Rob Hahn

Managing Partner of 7DS Associates, and the grand poobah of this here blog. Once called "a revolutionary in a really nice suit", people often wonder what I do for a living because I have the temerity to not talk about my clients and my work for clients. Suffice to say that I do strategy work for some of the largest organizations and companies in real estate, as well as some of the smallest startups and agent teams, but usually only on projects that interest me with big implications for reforming this wonderful, crazy, lovable yet frustrating real estate industry of ours.

Rethinking the REThinkFuture Program: Part 1

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At Inman Connect this year, I was fortunate enough to be invited to participate in REThink Future, an initiative of NAR that attempts to open up the strategic planning process to the membership and to some non-members (like me). Given that I do strategic planning for a living, and given that I have a few … Read more

On That Strong Buyer Demand Thing…

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First, watch the video above. It’s my doppelganger Lawrence Yun, Chief Economist at NAR, explaining the 1.4% drop in June pending home sales. This comes on the heels of bad news about June released several days ago: June Existing Home Sales down 5.4% June New Home Sales down 8.4% And predictably, the media and various … Read more

Magical Thinking vs. Boring Reality

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  Facebook can sometimes be a gold mine for content. Consider these two seemingly unrelated events: Marie is a friend who used to work in the real estate industry, as the Director of Marketing for MRIS. She relocated to Florida, and asked me months ago for some agents I knew in the area. I didn’t, … Read more

Real Estate Hope and Change for the Hope and Change Generation

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My friend Eric Stegemann, a Millennial himself, tweeted out the following article from BusinessWeek talking about the “Lost Generation” of Homeowners: For some analysts, the scariest outcome of the collapsed home-price bubble is that it could turn an entire generation of would-be homeowners into perma-renters. Yale economist Robert Shiller floated the idea of a “lost … Read more

On Pinnacle: Interview W/ Stefan Swanepoel and Jeremy Conaway

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Recently, I found out that the Pinnacle Group Project — something I had heard rumors about for a few months — had officially launched. What the hell is Pinnacle? From the website (the URL is “thechangechampions.com” by the way): A two year intensive course of study for Association Leadership and Management. This program includes: Eight … Read more

Episode 5 of Trialogues Podcast is Up

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In case you didn’t know, I’ve been having some fun with Matthew Shadbolt of Corcoran and Gahlord Dewald of Thoughtfaucet on a podcast thing of late. Episode 5 is now up: http://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/trialogues-conversations-on/id524756328 Take a listen if you enjoy the kind of impractical, highly theoretical ramblings that we happen to like. 🙂 -rsh

NAR the PAC: Three Questions

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I’ve been having a twitter conversation (remember those?) with my good friend Mike Pennington, who is not only one of the guys behind RETSO, but is an active member of his local and state Association of REALTORS, about NAR and political power. I assume it’s because of either the Trialogues podcast in which we discussed … Read more