Nov. 26, 2012
Friendly Home Sales and Real Estate Transactions
In the middle of a frustrating day, I was searching through a folder of images and I stumbled across this one. It was a bright point in the middle of a day that was really grinding on me.
When I took this picture I was at a final walk through. I opened one of the kitchen drawers and discovered this lovely note and a couple hundred bucks because the owners wanted the new owners to purchase a new dishwasher. This dishwasher worked fine. The sale was “as-is with the right to inspect” and it wasn’t a contractual obligation to even fix the dishwasher if it was broken. The dishwasher was just older than the rest of the appliances and the sellers just wanted to make sure the new owners enjoyed the home. It was nice to see and such a surprise it even compelled me to take a picture of it.
This grinding day that I’m wading through is due mostly because I’m in one of those sorts of real estate transactions with a “pill” for a listing agent. Everything is an argument, everything is point of contention. She spends more time and energy making excuses for not doing the required repairs than it would take to just do them. On a $300,000 home, fighting over a fist full of dollars.
I don’t get it. I sell real estate and make it a point for it to be a good experience for everyone involved. Whining and crying over a penny ante repair when there is a handyman going out to fix something else anyway is just stupid.
From my standpoint, when I’m a listing agent, I just try to get as much corrected as possible, sometimes it’s not even necessary to fix some of the items but I do. First, so the agent will look forward to showing and selling my listings agent and second because the buyer might just appreciate the extra effort and if their agent isn’t in the real estate business down the road when it’s time to sell again, maybe they’ll call me because I did a good job.
Eh, then every once in a while there is someone who tosses a couple hundred bucks in a drawer for the new owner. It makes up for the “pills”. Besides the good Karma, it must have just felt good for every person involved the sellers, the buyers and, unwittingly, me. I’m just one of those agents that makes sure everything is just right before the keys get turned over or I probably wouldn’t have had the chance to see it and feel good about it and smile and take a picture even so that I’d find it again on a day that was not as lovely as it should have been.
Those are the great things about living and selling real estate in Bonita Springs that I enjoy the most. Happy and kind buyers and sellers. Just plain kind people.
Kindness is contagious, go infect someone today.
