RE barcamp gets a passport and heads to Barcelona, Spain

Back in February at REBarcamp Seatttle, a few of us had an impromptu session called the ‘Future of REbarcamp’. Andy and I thought it would be pertinent since we had Nick Bostic and Nick Bastian on hand who would be volunteering for the soon to come Portland and Phoenix events. What we did not anticipate is Claudio Cossio showing up. Claudio introduced himself to me earlier in the day as someone who would be interested in holding a Real Estate barcamp in Barcelona, Spain.

The discussion was great. I’m sorry that there was no audio or video taking, but that’s what happens when things are done on the fly

So the writing was on the wall, and looks like they have a date. Now how about that? RE barcamp Barcelona. September 16th, 2009.

RE Barcamp, es una propuesta para compartir y aprender de las personas
que tiene el deseo de crear un ambiente abierto de colaboración. Es un
evento donde se comparten ideas, se hacen demostraciones de productos e
intercambio de ideas entre los asistentes.

If you are half as curious as I am, you can take a look at plane tickets right here. At $529.00 round trip from SF, that’s as cheap as getting around the states for an RE barcamp.

No website up yet, just this Facebook group (sorry, you need to be logged in to see it.) We’ll keep you posted as things develop.  In the meanwhile, I’m just going to root through my belongings and make sure my passport is up to date.

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Creating your own RE BarCamp

With RE BarCamp events in the works across the country, rebarcamp.com has a new focus. We want this blog to be a landing page for upcoming events, but also a resource for those who want to plan these events.

This is clearly a work in progress, but consider the site relaunched. If you’re reading from a feed reader, please come take a look.

Meanwhile, I thought I would publish this post before I wrote it. Seems like the BarCamp thing to do. Make it collaborative. I’m looking for many points of view. I’ll be asking the folks who’ve already organized these events to share there thoughts, then organize it all into a living document on how to organize an RE Bar Camp Event. Here are some areas I want to cover.

What the hell is RE BarCamp?

We need a about page that doesn’t scare off the average real estate agent. something that organizers can also use to market ot prospective attendees.

What do I do first?

Basic organization is the first step. We need to cover the tools we used to organize. Things like wikis, TalkShoe, and basic recruiting concepts.

What do I need for a venue?

This largely depends on what kind of event you want to have. This is a open source conference platform, you can do it just about any way you want. But we need to share stuff like Broadband Connections and having enough power outlets

How does all of this get paid for?

We used sponsors. But you can charge admission. The spirit of BarCamp is to take any profit, and donate it to a charity. We also need to cover how to handle the money.

What Else?

the main reason I didn’t start writing this post in detail is that I don’t know all the questions. What would you like to know about organizing an RE BarCamp?

RE BarCamp Houston

The second RE BarCamp event is a wrap. Mike wrote up a great summery on his own blog, and at Agent Genius. Also check out Rich Jacobson’s post over on Active Rain. Be sure to subscibe to RE BarCamp for details on upcoming RE BarCamp events.

REBarCamp Thank You’s.

Wow, what a week. I have to say that I was very nervous as to the success for REBarCamp. But I have to hand it to Andy, he came up with a truly awesome idea. I would have considered 50 people attending to be a success. It was closer to 200.

When it comes to feedback, some the the bloggers I respect the most were calling it the best conference they had ever attended. We were the buzz of the Inman conference over the next week, and the sheer number of people following, greeting, and thanking us for the event is mind blowing.

I’d thank to thank a few people. I’m sure I’ll miss some folks. My head is still spinning. So I apologize if I miss you.

Andy Kaufman deserves ultimate credit for this event. He thought it up, organized it, and did most of the work.

Brad Coy put in a ton of local work in San Francisco. He was largely responsible for keeping things moving on Tuesday.

Mike Price put in a lot of work from the beginning. He also put his talents into designing our awesome logo.

Jay Thompson was our accountant so to speak. Thanks for handling the money Jay.

Jeff Turner, Jason Burman, Matt Bowe, Justin McHood, Nick Bastien for helping us setup on Monday.

Jason and Matt also manned the registration desk for much of the day, but we also had help from Rudy Bachraty, Cindy Linn, Sarah Fields, Kristal Kraft, Kelley Koehler, and Ben Martin.

Mike Mueller, Teresa Boardman, Kevin Boer, Kris Berg, Matt Fagioli, Jim Cronin, Daniel Martin, Frances Flynn Thorsen, Mark Eckenrode, Joe Ferrara, Dustin Luther, Jeff Brown, Jeff Turner and at least a few others all lead discussions. I know I missed a few here. So let me know and I’ll edit this list.

I want to thank the gang at Inman for being so cooperative. It looks like that relationship will be even stronger next time. I also want to thank all of the sponsors, who are linked to the the right.

Thanks to everyone who contributed content to REBarCampLive! Also thanks to Derick Overby for live streaming coverage of the event. He was using an awesome new tool called qik that I can’t wait to try out at REBlogWorld on my iPhone.

I also want to thank Danial Rothamel, along with Gia and Grant Freer from Realseekr for the trading cards gifts. What an awesome idea.

Finally, I want to thank everyone who came to the event. I put quit a few hours into this, and at one point last month, was really questioning if it was going to be worth it. It was, and so much more.