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Westchester

Oil Versus Gas Fuel. What do I do? | Chappaqua NY Homes

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Gas Furnaces vs. Oil and electric Furnaces
Most residential furnaces are old, highly inefficient, and a cause of high energy bills and pollution. And many are oil furnaces, which raises the question: is it worth changing to a gas furnace?

Furnace and fuels
For many years oil and natural gas heating systems were in direct competition, without no clear economical advantage of any of them.

Today, in most cases, gas furnaces are a better option due to their efficiency, cleanness, easier maintenance, and also by economical reasons. Propane isn’t such a good option, and electricity isn’t a true economical choice, except for small needs…

Fuel Prices
The oil and gas prices are still fluctuating, making it difficult to give a definitive advice. But most experts bet on gas, even considering prices fluctuations or the supply and connection charges, surcharges, discounts, etc. involving the different fuels.

Electric furnaces
Electric furnaces have low maintenance requirements and are easy to install and cheap, but they are much more expensive to operate than gas (and oil…) furnaces.

Electric furnaces should only be considered for infrequently uses and small needs, mostly in moderate climates. But in this case electric furnaces have other well positioned competitors, like modern gas stoves or even insert fireplaces…

Oil furnaces
Oil furnaces are no more a popular option. Their efficiency has risen a lot (80% and more are the standard), and there are now new high-efficient oil furnaces offered by manufacturers like Carrier/Bryant or Thermo Pride, but that doesn’t make them a first option.

High efficient oil furnaces – with a reliability that prior models didn’t offer – require a different and better chimney, often an upgrade with a stainless steel liner inside the old structure. Installing a sealed-vent model is highly advantageous, even if that costs more…

Oil Furnaces disadvantages
Oil furnaces are now a relatively clean option, but not as cleaner as the gas one; they also require more maintenance than their gas or electric counterparts, besides storage tanks and insurance costs and other higher requirements; but above all, they involve higher running costs – a trend that will not be reversed in the future, according to most forecasts…

New natural gas and propane furnaces
In most cases, switching from oil or electric furnaces to gas units is an economical option. Even if the gas furnaces require relining the chimney or a plastic venting out the side wall, as high-efficiency furnaces do.

Gas furnaces are cleaner, require low maintenance, provide higher energy savings and are more friendly for the environment. Bet on a highly efficient gas furnace system, if you are not considering hypotheses like solar, heat pumps or space heating combined with high levels of home insulation and sealing…

Propane furnaces are usually modified natural gas equipment, for regions where natural gas isn’t available.

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10 Year Prices For Bedford NY | Bedford NY Real Estate | RobReportBlog

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Bedford NY Residential Real Estate  |   RobReportBlog

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Dealing With Snow On The Roof | Bedford NY Homes – Robert Paul’s blog

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Bedford ny snow on the roof by robert paul 

With snow piling up on my roof I am afraid it might do damage or worse yet cave in. What can I do?
Lisa – Ypsilanti, MI

I have talked to many people with the same concern this week. The fact is, snow along with ice could cause roof damage. The threat of collapse is a very low probability, but possible. As I stated in my February 10th, 2010 article “preventing Ice Dams”, sometimes snow can weigh up to 30 LB per square foot. On a 1500-square-foot house with a roof surface area of 1600 square feet, that’s 48,000 Lbs or more on your roof! Some roofs aren’t built to withstand that amount of weight. The weight of a large amount of snow and ice can also cause damage to your gutters and downspouts.

The damage mostly occurs when the snow melts and refreezes underneath snow where it meets the shingles. Snow melts due to the heat from the attic, then drains to the gutters and refreezes. Now the water and ice accumulates and works back up the roof growing underneath the shingles causing damage – and in many cases melts into the house.

Using a roof rake and getting it replaced or repaired by austin roofing will help you alleviate some of the stress on both you and your roof. A roof rake is a solid piece of metal or plastic about 16 to 20 inches wide on the end of an extension pole which allows you to “rake” or pull snow off the roof. They can be purchased at most of your local hardware stores. Remove as much snow as possible from the top of the roof down toward the gutters. About 10 to 15 feet should be sufficient. Never remove the snow while on top of the roof. For obvious reasons, it is a slippery slope and snow isn’t as soft as you think to land in.

Apply calcium chloride to all ice in gutters and down spouts. Do not use sodium chloride (rock salt), or table salt, it can cause damage to your landscape greenery. I’ve seen homeowners insert calcium chloride into panty hose and lay it inside the gutters, it was successful to remove the ice. To apply, I recommend tossing it up into the gutters, sounds funny but it really is the best way. Roofers In Boca Raton will do it professionally for you at fair pricing.

There is controversy over whether or not to use a ladder when removing the snow. I believe it is much safer not to use a ladder because when the ice and snow melts, it can accumulate on the rungs of the ladder and refreeze in minutes. This is definitely a slippery and hazardous situation. You can easily fall and get seriously hurt.

Lastly, if your home continually has a problem with ice damming, have a professional check your home for proper roof ventilation and insulation. You may consider having heat tape installed in those problem areas along your roof then you’d be able to melt the ice with a flick of a switch. Heat tape is a low temp electrical cord that is normally placed along the perimeter of the roof, in the roof valleys and in the gutters and downspouts to keep the water moving during the frigid winter months. It should be installed by a professional.

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TheRobReportBlog | Armonk NY Weekly Real Estate Report

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AemonkArmonk NY Real Estate Report   |    RobReportBlog

63   homes available

$14,995,000   high price

$469,000   low price

$1,350,000   median price

4921  average square feet

$418  average price per foot

209  average days on market

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Chappaqua NY Weekly Real Estate Report | Chappaqua NY Homes – Robert Paul’s blog

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Chappaqua NY Weekly Real Estate Report | Chappaqua NY Homes

Chappaqua NY Real Estate Report  |   RobReportBlog

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84  homes available

$27,500,000  high price

$449,000  low price

$1,097,500  median price

4097  average square feet

$414  average price per foot

107  average days on market

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10 David Ogilvy Quotes that Could Revolutionize Your Blogging | Bedford Homes

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via problogger.net
A good advertisement is one which sells the product without drawing attention to itself.
David Ogilvy

Advertising is a business of words, but advertising agencies are infested with men and women who cannot write. They cannot write advertisements, and they cannot write plans. They are helpless as deaf mutes on the stage of the Metropolitan Opera.
David Ogilvy

Advertising is only evil when it advertises evil things.
David Ogilvy

Advertising people who ignore research are as dangerous as generals who ignore decodes of enemy signals.
David Ogilvy

Advertising reflects the mores of society, but it does not influence them.
David Ogilvy

Can advertising foist an inferior product on the consumer? Bitter experience has taught me that it cannot. On those rare occasions when I have advertised products which consumer tests have found inferior to other products in the same field, the results have been disastrous.
David Ogilvy

Develop your eccentricities while you are young. That way, when you get old, people won’t think you’re going gaga.
David Ogilvy

Does advertising corrupt editors? Yes it does, but fewer editors than you may suppose… the vast majority of editors are incorruptible.
David Ogilvy

Don’t bunt. Aim out of the ball park. Aim for the company of immortals.
David Ogilvy

Every advertisement should be thought of as a contribution to the complex symbol which is the brand image.
David Ogilvy

First, make yourself a reputation for being a creative genius. Second, surround yourself with partners who are better than you are. Third, leave them to go get on with it.
David Ogilvy

Good copy can’t be written with tongue in cheek, written just for a living. You’ve got to believe in the product.
David Ogilvy

Hire people who are better than you are, then leave them to get on with it. Look for people who will aim for the remarkable, who will not settle for the routine.
David Ogilvy

I avoid clients for whom advertising is only a marginal factor in their marketing mix. They have an awkward tendency to raid their advertising appropriations whenever they need cash for other purposes.
David Ogilvy

I did not feel ‘evil’ when I wrote advertisements for Puerto Rico. They helped attract industry and tourists to a country which had been living on the edge of starvation for 400 years.
David Ogilvy

I do not regard advertising as entertainment or an art form, but as a medium of information.
David Ogilvy

I don’t know the rules of grammar… If you’re trying to persuade people to do something, or buy something, it seems to me you should use their language, the language they use every day, the language in which they think. We try to write in the vernacular.
David Ogilvy

I have a theory that the best ads come from personal experience. Some of the good ones I have done have really come out of the real experience of my life, and somehow this has come over as true and valid and persuasive.
David Ogilvy

New York State Association of REALTORS, Inc. – New York housing market aided by tax credit, low mortgage rates in 2010 | Armonk NY Homes

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via nysar.com
The federal homebuyer tax credit and low mortgage rates helped bring consumers to the housing market, particularly in the first half of 2010, despite overarching concerns about the economy. As a result, 74,718 existing single-family homes were sold in New York State in 2010, a decrease of 4.6 percent from 2009, according to preliminary existing single-family sales data accumulated by the New York State Association of REALTORS. Home values remained solid as the $215,000 annual statewide median sales price finished above both 2009 and 2008.
“Without the federal homebuyer tax credit, we would undoubtedly be telling a much different story about the Empire State’s 2010 housing market,” said Duncan R. MacKenzie, NYSAR chief executive officer. “The tax credit, low mortgage rates and large inventory combined to help New York State homebuyers overcome larger concerns about the economy.”
With little chance of another significant federal home buying incentive, the future of housing in our state may well be dictated by how state lawmakers address the enormous state budget deficit…

Facebook’s next big media move: Comments | The Social Media Realtor | Katonah Homes

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via news.cnet.com

Facebook is planning to launch a third-party commenting system in a matter of weeks, according to multiple sources familiar with the new product. This new technology could see Facebook as the engine behind the comments system on many high-profile blogs and other digital publications very soon.

The company is actively seeking major media companies and blogs to partner with it for its launch, part of a bigger media industry move spearheaded in part by the recent hires of Nick Grudin and Andy Mitchell, media business development executives with respective track records at Newsweek and The Daily Beast.

Representatives from Facebook were not immediately available for comment.

Facebook, of course, is already very present in blog comments. Currently, a digital publishing outlet–say, a blog or a newspaper’s Web site–can integrate Facebook’s developer API and allow users to “connect” to their Facebook accounts, or can build in “Social Comments” in a widget of related messages. Often, users can post alerts on their Facebook walls announcing that they’ve commented, or can have a “Social Comment” turned into a status message. The new commenting product is a significantly deeper expansion of this, according to sources. Facebook will be able to power the entire commenting system–handling the log-in and publishing, cross-promoting comments on individuals’ Facebook walls, and possibly even promoting them as well on media outlets’ own “fan” pages. Undoubtedly, the Facebook “like” button will be deeply integrated as well.

Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-13577_3-20030106-36.html#ixzz1CjJ6BgFt

Real Estate Marketing – 3 Steps to Making it More Personal | Pound Ridge Homes

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via futureofrealestatemarketing.com

I must be on a lot of Realtor’s marketing lists. I’m not surprised, I know a ton of real estate agents and brokers from all over the country and I blog about real estate marketing and social media. The downside to being on all these lists (most of which I don’t remember signing up for), is the onslaught of marketing materials I receive. I get tons of postcards and newsletters sent to me and emailed to me.

I receive reminders about turning the clocks back, and when it’s time to change the batteries on my smoke detector. All of this is fine – and I know as a marketer, some real estate agents were sold the idea that the more “touches” they got to me, the more likely I am to call them to buy or sell a house.

Not only that, I was a promoter of this theory!!

I remember working with agents, getting their databases organized and getting them on a 12 month drip marketing campaign. It all sounded so great until now.