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I LOVE reading real estate blogs.

And I especially love reading the posts written by the people who I believe are shaping the future direction of the real estate industry. I’ve learned so much from some of the brightest minds in the game.

How much? Several of the major components of our real estate franchise concept were taken verbatim from things I read in blog posts. That’s how much.

Top 10 of 2010

That being said, I’ve read literally hundreds if not thousands of real estate blog posts this year. And I thought it would be cool to come up with a “Top 10 of 2010 list.” So, I sat down with a legal pad and my trusty fountain pen, and I started writing down posts from memory.

Oops… Make that Top 15

The list at right is the actual list. I was amazed at how quickly I put it together. It took me *maybe* 10 minutes. I tried to eliminate a few, but I just couldn’t do it. So, I ended up with 15 instead of 10. Sorry it that’s too many, but I sincerely believe that every one of these posts is worth reading.

So, in no particular order, here are the 15 posts written during 2010 that had the most impact on me:

• If I Can Change, and You Can Change, Everybody Can Change | Glenn Kelman (@GlennKelman of Redfin) | Kelman nails this one from start to finish. His post included one of the most memorable quotes of the year: “Every time I start to think that real estate will sort itself out, I go to a conference of brokers and panic, because I’ve never seen so many professionals invest all their passion in topics that have nothing to do with the customer.”
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  Knuckleheads Beware: Real Estate is Changing | Brian Boero (@1000WattBrian of 1000Watt Consulting) | I love the candor and the accuracy of this one, and in particular was captivated by this line: “It’s getting easier to be great and harder to be lame.” Be still, my Tweeting heart! By the way, that’s Brian in the photo at right…
• How Many Real Estate Agents Should Not Have a License? | Stefan Swanepoel (@Swanepoel of Realsure) | A wake-up call from the man I think has the best, most informed, most educated and intelligent perspective on the real estate industry.
• A Pulse, a Passing Grade and a Business Card: Raising the Bar on Real Estate Agent Qualifications | Marc Davison (@1000WattMarc of 1000Watt Consulting) | I think Davison is the best blogger in real estate. Here’s a highlight from this brilliant post: “And if an account executive at Yelp needs to have a college degree and at least a year in sales to sell web ads to restaurants, well, then I can require at least as much of people who will be selling shelter to families. I know, hard ass!” The man is an artist.
• The Whole World is Watching | Brian Boero | Boero brings more truth as he tries to understand how a major real estate brand would openly devalue its branding image…on a BILLBOARD, no less.
• Demolishing Real Estate’s “Fortress of Suckitude” | Brian Boero | This one wins for best “Blog Post Title of the Year.” The post is compelling as well.
• You Are the MP3 – Would I Download You? | Chris Smith (@TechSavvyAgent of TechSavvyAgent.com) Smith weighs in on the coming impact of agent review sites and how they are going to change the future of real estate.
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  Does the Real Estate Brokerage Matter to the Home Buyer/Seller? | Jay Thompson (@phxREguy of Thompson’s Realty) | This post has the most comments – 206 as of today – of any post I read during the year. A book could be written from those comments alone! Thompson is great at eliciting conversation, and this was one of his best ever. Thats’s Jay, at right…
• Can a Real Estate Brokerage Matter? | Marc Davison | This is essentially a “companion piece” that caused Thompson to write the post in the point above.
• On Industrial vs Artisanal Real Estate | Rob Hahn (@RobHahn of 7DS Associates) | The always intellectual Hahn makes some very interesting observations about a future trend of real estate, away from “industrial” and toward “artisanal.”
• Foursquare and Five Years Ago: Recalling the Promise of Real Estate and Social Media | Marc Davison | Davison reflects on the promise of Social Media vs the way it’s actually done by most in real estate.
• We are Number 1!! Now Make it Stop. PLEASE? | Jay Thompson | I wrote a blog post called “Think Before you Tweet.” Someone didn’t read it very closely.  Jay helped them see the light…
• Twitter is Stupid | Chris Smith | I love Smith’s analysis here; he takes something that I thought of as purely qualitative and he measures it. Really clever.
• The New Rules of Content Creation & Curation | Nicole Nicolay (@Nik_Nik of MyTechOpinion.com) | The queen of real estate weighs in on the king of Social Media: content.
• Coming Soon: Wholesale Changes | Rob Hahn | This was perhaps my favorite post of the year in terms of igniting conversation re the intention of branding in real estate. Lots of great comments follow the post.

So, these were the “best of the best” from my purely subjective, unscientific perspective. And I am POSITIVE that I missed tens if not hundreds of other great posts that I simply didn’t read, so please don’t be offended if I omitted something that clearly should have been included.

That being said, I hope you enjoyed these awesome posts as much as I did!

PS – This past year, real estate lost one of its foremost and most influential blogging voices, Joe Ferrara. Here is Jay Thompson’s heartfelt memorium to Joe.