Inside this issue
  Upcoming webinar promotes REALTOR® safety  
 

As part of NAR's ongoing efforts to keep members safe, it dedicates September as REALTOR® Safety Month. In recognition of REALTOR® Safety Month, NAR's REALTOR® Safety Program is hosting a free safety webinar on Wednesday, September 12 at 11 a.m. Cheryl Knowlton is passionate about REALTOR® Safety, and teaches how to easily adopt good habits that help keep real estate professionals safe on the job all year-round. Register now at www.nar.realtor/safety/safety-webinars.

While this month helps remind us of the importance of REALTOR® Safety, safety materials and messaging are available year-round at this link: www.NAR.realtor/Safety.

 

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  Are you too nice for your own good?  
 

No one is ever truly prepared to defend themselves against an attacker. "It goes against human nature," says Siciliano, CEO of IDTheftSecurity.com, who teaches personal safety skills to real estate professionals. "We inherently need to trust one another in order to survive."

According to Siciliano, most of us went through "civilized conditioning" as children, where our parents taught us to be courteous to others. While that's a virtue of society, it also teaches us to keep our guard down - and hampers our ability to assess true danger - when dealing with strangers. "As good as it is to make [kids] behave, it also suppresses their instinctual need for survival. So when they come into contact with a predator, they don't know how to deal with it," Siciliano says.

Click here to read the full REALTOR® Magazine article.

 

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  Top 7 safety tips for real estate agents  
 
With crimes against agents on the rise, these are practical tips for REALTOR® safety
According to the National Association of REALTORS® 2017 Member Safety Survey, almost half of female REALTORS® (44 percent) and one in four male REALTORS® have experienced a situation in the past year that made them fear for their personal safety or safety of their personal information. To help improve agent safety and reduce the opportunity for a potentially harmful situation to occur, SentriLock, a leading provider of electronic lockbox solutions, today announced seven safety tips for real estate agents.

While it might not seem like a dangerous occupation, data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows there were almost 100 fatalities of real estate professionals in 2016 alone. Predatory crimes against REALTORS® are a growing problem, with criminals often seeking out opportunities to isolate agents in a secluded location. This is made possible by the fact that many agents are scheduling almost half of their showings with people who have not been screened by another agent, according to data-analytics from Gogint. Click here to read more. 
 

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  Real estate community focuses on disaster preparedness  
  Natural disasters such as floods, fires, hurricanes, and mudslides pose threats to more communities than ever before, and the real estate community is keeping an eye on how this affects housing. The costs associated with natural disasters in the U.S. reached a record high of $306 billion in 2017. Recent reports have warned that more is to come: Rising sea levels and climate change could put 2.4 million homes and 107,000 commercial properties at risk of flooding events by 2100, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists.

In addition to REALTOR® Safety Month, September also marks National Preparedness Month, and the real estate industry is working to raise awareness of how homeowners can better protect their greatest asset as well as how to recover when disaster does strike. Click here to read the full story from REALTOR® Magazine.
 

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