Hey gang!
I am recovering from 3 days of CE and man was it a good bit of info to be exposed to. The main theme of the conference was related directly with fraud in the appraisal industry, mainly with mortgage transactions. I got in one class about Institutional Fraud, put on by NAIFA, and a class about appraisal reporting fraud, put on by the institute in conjunction with FNC.

There was a real gathering of high quality appraisers there. I talked with many and you can tell when someone is serious about ethics. To say the least I was very impressed.

We had several panel discussions: Government lending, Non-Origination Panel, Lender Panel, Key Note address by Chris Low, chief economist for FTN, and a panel of AMC companies.

The best one, labs related of course, was an hour about...(drum roll, please) GIS, and appraiser assisted valuation modeling. The guy putting it on, Mark Linne (who's ancestor was the guy who created genus film organization for biology, kind of a big deal), is an appraiser that is very qualified to value, but specializes in information technology.

He is a firm believer, as am I, that appraisers are bridging the gap between AVMs and traditional appraisal products. I will be writing an more in depth article about this,as it really is one of the most intriguing things I have seen in many years.

The only thing I was disappointed with was the failure of Bill Raeburn,CEO FNC, to address or mention the hundred million dollar lawsuit that was filed against them for data stripping. I happen to be an admirer of one of the plaintiffs, and I feel like it was improper to leave it just to sit out there. Data is such a big deal right now in our business that it should have either been mentioned or explained. Just my take, what's yours?

Sites to see for August 24:

An overview of the evolution and possible direction of client-based mobile positioning technology.

How Social Media Influences Change in the Marketplace with respect to real estate.

Protect yourself from bluejacking and bluesnarfing and other threats to your mobile device security.

Recommendations on Tablets and UMPCs.

Want a video rundown of how mortgage fraud works, complete with an appraiser's perspective? Film at 11. Let's all chip in and buy Gary Crabtree a Disto!

While you're waiting for Virtual Earth integration into Aurora and Armstrong, you can play with new sky/space views on Google Earth.

Have a great weekend!

Today we released another update to DaVinci from our labs and it contains many nice improvements. To download the update, run the Instant Customer Update under the DaVinci program group in the Windows Start menu. There's no need to uninstall DaVinci. Just run the Instant Customer Update. Here's a brief rundown of the improvements we've added:

• We've improved the ability to "cut out" a new area from an existing one. You've always had the ability to easily cut out a garage from an existing first floor area. Now we've added the ability for DaVinci to automatically redraw the original area and recalculate the dimensions and square footage for both areas. To do this, just start drawing the new area by beginning on the wall of an existing area and then ending on a wall of that area.



• We've improved the area calculation options. You'll notice this is easier when you close a shape and the calculation options are displayed. Now you can quickly choose whether the area is living space to be calculated as part of the GLA, or non-living space, or if it should be subtracted from the living space (for things like "open to below"). We've preset the calculation options for each area definition. So, for example, "garage" area types are preset to "non-living area."



• We've added a new Critical Items feature. This is similar to the Critical Items feature that exists in Pocket Total, only now it's completely customizable. You'll see the Critical Items tab under the Data view. This is a compiled list of every field in DaVinci that has been marked as "critical". This gives you a single view of the items you want to make sure you have covered before returning to the office. Marking or unmarking an item as critical is easy. It's been added to the Customize screen for each Data tab and Room Features screen.



• We've made multiple improvements to the sketching code. You can now draw interior walls with digital ink and pen. We've added more gestures for changing the names of area types and room labels. Just write the first few letters of what you want to change in ink (like "kit" for "Kitchen") and DaVinci will change the text. We've also added buttons to the toolbar for centering the sketch and for panning in any direction.

As you can see, we've been busy. But we're not finished yet. Remember, this is still a prototype from our labs. We'll be releasing more updates in the near future, before it goes to beta, so stay tuned. Your feedback is always welcome, so please continue to send it to us. Just send a message to labs@alamode.com.

Also, we'll be conducting another online seminar next week where we'll go over the recent changes to the product and give you some tips on how to use DaVinci more effectively. It's scheduled for Wednesday, August 29th, at 12:00 noon Central Time. To register, click here.

Please plan on attending. It's free and I'm sure you'll find it useful.

Regards,
Chris Low

I have just about finished Part I of the Regression Labs initiative. This includes a discussion of market modeling (which includes AVMs). It will also include a down-loadable regression application that runs in Excel (this application will run until the end of the year). It is designed to download data from your local MLS (Your MLS must download to a spreadsheet). I am looking for appraisers that have been using regression analysis and can give me some input. Be watching for this article on the Lab's site.

What's your opinion of integrating GPS technology directly into future versions of WinTOTAL? It occurred to me that up until this point, no one has asked. It's seems logical and the feedback we received at the a la mode Convention was overwhelmingly positive but what does the appraiser on the street think?

GPS Integration is my pet project. The idea came to me from appraisers just like yourself who have great difficulty obtaining accurate maps for properties that are either new (or newer) or vacant land. For those of you who need a refresher or want to know the full history and the how and why, I encourage you to read my article from the Labs website located at http://www.alamode.com/labs/articles/A013.aspx. Even if you don't consider yourself an especially technical person, wouldn't it be worth making a $100.00 or so investment in a handheld GPS device that, along with it's integration into WinTOTAL, would allow you to map every property accurately every time with almost no possibility of error (user error excluded of course).

The concept is simple but we are finding the execution isn't so easy. We'll get it done mind you but it's taking some time. The many different GPS devices on the market are causing some headaches but we'll get through it. Hopefully, a version of GPS integration will be out in Beta shortly. I've seen the latest testing version and it's coming along nicely.

Please review my labs article and let me know what you think. You're honest opinions are very helpful and this Blog is a perfect forum. I know I'm opening myself up to those "Why don't you fix WinTOTAL before you add another feature?" responses but I can take it. I think this tool will be simple, practical and very useful but I'm not the one who will be using it. Please let me know...if will build it, will you use it??

Jeff Jones
TechSource
Appraiser Technology Consultants

I hope all of you guys had a great couple of weeks since my last post. I have had a great several days and I am looking forward to more good times and profitable experiences in the near future.

Here are some points that I wanted to update everyone on:

Labs related: I am still looking to get some development help with the comps exchange. We are still letting the idea "germinate", but hopefully we'll get it rolling some enough.
I have been fiddling with David Braun's regression tool he has in excel, and i am very impressed with it. I have actually been using it in the real world a bunch. It has given me back some really good data, and it is pretty close to where it needs to be with established values for a given neighborhood.

Business Related: I will be attending The FNC Appraisal Port Convention in DC the later part of this week. Before anyone starts tossing produce at me, I am not exactly a fan of them, but they are so large that I pay attention to what they do, and what directions they are heading. They are focusing strongly on collateral stuff, and as such I have been gearing my office in that direction as well.

Personally: I got to see David Beckham debut in DC a week and a half ago, and I was excited to see someone of his caliber playing in the MLS. Whether you are a fan or not, he is arguably as big a catalyst as Magic Johnson was for the early says of the NBA. Just as an example, the New York game this past weekend went from and average attendance from around 12,000 to over 66,000 to see "Becks" play. He really is that big a deal.

Hope to hear from you guys soon, and i pray that you all stay busy. If I can be of any assistance please feel free to email me.

There's a new podcast interview up on this site and the labs site, this one with Research Fellow David Braun. David shares his thoughts on his role in the labs and the labs' importance to appraisal technology.

On this site or on the labs home page, find the "Listen to podcasts" link on the right menu. When you click on it you'll see five interviews available for listening, including the new one. Hit the "play" button to listen right from the page. Then let us know what you think by posting a comment below!

In a software company like a la mode where we do everything in-house and mostly at our OKC headquarters, tech support and sales really are the "front lines" where you get thousands of issues thrown at you daily. Our tech department really buzzes, and we actually have it smack dab in the middle of the building so it's kind of like a 24/7 pulse for the rest of the company. So, even though we don't see the customers face-to-face on a regular basis, we're constantly aware of what's really important.

Something else kind of cool is that most of a la mode's management and product teams actually started in some capacity where they worked with customers every day on the phone - and we can't help but take that with us in whatever role we're put in.

So, after a few years of being a la mode's EVP of Customer Service and overseeing the support and documentation teams, I'm returning to my role as a Product Manager, and my customer service mentality is still on overdrive.

In support, it was a given that if an appraiser mentioned they were getting a new PC, we knew we'd be talking to them several times over the next week while they switched everything over. It's not that things really malfunctioned. It was just a tedious process that had a lot of details to get right. (The documentation for moving WinTOTAL to a new PC is on our website at http://help.alamode.com/docs/backup.) We're more than happy to help people over the phones with this type of stuff and have the staff to do it - but the point is that the customer is supposed to be doing appraisals and is typically getting behind while messing with a new computer. Not good.

Now, could you use the Vault to move everything? Sure. But, you'd need to buy a lot of space and have a really fast Internet connection to move your gigabyes and gigabytes of data. The current Vault is unbeatable as an automatic, incremental, off site backup for WinTOTAL. But if you're doing a one-time shot to a new PC, it would make more sense to use one of the readily available and shockingly inexpensive removable USB drives - that's what I'd do.

So, one of my first tasks as a Product Manager was drawing up specs for a simple utility we could add to the Vault that would automate archiving a WinTOTAL installation with data to a removable hard drive and restoring it to a new system. The specs are in - it's a simple 4 step wizard - and the most difficult thing you have to do is plug in your removable drive and know how to browse to it. Sound like something you could use?

Since it's not all that complicated of a utility, we should have it out by autumn - just in time to help out all those folks getting new PC's at the end of the year sales.

Matt Krodel
Product Manager, Appraiser XSites
a la mode, inc/

Collaboration Concept

With the prices on computers continually dropping lower, gas prices moving higher, and appraisers collaborating from remote locations more, you are more mobile, flexible and technologically savvy than ever. E-mail, being an unreliable and sometimes frustrating tool, simply isn’t the most ideal way to shuttle files from one place to another. I hear from customers all the time that there needs to be a better way to move a file from one PC to another. With Armstrong on the horizon and Aurora pretty well tamed, I’ve been thinking of ways to solve this problem in WinTOTAL.

Today, how do you move a file from one PC to another? E-mail the ZAP from inside WinTOTAL to yourself and then grab it once you get home, upload it to the Vault and then download it from another location, move it to a USB drive and then take it to another computer, or some other way I’ve not thought of (you guys are crafty after all). None of those methods are necessarily a huge problem, but I think we can save you some trouble.

I’d written an article on Live Messenger’s capabilities, one of which being the Sharing Folders feature that lets you share files between people, but there’s also another tool I’ve used for some time that I think is better suited for appraisers and has given me an idea.

FolderShare is a free tool you can get from www.foldershare.com. In short, you make an account, and then install it on all the machines you want to be able to move files to and from. A specific folder on each PC is made, and then whenever a file is moved into that folder, it’s synchronized with all your PCs FolderShare folders. So, you could add your FolderShare folder as an attached directory in your Appraisal Desktop on each machine, and then when you want to work on a file from home, share it with a colleague or move it to a Tablet or Ultra Mobile PC, just drag it into your FolderShare folder and within seconds it’s available on the other machines (provided they’re connected to the Internet).

You can also read a very interesting article on FolderShare written by an appraiser, Brian Davis, on his blog AppraisalScoop.com.

Pretty neat, eh? My intention is to take that a step further. The premise behind FolderShare, technically, is simple. It’s something we could build on our own very easily. But appraisers don’t need to only move files to their own separate PCs, they need to be able to send them to trainees, co-workers and remote appraisers easily. Fortunately, we’ve already got an infrastructure in place that can accommodate that. The XSite.

Here’s what I’m thinking. For each appraiser in your company, if you have an XSite, they already have a profile set up in your XSite’s User Management. And Aurora communicates with your XSite already. So how cool would it be to be able to click the Folder button on the toolbar in your file cabinet, choose Add Shared Folder, choose “Bill” or “John” from a list of your XSite users, and boom, a new folder is added to your Files PowerView. Now, if you need to send a report to your trainee Bill or your remote appraiser John, just drag the file into their folder and it will then show up in their Appraisal Desktop within seconds. Because it would all be tied to the XSite username configured in WinTOTAL you could even make a shared folder with yourself so you could make a file available on a laptop when you’re at home or on the road.

I think this would be an awesome addition. Thoughts?


Adam Calvery
VP, Appraisal Products
a la mode, inc.

Well Guys & Gals, the market has finally caught up with us here in VA. We are slower now, and last week, then we've been in 4 years. I have been spending a large amount of time working on continuing ed, my website, a possible business merger, and expanding my territory.

I guess you can tell that slow times mean something different to me then they do to most. We are still working, and getting assignments, but not at the volume we were at for so long. Times like this allow us to actually spend some time mending some fences, improving some things, and working on new avenues of business.

I hope that all my colleagues out there are working in similar form. It is inevitable though, that some folks will give up the profession due to the work load levels. Unfortunately the amount of people that rushed into the industry mandates that some will have to purge themselves out. Hopefully you are not one of them.

Take the time to look through your contacts, and reestablish the lost ties you had. Work on some advertising, and increase your market value with new certs, or a higher license. Whatever you do to improve yourself, make sure you are spending the time to make your clients remember why they started using you in the first place.

Woody Fincham

It's been about six weeks since we first announced and demonstrated DaVinci at our Annual Convention in Las Vegas. Since then, we've been overwhelmed with feedback from appraisers all over the country. It's clear that we've hit a sweet spot with DaVinci. Hundreds have been clamoring for more information.

Two weeks ago I taught an online seminar -- a "webinar" -- that went over the details of DaVinci, how it works, some tips and tricks, and what we're currently working on. We had a lot of appraisers attend the webinar, as well as a similar class at the convention in Vegas. We've recorded the webinar for those of you who didn't have a chance to attend in person. Just click here to view it. I'm sure you'll find it useful.

Did you know we offer a number of live and recorded webinars each month dedicated to the kinds of things you need and want to learn right now? From Formfilling Shortcuts to Going Paperless to Driving Traffic To Your XSite, these sessions are available at your convenience and offer the kind of one-on-one training you normally could only get in person. Check out this month's schedule and invest some time in gaining the kind of knowledge you can translate into better productivity and higher earnings.

Chris Low
Executive Vice President, Products
a la mode

Well. It’s official. I turned the specs over to our development team on Monday of this week to begin integrating Microsoft’s Virtual Earth platform into WinTOTAL Aurora. I’m really excited about it, and I know you will be to. Virtual Earth (I’ll just call it VE from this point forward) brings so much more to the table when it comes to mapping than our previous system (Microsoft’s MapPoint service) does. The road maps themselves are much crisper and cleaner than previously available, and the new aerial and hybrid maps are just awesome.

When I was in Houston a couple of weeks ago for one of our seminars (and to a wider degree in Vegas at our convention) I was really happy to see how many appraisers are already including this type of imagery in their reports, whether it was from Virtual Earth’s public site or an alternative like Google Earth. This project will make that so much simpler for those of you that already do that by integrating it directly into the map wizard in WinTOTAL. With the click of a mouse button you'll be able to switch views on the fly, and zoom in or out using your mouse wheel. Super easy.

In addition, we're improving workflow by making it simpler and easier to choose what options you need for the map you’re working on by including the options screen as part of the new map process. You’ll have a choice on how you want this to work, similar to how the process worked in Athena, which is widely recognized to have had a smoother map process. For those of you that find yourself changing your options often, this will be timesaving change.

Lasty, we're working to improve how WinTOTAL handles GPS data. In the past, you've been able to manually enter latitude and longitude data into the wizard so that WinTOTAL will place properties exactly, but it wasn't obvious how to do this. We're improving that aspect, as well as building in direct integration with popular handheld GPS devices!

If you haven’t had a chance to check out the project details page on the labs website, I’d encourage you to head over there and do that. Here’s a link to make it easy. It talks in more detail about the features and timeline. Send us your feedback and comments when you get a chance! I’m really excited about this, and can’t wait to get it into our customer’s hands.

Paul E. Stansberry, III
WinTOTAL Product Manager
a la mode, inc.