The week of February 1st through February 4th, 2010, the New York Association of Realtors held it’s winter meetings in Albany, NY at the Desmond Hotel.

During the week, the Chair of the Technology Forum organized a workshop, very much like a Real Estate Barcamp to help educate the members on different areas of Social Media and technology.  I was asked to participate in the area of Social Media for the agent.

The Technology Forum was under the Moderation of Bettie Meinel and the Round Table Discussion Leaders were:

Steve Babbitt, Broker Associate with ReMax Realty Group and 2010 President-elect of the Greater Rochester Association of Realtors
Topic: Social Networking – Agent’s perspective

John Reinhardt, Fillmore Real Estate President/CEO and 2010 President of the Brooklyn Board of Realtors
Topic: Social Networking – Broker’s perspective

Sean Dowling, NYSAR Network Administrator
Topic: Mobility Devices

Austin Moran, NYSAR Director of Information Technology
Topic: Video

Sal Prividera, NYSAR Director of Communications and Marketing
Topic: NYSAR.com

According to Sal Prividera, the feedback from the event was extremely positive and there will be more events like this in the future.

As I was summarizing my thoughts on the sessions to the group at the end, I said to them that they had just attended their first rebarcamp!

For our State Meetings in September in Rye Brook, NY, I plan to help organize and host a rebarcamp.

Anticipation

There is always an excitement about going away as the time approaches and the anticipation starts building towards the day or the event. Isn’t that true with you too? For me it definitely is!

Well, for me, next week is rebarcamp Ohio and I am getting excited about it. It is my first barcamp to go to. I am been wanting to go to one of them since I first heard about them in New York City before the Inman Conference. Since then, I have been following the rebarcamps in Atlanta, Charlotte, Philadelphia, Boston, Phoenix, and San Francisco. Here is a link to the sites:

Fortunately for me, Bobby Carroll from Dakno Marketing was there to video stream many of the sessions and I was able to participate in a small way and pick up some good ideas and tips. Use this link to watch the next one if you can’t attend the next one.

You might ask, What is a rebarcamp? It is an unconference where real estate agents and others get together to learn from each other. It has grown out of a desire for real estate agents to network and improve their business by using social media.

Since their inception last year in August at the Inman Conference in San Francisco, they have sprung up all over the country. Once again real estate agents are taking the lead to use and promote the newest technologies in their business.

Are you? If you aren’t call me, no twitter me at @RochesterREguy and I’ll get you started.