Whether you are an established family or just starting out, you probably have property that is covered under your insurance. Items like your automobile, furniture, and personal possessions are some…

Inman News has launched an online survey, "Beyond Brick and Mortar," that seeks your input on the changing real estate brokerage office.

Share your insight on ways in which brokers are finding greater efficiencies in operations and agents are finding greater mobility through technological innovations.

We are offering a $200 Amazon.com gift card as a prize to a survey participant, selected at random.

Our congratulations to Mauricio DeFrancisco, an agent with Fortune International Realty in Weston, Fla., who will receive a $200 gift card for his participation in a previous survey focused on real estate commissions.

During the month of March, Inman News will be publishing stories focused on rethinking the traditional brick-and-mortar brokerage office and technologies enabling virtual brokerage operations.

We are offering a free pass to the upcoming Real Estate Connect conference in San Francisco (Aug. 5-7) to the author of each essay that we publish in full (essays should be 500-1,000 words and should not promote a particular company) that is focused on the reshaping of the traditional brokerage office and the role that the office plays in agents’ daily work. Click here for details.

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A post that Phoenix-based broker-owner Jay Thompson wrote for his blog, "The Phoenix Real Estate Guy," is turning up on page one of Google search results for "home buyers tax credit" — higher than the IRS, Realtor.org and mainstream news, he Tweets.

The tax credit is a hot topic right now because the new stimulus bill expands the existing $7,500 tax credit for first-time homebuyers (anyone who hasn’t owned a primary residence in the last three years) to $8,000, eliminates a requirement to repay the credit, and extends the previous July 1 sunset to Dec. 1.

That’s not quite as much as the $15,000 credit for all homebuyers that was in the Senate version of the bill, but the news is generating lots of interest on the Net. Thompson demonstrates how to capitalize on such news events: with a thorough, accurate table comparing the existing tax break to the new one.

Thompson doesn’t rank as high if you use the more formal search term, "home buyer tax credit" (with no s after buyer — both searches conducted without quotation marks). Nevertheless, an impressive accomplishment for a blog to land on page 1 of Google search results.

Another facet of massive stimulus bill that you can capitalize on in your blog because it’s getting lost or buried in many news stories: The legislation reinstates the higher $729,750 loan limit in high-cost areas in place for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and FHA during much of 2008 (see Inman News story).

Get more tips on blogging from Thompson and more than 380 other members of Inman.com Real Estate Bloggers group.

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