Whatever Happened to "The Real Estate Lady"?

[WV "Pop's" Smith]

There was this lady in the neighborhood where I grew up. I think her name was Mrs. Mims. Or was it Mrs. Foster?  I'm not sure. We kids called her 'The Real Estate Lady", although most of us had not the vaguest notion of what that meant, or what she really did. We knew it had something to do with houses and the people who lived in them. And we knew that, when she came around, doing whatever it was she did, the result was usually the appearance of a new family on the block; and, if we kids were really lucky, a new "best-good-friend", or two, to play ball with, in the streets.

 

What I remember most about her, was that she seemed to be such an active, energetic, little lady. She was  always well-dressed and seemed to be always "on-the-go"! She drove a big, black, shiny car (I think it was a Buick Roadmaster), with lots of glistening chrome and big-fat-tires, with gleaming, super-wide, white-walls, that were the whitest-white I think I'd ever seen. And whenever we saw her, she was, almost always, pounding a sign that read "For Sale" into someone's front lawn.

 

Now, decades later, as a real estate investor, I've thought about that "real estate lady" (and those like her) quite often, lately. In those days, the impression most people had was that real estate agents were career professionals, who had their clients best interest at heart. They seemed to understand that reputation ("word-of-mouth") was critical to their success and that customer satisfaction was the key. Unfortunately, it seems much of that has changed, since I bought by first house with VA financing, "on the GI Bill", way back in 1969.

 

Today, it seems, too many agents do what little work they do, grudgingly (an open house, you can't be serious?) and, only then, to "get the listings", lots and lots of listings (from unsuspecting sellers) priced too high!  It's no longer about service, satisfaction, credibility, responsibility, or reputation. In a world dominated by the Multiple Listing Services (MLS), the internet, and the ubiquitous "world-wide-web", its now all about the numbers and the sales. Sadly, too many of today's real estate "professionals" are simply "watchers" of the local MLS-and not much more!

 

Fortunately, there is a "flip side" to this lamentation. It is that there are still some "old school" real estate professionals out there, adherents to the "old code", who know what they're doing, take pride in doing it, and will do the job the way it should be done. I know they're out there, because I have found and worked with a few them, in a number of markets throughout the country. As is the case with anything scarce, however, the best of them will not be easy to find. But the time you'll spend to find them, will be time well-spent, indeed! And when you do find them, be sure to treat them well, for they can be (especially for investors) worth they're figurative "weight in gold".

 

That's my opinion, I'd really like to read yours...

 

"Pop's"