over rare whale
Since its takeover by Amazon, Whole Foods has gained a reputation for being less concerned with accuracy and more concerned with pushing out product. As a real estate agent, you know the local growers and mom-and-pop stores. You can draw attention to the local food scene and provide highly accurate information that people will respond to.
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