Saturday, February 20, 2016

Real Estate folk, surveyors and coincidences

A couple folks here in Bloggersville are looking for houses or selling houses and dealing with Realtors.  There are some good ones and others who will aggravate you no end.


(Animal pictures today because I liked them)
In my life as a builder I did meet all kinds. One lady, an acquaintance in real estate kept after me to LIST my houses with her. I listed one. That was the last I heard from her until someone else sold the house. She was only interested in the listing fee.  Never again.


Custom was not my cup of tea, but I did do some custom building. One Realtor whom I had never met, sent me a referral out of the blue, because she had shown some of my houses. I took the contract and built the house. The next speck house of ours, I went to her to list it. She said, "I won't list it myself, but I have a young salesman who would love to," and she introduced me to Greg Cline. Greg sold the house and many more after that. I always admired that Realtor, for the business and her hands on follow thru work.


In Building you deal with all trades, I met a surveyor on my very first house and used him the entire time of my building life. Preston Taylor and his helper Majors, made up his company. I always had to chase him down to get a bill and pay him. My BIL who had known Preston all his life, said Preston didn't like to collect money nor pay his bills, money was not important to him. Elmer (BIL) said growing up, Preston would not make his car payments and every car dealer in town  had to nearly repossess his cars


Three surveying incidents stick out in my mind. Twice Preston suggested I give some land away, and once to hold a piece.  The first was when I bought a large lot in a nearby town. Preston called me and said, "You have bought a drive way that a widow has been using for years thinking it was hers.  You don't need it, why don't you give it to her." I did.  Funny thing a month later son Mark went up to check on the house we were building. The new yard was muddy, so he parked in 'HER' driveway for a few minutes. She ran him off.  WE have laughed about that for years.



Life is fun.  I wish I had the promise of 50 more (healthy hearing ) years.



Nite Shipslog
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Some folk have to make a car float or fly!

6 comments:

I'm mostly known as 'MA' said...

Having a good realtor is a blessing. I once had an occasion to find that out. Hopefully, I won't ever have to deal with that again, but I've also found out that I should never say never. All but a few little piles of our snow has melted here after a couple of warmer days. It felt like Spring was in the air here for a couple of days.

Lisa said...

Realtors are great but you have to make sure you listen and read the fine print all the time. They have a way with turning words around until the end. Just like any good salesman.

Ready to move myself.
Lisa

betty said...

As you know, I love our realtor, but she can be a bit scattered at times, however, when it comes to push and shove to close the deal and get that little bit extra, she does know her business :) That was interesting about Preston; you would think perhaps he would have hired someone to keep his finances in order. That story about the driveway was hilarious :)

betty

Mevely317 said...

Kudos to you and Mark for finding humor in the (driveway) situation! Guess it's true what they say about 'those who laugh, last.'

That's pretty neat about your realtor unselfishly giving her protege' your listing! That speaks volumes about her character, doesn't it.

Unknown said...

Will don't know a lot about buying or selling houses. I don't know where
my time has gone and I have missed several Blogs. I think I was doing volunteer works at Historic House. I don't even know where my time went this Sunday. This week I will get back into the real world I hope.

Rick Watson said...

We've only needed a realtor once in out lifetime and that young lady made the transaction painless. She sold the house in less than a week and walked us through the transaction ps at closing. I made up my mind that if I ever needed another realtor it would be her.
R