Date Archives: February 2014

Old Dominion Realty recently underwent a "makeover."

With the goal of giving customers an easier-to-use, more up-to-date website experience, Old Dominion Realty redesigned its Property Search and Search Results features.

Jessica Phillips, Old Dominion Realty Marketing and Technology Director, commented, "We are constantly researching new technologies to help our customers find homes in the local Virginia and West Virginia real estate areas."

"We think the time we spent redesigning this portion of our website was well worth it.  Our changes make the search cleaner and easier to use.  Our results page features now include:  three ways to view property -- List View, List View with Map, and Gallery View; the ability to scroll through and browse home images from the search results page, and an enhanced photo viewing system to view larger, more detailed images of the home."

"Our online marketing partner, Delta Media Group, has provided us with some of the most robust real estate technology in the industry today."

Old Dominion Realty's new real estate search is compatible on tablets, especially the iPad. This compatibility also includes this photo browser on the search results.

In addition to its new property search results feature and photo viewer, Old Dominion Realty has recently added property videos onto many of their website's property listing pages.  Old Dominion's videos allow home buyers to "tour" a home online before actually scheduling an appointment.

Ms. Phillips commented, "Our goal is to always serve our customers in the best way possible.  Our recent site enhancements along with the live webinars scheduled throughout this year were done to make the home buying and home selling process easier for our customers.  Old Dominion Realty is built on integrity with proven results."

The In's and Out's of Becoming a Licensed Real Estate Agent in Virginia

To obtain a License to sell real estate in the state of Virginia an individual must attend an approved required 60 hour pre-licensing course called Principles of Real Estate.  This course is offered in several different formats.

1) Community Colleges and Universities such as Virginia Tech and New River Community College have offered this class in a semester long format.

2) Correspondence courses provide printed materials for self-study and are available through Moseley Real Estate School and other providers.

3) Online study is available through McKissock and other providers.

4) Classroom format is available at our Old Dominion Harrisonburg Office. We have partnered with Moseley Real Estate School to offer this service.  Visit the Career page at ODRVA.com for more information.

The Virginia Department of Professional and Occupational Regulation webpage identifies all approved providers for the Principles Class at this URL:

http://www.dpor.virginia.gov/uploadedFiles/MainSite/Content/Boards/Real_Estate/A490-02PRE_LIC_CRS.pdf

Once the classroom work is complete, a candidate must schedule and sit for 2 portions of a PSI examination and pass the National and State portions of that exam.  When both portions of this exam have been passed an applicant can then apply for a license at DPOR (Department of Professional and Occupational Regulation) or REB (Real Estate Board).

Cost:  Note*-these figures are based on estimates and average costs of fees to get started.

*These costs are an estimate. Actual costs may vary according to area.

Author of this blog article: Micah Branson