Greetings,

I hope your new year has gotten off to a good start. Opportunity is knocking on your door. We currently have three chair positions open on our Executive Council: Membership, Web site/Technology, and Public Relations. We also need more people to serve on our other committees. You will find it surprising how much you will benefit by serving. Don’t miss this opportunity to grow your career by working with other top professionals in our industry. Call me today to learn more about how you can get involved.

At IREM Central Florida, we are doing some new things to further benefit you. For starters, we are having monthly membership meetings. By doing this, we will be able to present twice as many learning opportunities, and give you twice the opportunity for networking. This year, look for programs, such as: Industry Forecast, Green Building, New Property Tours, and more.

You can look for iCalendar dates to download our events directly into your Outlook calendar from our chapter e-mails.

We are strengthening our connection with local universities, such as UCF, which will give us the opportunity to utilize their internship programs and possibly receive group discounts on continuing education.

Our Web site, www.irem60.org, received a significant update last year. If you have not visited the site recently, you will enjoy the new look and functionality. We have more plans for improvement that you will notice throughout this year. Check out the “Calendar” section of the site to stay current on upcoming events.

We are lobbying on your behalf to ensure the interests of property managers and owners are being heard.

Sign up to participate with your chapter in our two “Habitat for Humanity Days” this year. Our first Habitat Day will be March 8, 2008.

If there is anything I or the chapter can do for you, please contact us.

Kevin Grail
CPM, President

Coastal Reconstruction, Inc., is a general contractor specializing in fire, wind, and water restoration of any type. We have over 25 years of experience in doing business in the southeastern United States. Our field of expertise is catastrophe management, and we specialize in working with property owners and adjusters to create a detailed scope of work, assisting in the negotiation of the settlement of claims with insurance companies, as well as performing the actual reconstruction. Coastal also has extensive experience in construction rehab and offers discovery services to locate the source of problems. We also perform custom commercial build-outs, built to clients’ specific needs.

We are a "one-call-does-all" company and can assist clients in any type of construction need, no matter how small or large. We are looking to establish a long-lasting relationship with our clients, so we can service all their construction needs when they arise. We are currently licensed in Florida (our home state), Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, and North and South Carolina.

Chapter 60 conducted its annual “Industry Forecast” presentation. Our talented panel of experts provided us an industry forecast for the retail, office, and apartment markets. Gary Ralston, President of Florida Retail Development, presented the retail side; Cynthia Shelton, of Colliers Arnold, focused on the office market; and Chip Tatum gave us the inside scoop on the apartment industry. Thanks to all of our experts for bringing us an exceptional presentation on our economic outlook in these markets for 2008.

Welcome to Our "Customer-No-Service" Department!

By Scott McCurdy, Coastal Reconstruction

What was the number? 407-257-4578! Ringing once…ringing twice…ringing three times and then the answering machine picks up. “Welcome to Wachovia National Bank. If you would like to continue in English, please press 1. Si usted quisiera continuar en espanol la prensa dos por favor. If you would like to make a transfer, please press 3. If you would like to make a withdrawal, please press 4. If you would like to pay off your loan, please press 5. If you would like to drive your car off a cliff, please press 6!

We all live in a world that is operating at such a fast pace, honestly we can each admit we are challenged with finding the time to keep up with everything. The one most critical thing I feel we have left behind us is customer service.

I refer to what many of us get today as “customer no service.” Where did customer service go? What happened to it, and why can we not get it back?

As an owner of a business, I realize that without customer service, we are the same as everyone else. I have never wanted to be the same about anything. One of the best TV commercials I have seen of late about this subject is a scene in a conference room, where a company’s entire sales team is sitting around this huge conference desk, and I presume the owner is walking around the table passing out airline tickets to everyone. He then proceeds to tell each of them that they are to personally go and see each of their clients face-to-face and tell them how much the company appreciates their business. Wow! What a concept, an actual face-to-face meeting with someone you do business with.

I know that some of you reading this have been in business as long as I have (about 36 years and counting). I have been around long enough to remember a time when pagers weren’t even around. There were no cell phones, no faxes, no e-mail, and no laptops either. Yet somehow, we got business done, but it was at a much slower pace. In fact, I can remember a time before ultra-efficient delivery companies, like Fed Ex and UPS. The only way to “overnight” anything was to drive it or fly it yourself. But what we did have in those days was “customer I-do-care service.” We had meetings and did lunch, uninterrupted by the ringing of Blackberry devices and cell phones.

I recently was having trouble with a bank, which I will not name, about some rental properties my son and I own together. The bank was constantly misapplying one of the note payments to the other, which made me always late on one payment. After a frustrating year-long battle of trying to get the bank to correct their internal problem, which in turn became my problem, they finally transferred me to a supervisor, whose, after a long conversation, closing remarks to me were, and I quote, “Mr. McCurdy, I wish you all the luck in the world!”

I know that everyone I have met with IREM is a cut above that grade, and I know that customer care and service is a priority on your minds. In a world where people do not seem to care about how they treat their customers, it truly leaves a lot of room at the top for those of us who do. We spend countless hours in training our field personnel on how to communicate better with our clients and try to make them understand the importance of constant client communication, even if we have no new news to report. Just a phone call to mention that is valuable, as it tells our clients that we truly do care about them and value their business. I am constantly amazed at what just a smile can do.

I was doing a take-off for an interior remodel of a retirement community in Jacksonville. This was a huge facility and they had hundreds of retirees living there. As I walked the halls, being the youngest person at the facility, it was obvious that I was not a resident there. What I noticed is how most everyone kind of had their heads to the ground. When I could get any of them to make eye contact with me, I would give them a big old smile and sweet, “How ya’ doing?” I was amazed at the effect it had on them.

No matter how little customer service we receive, we must all strive to give it back everyday. If we give to others what we truly want from them, sooner or later, it will turn itself around. And we will once again live in a world that is not filled with computer voices but, rather, people who, when speaking to others on the phone, kindly say, “How can I help you?,” and truly mean it. Customer service to the younger generation, because in most cases, they do not even know what it is or possibly even expect it.

There really are no new ideas. The old ones still work. The owners of J.C. Penney went to see the owners of Nordstrom not long after they came onto the scene. The purpose of their meeting was to try and find out what made Nordstrom so successful while J.C. Penney was failing. When the question was posed, the CEO of Nordstrom excused himself, went into his library, pulled down this thick, old, tattered book, and laid it on the conference table between everyone. He boldly told them, “We follow, to the letter, everything in this book!” When the men of J.C. Penney’s opened up the book, they found they were looking at the original J.C. Penney’s employee manual!

I rest my case!

As an IREM member, your fellow members are some of the best resources you have available to you. The IREMFIRST Message Boards/Online Communities were specifically designed to facilitate member-to-member connections, so you can easily exchange advice with your peers wherever you have an Internet connection.

How exactly do these community tools work? Here’s a real-life example; a member recently posted an inquiry about resume-writing services on the “Human Resources” IREMFIRST Message Board, and another member responded within 48 hours, directing him to www.best10resumewriters.com, a Web site that reviews and ranks the top resume- writing services. Take advantage of this extraordinary resource for members only. Post your own questions today on the IREMFIRST Message Boards/Online Communities.

Courses

• Ethics 800 March 12th (Jacksonville)
• ASM603, 604, & 605 - 4/7-11/08 (Orlando)

• 8,554 CPMs
• 3,150 Candidates
• 3,537 ARMs
• 1,942 Associate Members
• 500 AMO Headquarters
• 621 AMO Branches

2/1/08

 CPM

107

 CPM Candidate/Pending

55

 ARM

38

 AMO HQ

3

 AMO Branch

19

 Associates

22

 Friends

9

 Students

5

TOTALS

253