Report from the Urban Living Meetup Front
by guest contributor Carl Goodman
More than 20 Urban Living fans got together Wednesday night in the swanky VIP room of Amber Lounge in Belltown for our second Meetup. Our Meetups are great ways to connect offline, share insights about downtown Seattle condos, and build a palpable sense of community among kindred souls passionate about the urbanization of our Emerald City. And we do all this while celebrating our budding consumer-empowerment movement – and the concomitant diminishing clout of the real-estate and mortgage-broker cartel.
It’s amazing how many of us are transfixed with Matt’s personal real estate war stories and cheer him on as he exposes the conflicts of interests and marketing ploys of developers, agents, and sundry others. Too many of them co-opt our needs and desires in their pursuit of the quick buck. But as our community of Urbnlivites grows, smart real estate professionals will start listening to us and help us achieve our aspirations.
Next month marks the one-year anniversary of Matt’s launch of his completely original Web site and blog. We’re planning on organizing a celebratory Meetup to mark the occasion. Keep your ears open for date – and please use the comments to nominate a cool neighborhood watering hole with a semi-private room that we could take over.
Matt: Thank you all for coming! It was great to meet you all and hear your stories. We heard from a number of buyers. There was the conversion in Ballard, an impulse purchase at Fifth and Madison, Trace envy (we love you Justin and Rachel!), the looting of the construction site at Equinox (dude stay away from the asbestos), an under water condo in Whistler (apparently the market is turning around) and our friends at NW Property Group (we got the inside scoop on 2200 rentals.)
I’d also like to pass the torch of condo fanatic to Foster who regaled us with many stories of his investigative condo exploits.
Also a reminder to everyone that Urban Living submissions are always welcome! Sounds like everyone has a story to tell or a lesson to share and soon you will get tired of my hand wringing and improper use of their/there :).
And thanks to Carl for organizing!