ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, April 18, 1996 TAG: 9604180042
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: STAFF REPORT
Homes Plus, a real estate advertising publication produced by the Roanoke Valley Association of Realtors and The Roanoke Times, will debut Friday.
The tabloid-sized publication will be distributed every other Friday morning to about 200 racksthroughout the Roanoke Valley and some outlying areas, according to Pam Rickard, who is in charge of the project for The Roanoke Times.
For its first week only, the section will be inserted into Friday morning's editions of the newspaper, she said.
The publication is free to readers and supported by advertisers.
Rickard said Homes Plus will be unlike other home publications because it will be distributed every other week. That means the listings of residential and commercial properties for sale will be as current as possible, she said.
Lacy Edwards, an agent with MKB Realtors and chairman of the realty association's Homes Plus task force, said the publication is unique in other ways.
Consumer education is one of its primary purposes, he said. Every edition will contain an article about the real estate industry, on such topics as how the dynamics of the market affect buying and selling, the best times to buy or sell, the number of houses a prospective buyer should visit and buying with resale in mind.
Secondly, Edwards said, the tabloid is a cost-effective means of promoting properties that are available in the Roanoke Valley, Smith Mountain Lake and Franklin County. It will pull together houses for sale on a regional basis and allow them to be shown with pictures.
The task force hoped to average 24 pages when Homes Plus was conceived, Edwards said, but the first edition will contain 84 pages.
It will be inserted in 80,000 issues of the newspaper Friday. After that, 25,000 copies will be distributed to more than 200 locations.
LENGTH: Short : 41 linesby CNB