CLUSTER BID under development at stealth location in Cambridge seeks to transform runaway bidding wars into a “Force for Good”
Tired of losing bidding wars, innovative DIY homebuyers in Cambridge, Massachusetts, one of the few cities in the world to have it’s own Peace Commission, are using the Social Enterprise Conference at Harvard Business School today to leak information about a “killer app” they are developing –
a cluster bomb designed to win bidding wars.
Last year, behavioral scientists in the city famous for innovation on both Harvard and MIT campuses, looked to the Slow Food Movement to inspire real estate reforms. Attention generated by that research and the ongoing state of emergency in the Cambridge housing market caused homebuyers to crowd fund the new “Bidding War Lab” where the cluster bomb has secretly been under development.
“Despite building strong relationships with local law officials and consumer advocates, including the Consumer Financial Detention Bureau (CFDB), we realized there are limits to what the public sector and real estate regulators can achieve with the Slow Bid Reform Act, ” an unidentified sources confided. “So we’ve turned to a new generation of app builders and social entrepreneurs to launch a “Peace Offensive” that will transform bidding wars into a force for good.”
Imagine the ideas you could generate if the estimated $7M in bidding war premiums homebuyers paid over asking prices during 4Q2013 alone in Cambridge were offered as prize money in an IDEAS COMPETITION, or redistributed to seed social enterprise start-ups, non-profit organizations, and causes? See similar subversive, open-fundraising model from a decade ago:
ASAP: AIDS Shelter Alliance Partners
We think the Bidding War Cluster Bid has the potential to become the “Mother of all Crowdfunding Opportunities;” but even if it doesn’t, we’re eager to use the period between April Fool’s Day and Patriot’s Day to recruit courageous consumers and innovative social do gooders to use this powerful new weapon to light up the bidding war process!
When buyers and sellers see the impact of this stealth project has on local communities, we hope Cluster Bids will inspire other legacy bid models — maybe even a new arms race between housing markets worldwide.
Let us know if you’d like online access to our secret lab or meet in person sometime before, during or after the Social Enterprise Conference.
Disclaimer: The Bidding War Cluster Bomb / Cluster Bid are not products or trademarks of the Harvard Lampoon, The Onion, or the Colbert Report but we encourage all three to help us identify and honor altruistic Bidding War Heroes, both homebuyers and sellers.
