Stacey Freed

Facebook’s aim to become a “digital living room,” making users’ networks smaller and more private, may require a change in your social media strategy to remain visible to current and prospective clients online. It will take time to know the full impact of the social network’s latest shift, announced in March, which prioritizes private messaging and Facebook groups over other content. But the intent, like other recent Facebook changes, is to limit users’ exposure to posts generated outside the...

Some nights Katie North and her fiancé find themselves in their Oakland, California, kitchen doing a little cheerleading, a little jazz scat singing, a little dancing and clapping all in the name of getting Rugger, their 12-year-old springer spaniel mix, to eat. “He usually stands there, asleep at the wheel; we have to get him excited enough to eat. It’s absurd; he wants entertainment with his meal.”

While most dogs don’t require dinner and a floor show, plenty of dog owners find themselves as frustrated as North. How do you get those picky eaters to nose in on their bowls?

A next generation custom home builder takes a virtual leap to help clients see their future
Like many builders, Todd Lozier got his start at a young age in the family construction business. “I felt like I was an owner at 16,” he says. But it would be another 26 years before Lozier took over as president. Since then, he has brought a series of changes to the company, including the use of cutting-edge technology that truly differentiates Lochwood-Lozier Custom Homes from its competitors.
IN HIS...

Scripts can help you handle a diverse array of issues, situations arising from open houses, expired listings, online leads, listing presentations, lead conversion, property needs, or other contexts where you’re engaging with buyers and sellers. But plenty of agents don’t like to use them or don’t use them well. Whether you’re new to the industry or a seasoned professional, the key to getting the most out of a script is to “internalize it and make it your own so you don’t have to think about i...

Out of the Closet

Homeowners want storage systems that work with the rest of the home

Creature Comforts

New products and amenities make everyone happy in the new dog house.

Whether you have a llama or a lab, volunteering with your pet is a great way to bring the calming power of animals to others.

Business smarts and old-meets-new design have helped Environs Development carve itself a niche with stately infill homes in Chicagoland
About 170 homes ago, architect and builder Ken Brinkman designed and built his first spec home, a small frame house with vinyl siding on a narrow lot. “We tried to create a configuration that was efficient and gave a future owner a lot of livable space,” says the owner of Environs Development, in Chicago. And, looking back, he wouldn’t change a thing, he says...

When director John Curran (Tracks and The Painted Veil) first received the script for his new film Chappaquiddick, which opens nationwide April 6, it was 2016 and the height of the primaries season.
Like many voters, Curran said he was “disgusted with politicians...

Three decades after the term ‘universal design’ was coined, we still struggle with defining it. Here’s insight from builders that are forging ahead with clear ideas in mind
Talk to people in the building industry and they’ll agree that “universal design”—designing products and the built environment to be as aesthetically pleasing and as usable as possible by everyone, regardless of age, ability, or status—is “just good design.” So why is it that 30 odd years after R.L. Mace defined the term u...

Kitchen Cleaning Tips | How to Clean Kitchen Cabine...

When it comes to eco-friendly living, the options for your home are ever evolving. And new technology is making it easier for homes to be interconnected and smart, which can also make it easier to be green -- lowering energy use, saving money on energy costs and making your home comfortable, healthy and safer...

Steven Siegel's 15-year old Jack Russell terrier fell ill and had to be rushed to the hospital. AFter seeing several specialists, tests determined that Pumpkin was in kidney failure. "I gave her every bit of medicine [that] science could give us," Siegel says.

Nothing worked well...

The most stunning renovation in Rochester?

One-of-a-kind overhaul creates a kid-centric, California-inspired space for a well-traveled family

Every neighborhood has them: houses that need a little TLC. And then there was this Pittsford home, in need of much more than a little TLC.
Custom-built in the early 1990s, the house was overgrown on the outside, with makeshift tarps laid onto a leaking roof. Inside, a floor-to-ceiling aviary had been the home’s central feature, but it had contributed to the interior’s deterioration—and the birds were still in the cages when it went on the market.
Pass no judgment on the owners—things happen. But it would take major vision and commitment to turn the place back into a desirable home...