Geno Petro's Chicago Real Estate Blog

Geno's Wife is Going the Extra 149 Miles!

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Sun, 10 May 2009 12:16:51 -0500

She's riding on my behalf

Hello all you Real Estate mavens, pundits, and blog hounds, I'm posting the following message from my lovely wife, Mona, who will be riding the Multiple Sclerosis Tour de Farms 2009 on my behalf. We greatly appreciate your support if you are able to contribute. (And if not, good wishes and encouragement will be gladly and equally accepted!)

On June 12 – 14, I will be riding on behalf of my Husband, Geno Petro in the National Multiple Sclerosis Bike for MS Tour de Farms.

(No animals attending excpet for, perhaps, our Dog Elvis.) My Riding Goal is 150 miles! OH MY THIGHS!

My Fund Raising Goal is $3000.00. Sounds like a lot, but I know that with the support of you, my Friends and Family, it can be achieved or exceeded. Please pledge what you can. Every $ - $$$$ helps. (See attached link below) Geno and I sincerely appreciate your Contribution!

Kind Regards;

Mona Petro
Chicago, IL

PS: After the Bike Ride (assuming I can just walk to the car – HA), I will let you know how I did.

Geno, although not able to ride, will be working as a Volunteer. You know there has to be a story or two in store for the rest of us later!

Mona has shared the following link with you. To view it or to reply to the message, please click below:

Please Visit Here

Gratefully,

Geno

The U-571 iPhone (let's try this again)

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 10:37:09 -0500

The truth is, I was multi-talkxting (simultaneously talking to one person, texting another, and drinking a Red Bull) when the iPhone slipped out of my hand and into the dog's water dish. Frozen freak out as I watched my slow motion lifeline quietly descend to the bottom; like in that Matthew McConaughey movie---you know, the one where he's so busy trying to save a submarine he never gets a chance to take his shirt off.

Fully dressed, I dove into the drink, retrieved the bubbling device, and bolted up the stairs to the bathroom. This was not the first time my personal Pearl Harbor had come under attack. A veteran of more than a few such self-sabatoges over my distinguished sales career, I've acquired the basic EMT survivor skills necessary for simple real estate business to carry on even in spite of myself.

There was the time in the late 1990s when my Motorola Star-Tec met its own destiny in a powder room commode at a Sunday Open House. I searched for an hour before re-tracing my tracks back to its resting place in the bucket; toilet seat still up at half-mast, the exhaust fan playing taps. (That phone was the only thing in my physical possession that I actually bragged about being so small.)

Then there was that era in my pre-iPhone 'Verizon' subscription life when I rolled with a seven pound Treo 650 on my belt. On its final day, a slushy puddle became the final landing spot as I attempted to swing my big fat ass (not really, it's just an expression) out of the driver's seat of a Mini Cooper. I recall laying the gurgling remains on the Verizon counter an hour later when the Assistant Day Manager finally called my number, next in line.

"You dropped this in the water," he said.

"No I didn't."

"Then why is there all this moisture and condensation beneath the screen?" he inquired, narrowing his focus from behind Pearl Vision Express eyewear, probing the soggy brick with a Bic pen.

"I live in a very humid climate," I answered.

"Where's that?" he asked. " The Tropic of Cancer?"

Alas, another fellow English Literature major unable to find a position in his chosen field. I reached down deep into my mental Cliff Notes and attempted to establish 'Common Ground' (Step Two of the Sales Process directly after the 'Meet and Greet' but somewhere before the actual 'Sit'). We chatted up Henry Miller for a few moments before he loosened the corporate noose and gave me the 411 on cellular resuscitation.

"Next time this happens," he explained, "immediately remove the battery, shake all excess water from the phone, then point a hair dryer on Medium Heat toward the inside of the handset for 15 minutes. Then hope. Then pray. Then live to text another day...." The young man was indeed, a poet. And thankfully so, as his tutorial words echoed in my head on this latest occasion....

I burst through the door of the 2nd floor guest bath where I camp out and park all my toiletries (because the 400 square foot master bath in our house is somehow not big enough for two people). In my own tiny bathroom now, it suddenly hit me that a) the iPhone does not have a removable battery and b) I have no hair---thus, no hair dryer. I scrambled into my wife's private spa and plugged the first device I found into an outlet. A curling iron. WTF.

I quickly located the hair dryer as the final seconds ticked away. I pointed. I hoped. I prayed...

"Alright, Alright, Alright!" I might not be in the same heroic league as Matthew McC in U-571 but I kept my cool (and my shirt on) under SIM fire. The dry-out procedure was a cyber-medical success.

That original iPhone, although barely moaning through each ensuing ring anymore (and about to be retired in lieu of a newer and slicker 3G model), will forever occupy a special place in my bottom nightstand drawer full of other swaybacked cellular workhorses, mismatched chargers, and scattered loose, dead blue teeth. And even though the Assistant Day Manager at the AT&T store I frequent these days doesn't know squat about literature, I've decided to extend my unlimited minutes/texting contract for another two-years of close calls and narrow escapes. After all, "Life, as it is called, is for most of us one long postponement." (and that, my dear readers, would be Henry Miller).

Geno Petro

Google Your Mom...Redux

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 19:14:09 -0500

One of the first essays I ever posted on Active Rain back in 2006 was a piece entitled 'Google Your Mom.' At the time I thought it was a clever notion; write a cute, loving piece about my mother (born in the 1920s) and atomically collide her with a present day algorithm for a quick, ironic grin--a Google giggle, as it were. After all, (in blog years, that is), 2006 was a couple Morse Law generations ago and I was but a virtual piker in the constantly expanding Real Estate blogosphere.

I entered the same title into the Google Search Box a few moments ago (just to make sure the idea still had some digital legs, if not originality) and alas, there are now 42,100,000+ entries with the same keyword sequence, Google...Mom. It seems like everyone is writing about what their moms are doing on that 256K floppy up in the third bedroom these days. Still, at least through these biased eyes, my own fore bearer remains an unknowing pioneer of technological ingenuity as it applies to her...ahem, demographic. And while Mitzi Petro may not possess the same genetic motherboard as the matronly likes of a Mrs. Jobs, Gates, or Wozniak, she is still very special in her own Post-it Note sort of way.

Here is the most recent case in point:

Yesterday, during my usual Sunday morning phone call to the homestead back East, my folks and I covered the customary weekly topics---the food we ate, our states of health, and our collective economic uncertainties since the last big election. Now they've never come right out and said this to me but I know for a fact (per my youngest sister, Liz--the smart one), that my parents are afraid to even mention the subject of Chicago Real Estate in my presence. The Fox News Network has them both scared to death that, any day now, Obama himself will demand that I step down from my position as a Realtor, thus forcing my wife and me to live in their basement until we either a) agree to Loan Modification counseling or b) I sell something out of my housing inventory for close to asking price. Of course I exaggerate.

But not by much....

Anyway, come to find out, there have been two Listed properties in their Chalfont, Pennsylvania townhouse community that went under contract in recent weeks and according to the neighborhood sewing club, Market Values haven't backslid as much as everybody feared. Fantastic! This gave me the perfect opening to mention my newly flourishing business in Chicago, but just as I began to interject my own good news to ease their weary minds, I heard a muffled commotion on the other end of the phone...

"Did you get him, Mitz, Did you get him?" my father's unmistakable voice in the background.

"...mumble...mumble...," my mom, flustered. Phone hits the floor. More commotion. Then silence. Then dial tone. I immediately call back. Line busy. No Call Waiting. I call back again. Same. I subconsciously fumble for a cigarette before remembering I quit five years ago. I wait 5 minutes and call one last time. My mother finally picks up in mid-sentence as if there was never a disconnect at all....

"...and then, Genie, I was trying to get that squirrel. The little bugger, like I said, keeps eating the birdseed from the feeder. So I yanked on the string attached to the can of gravel your father made and....."

I'll shorten the story: My mother sits in a rocking chair in her den with one end of a long string in her hand that runs outside and is connected to a taped up can of gravel, on the deck railing, under the above hanging bird feeder. She waits for the squirrel to poke his head through the decking slats then she YANKS...and all hell breaks loose; her, my father, the squirrel, the birds, birdseed, gravel, everything. They all jump up and scatter in different directions. This has been going on every day since the Daylight Savings Time change, I hear.

My other sister, Margie (the resourceful one), invented the contraption based roughly, from what I can deduce, on the popular 1960s childhood game, Mousetrap. It was her 'Have-A-Heart' alternative to my mother's Plans B, C and D which were:

B) An electric lamp, plugged in, sans lightbulb, with peanut butter and birdseed in the socket.

C) A waffle iron, also plugged in, left intentionally open on the deck railing just beneath the bird feeder (for tip-toeing vermin. ouch).

D) A pea shooter.

Margie nixed the first two options as cruel and unusual, even for Mitzi. My mother, I then learned, jumped into her Suburu and drove halfway across Bucks county and back on Saturday afternoon in search of a pea shooter. She finally ended up at a gun store. I. Am. Not. Kidding. After hearing her story, (and the mandatory cooling off period for seniors with squirrel issues), they tried to sell her a slingshot, instead.

I suggested she 'Google' the problem for an internet solution. My suggestion was met with silence on the other end of the phone. I forgot. For some reason she thinks the 'G' word has something to do with pornography. Same with 'Hotmail.' Don't ask. Instead, I change the subject and inquire about what's for dinner. Forty-five minutes later the battery finally dies in my iPhone. Now that's Amore!

Geno Petro

$100K Off The Top?

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 13:04:24 -0500

I'm sorry, but I refuse to believe my primary residence (pictured) in the Forest Glen/Sauganash area of Northwest Chicago has dropped $100,000 in value since the purchase in September of 2007. Say it ain't so, Joe.

Cut me some slack, Jack. I sold it to myself. I did the comps. I know my market. Hell, I even talked my wife into it. So, wassup with the Bank Appraisal?

Just so you know, my Lender is a little reticent about allowing us to refinance right now. Something about reduced LTV (Loan to Value), a Declining Market, Back End ratios and other sundry real estate talkspeak. Oh yeah, and the fact that I'm a Realtor by occupation. A little ironic huh? I'm having my best year since 2006 but hey, The Ministry has spoken. Okay, fine. I'll play along for... another 12 months.

But I'm going on record now to my current Mortgage Holder---and you may or may not know who you are: When this whole credit crunch thing blows over.....it's HASTA LA VISTA, BABY. (and I won't be back.) No way, Jose...

ps...enjoy the extra $50,000,000,000 you just received from our favorite uncle Sammy. All I received was a letter from you saying....ah, forgetaboutit!

Geno Petro

My Wish List: A Pick-up, A House Trailer, A Forgiving Wife

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 13:01:28 -0600

Driving downstate through an ice storm this past week allowed me many quiet white-out hours to ponder my own, unfulfilled, Life's wish list. The cosmic notion hit me just about the time we pulled into Effingham, Illinois (love the name, Effingham---consider: "Honey, I'm sick of that Effing-ham. How 'bout some Effing-turkey instead this Christmas?") some 240 miles and 8 crawling hours south of our bittersweet home in sub-zero, salt mottled Chicago. We settled down for the cold winter's night at a Comfort Inn and dined on some warm gruel at TGI FRIDAY'S before awaking, early and rested, on Day Two to resume our annual Christmas pilgrimage to Tennessee and all gifts sweet and southern.

Next stop on the GPS, Metropolis: 'Home of the Giant Superman Statue.' We had been meaning to check out this giant statue for several years now but always took a pass in an effort to make better travel time. Perhaps this day would finally be.... 'the day' we threw haste to the wind and dropped in on the Caped Crusader and that whole cast of characters. Wait...maybe that's Gotham. Hmmm... Oh well, in the end it really didn't matter.

In a fleeting moment of clarity, I realized that all I ever really desire in this fair and unbalanced world is what everybody else around me has. I could learn to be content with just that, I supposed. The key to this mental metacafe, I concluded, lies not so much in the 'What'... but in the 'Where.' I want what everyone around me has as long as it's: on the Right Bank of Paris; on the Upper East Side of NYC; on a tropical beach... in the Tropics! So in the case of Metropolis, Illinois, this would compute to a comfortable house to decorate for the holidays, a pick-up truck, and a secure assistant-middle-management job at the Big John Supermarket in town.

My wife and I, forever pondering the myriad of future retirement options, always seem to pose the same question whenever we find ourselves in a new spot far, far away from Chicago: "Think we could live here?" We look around, pause...and usually continue on in silence. Truth is, we generally don't fit in. And this day is no different. We quietly pulled up to the Metropolis town square in the BMW and got out to stretch our legs. As advertised, there stood a statue of Superman, although whether it is 'GIANT' or not is arguable.

All things equal, the Big John statue at the Big John Supermarket across the street is much taller and more muscular for my money. But I'm an outsider. What do I know? Some teenaged locals were giving me a hard local look from the next pick-up truck over as I framed my iPhone camera upward for some tourist shots. One of them proclaimed, "That's a pretty big dog to be haulin' around in that fancy ve-hic-le."

I looked over my shoulder and observed our overfed pampered pet sitting upright on his own heated backseat with a jingle belled Santa collar around his neck, panting out the window. The locals had two very lean, growling pitbulls with rusty spike collars chained to the side rail of their flat bed. I looked back up at the two statues towering above and tried to remember the last time someone picked a fight with me. I attempted to mentally recall some of my karate moves but to no avail. I have a black belt laying around the house somewhere, I remember. I wondered if it was still good, praying for muscle memory. Another life, sadly. Really need to get back in shape...clean out the basement...did I unplug the coffee pot?...what was I just saying?...

"Where do you get parts for that?" another big farm boy asked, pulling me back into the Metropolis moment.

Hmmm. Good question. If I answered "at the BMW shop" someone was going to take a swing at me and let the dogs loose for sure.

"Its not mine," I finally say. "I just stole it. Wanna buy it? 30 grand. Cache." Smiling. Thank God I was wearing my sunglasses and skull cap. No more words were exchanged between the humans although the collective hounds continued giving each other the city/country stink eye for several awkward seconds.

I snapped a few shots, jumped back in the fancy ve-hic-le, and headed toward the interstate wondering how long I'd even survive in a short sleeve white shirt and clip-on tie, assistant-managing such indigenous folk. Maybe the retail food industry is not for me after all, I concluded. I pictured me and Big John eventually butting heads somewhere down my second career line and dismissed the fantasy altogether. "You can scratch Metropolis off the retirement list," I said. And although Mona would have made a pretty hot Superwoman, she didn't seem too disappointed with my executive decision (although just between us, she is faster than any speeding Bloomingdale's shopper I've ever met).

Upon reaching our peaceful and rolling hilled destination of northwestern Tennessee, we tossed around the benefits of good country living for two days and ate like fatted calves like we always do in this bucolic family setting. My father-in-law once again reminded me exactly how much real estate I'd need to sell in Dyer County to make a comfortable living. We've had this conversation often. The conclusion is always the same. A lot...of real estate, that is.

Mere price point alone dictates that selling houses and condos in Chicago assures at least a modicum of success for a Realtor compared to the deflated, slow moving housing market of this rural section of the Economy. Still, townsfolk sit around the local eatery, Toot-'n-Tell-It, and discuss the future of America as they see it. 'Goodyear's laying off. No acorns this year. Lot's of pecans, though...' The parking lot is full (as it is on every occasion I've been there) and the local, flannel shirted workers chew on the three square fat over black coffee and pie, everyday except Sunday.

Funny. The Chevrolet dealership in town is boarded up. Goodyear down the road is rumored to be laying off soon. GM, on a national level, is about to crash, but Toot-'n-Tell-It in Dyer, Tennessee is still packing them in and slinging hash morning, noon and night.

"If we retire here we could sell the BMW, buy a trailer and you could get a job waitressing," I said as we pulled into the parking lot full of pick-up trucks for one last stop before hitting the road for good after a most pleasant Christmas visit. My wife just looked at me. The passenger compartment smelled like dog and pecan pie. We'd been in the ve-hic-le hundreds of hours and traveled thousands of miles through storms of biblical proportions these past several days. And now we were about to embark on the final leg of our Christmas journey; the 492 foggy miles straight home to Chicago. No stopping; Effingham, Metropolis, and now Dyer, soon to be mere holiday memories left behind...

"Where do we get parts for this thing?" she asked, as we idled in front of Toot-'n-Tell-It for the final time this trip.

"I don't know. Not the Chevy dealership, that's for sure," I said.

"Why don't you go inside and ask someone?" she asked.

And I would have but I still couldn't remember if I had an actual Black Belt designation or not. I reached into the backseat and took the ridiculous collar off my dog before he got us both beat up, set the navigation, and waited for a signal, before pulling away. "TURN LEFT. 100 FEET," it instructed.

"Real men down here use compasses," Mona said, as we pulled onto Route 45 North, still pissed about the waitress comment.

"Yes," I said, as I adjusted my power seat and fastened my safety belt. "And their wives keep the trailer nice and clean, I'm told." as I quickly added Forgiveness to the list...

Geno Petro

Why I Should Pay My Mortgage: Reason #23

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 17:35:39 -0600

When my mostly white galoot of a hound goes galloping across the side yard as I stand watching--coffee cup already clutched and brimming--through the toastier side of the veranda picture window in my boxers and nightcap, all I can make out through the Chicago pre-dawn snowscape is a snout and three brown spots darting from pine to pine. We both know it's sub-zero outside but the animal has his own morning ritual--a personal call to duty marking his American Bulldog territory in chemical union with the less domesticated denizens of the adjoining Cook County Forest Preserve; racoons, possums, gophers and such. Basically, they just pee all over each other.

The truth be known, this is one of the main reasons I begged my wife to buy the house in the first place. I love my dog. I hate walking him in the winter. I no longer have the patience or thermal body make-up to dawdle from tree to tree to and back again on my end of the leash, waiting...anticipating...begging..."Elvis, take a dump already! I'm freezing!" He's on dog time. He does what he has to do, when he has to do it. No sooner, no later.

Forest Glen, as I've written many times before, is a bucolic little alcove tucked in a residential nook between the Milwaukee District North Metra tracks and the North Branch of the Chicago River. We love it here. We are demographically in the city of Chicago but mentally in Mayberry RFD, or at least this is what I'm told by our more urbane, fairer weather Lincoln Park/Old Town acquaintances. It's a 22 minute train ride to Union Station and a 22 second walk to Nature. It's where a guy can stand at the window in his boxer shorts and nightcap watching his dog walk himself at 5:45 AM. And it's the best and only reason I can think of today to get dressed, drive to the Bank of America branch on Clybourn and North Avenues, and make my December mortgage payment, which, by the way, is about the price of two round-trip Business Class tickets to Rome. Every month. Go figure...then again, don't bother. We all have our own financial beasts of burden to, well...burden

"Elvis...HURRY UP!!!" I yell through the frosted window as he sniffs around for the perfect spot, still putzing. He is such a putzer, that dog; definitely not built for condominium living, that's for sure. Not in the dead of winter anyway, which like I said, is one of the main reasons I put a contract on this house to begin with. After this month's payment we only have 345 more to go. That's 28 3/4 years. I'll be 81 and Elvis will be 35 (245 in dog years). Mona, of course, will still be 37. I should have done the math, I suppose, but I didn't. I follow my heart, not my accountant's advice; always have, never will. Besides, we're dead for a long time I've heard...

Geno Petro

Lights, Camera...Cut!

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 19:03:52 -0600

Let's see...there was the time I was 'cast' in an independent film and broadcasted to everyone in the free world that I was going to be in a "MOVIE," possibly even Sundance, only to never hear from the casting director again. That wasn't too embarrassing. I mean let's face it, I have degrees in both Theater and English but have to sell real estate in Chicago to make a legitimate living. Lord only knows what my net/self worth would look like if I were forced to sell real estate (or act on stage) in some place like...say, Minot, North Dakota.

And of course, there was the time I jumped up off my sandy blanket after drinking cocktails all day in the sun screaming, "Sharks! SHARKS!" on a crowded beach in Nag's Head, North Carolina, only to learn, very soon thereafter, that the dorsal finned illusions were actually a school of snub-nosed dolphins. That was fun to be reminded of every summer vacation for a decade.

And most recently, last week to be precise, there was The Food Network show that Mona and I so didn't appear on. This is after ruffling more than a few feathers with one of my more widely read tongue-in-cheekers in recent months. I have to keep reminding myself that not everyone thinks I'm funny. At least, none of my wife's friends do. Not anymore. Nor, apparently, did the post production folks at DD&D. Fine.

So instead of making the usual Thanksgiving rounds last Thursday to those in our once too close social circle of ex-BFFs, Mona and I dined in seclusion at David Burke's Primehouse in The James Hotel. And if a camera crew would have just happened to walk in and stick a boom in our face with the videotape rolling, you wouldn't have heard a peep out of me. But it didn't, nor did I... and we're both still not famous.

Geno Petro

image by brommel.blogspot.com

15 Minutes of Infamy

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 08:33:11 -0600

I'm on "DINERS, DRIVE-INS AND DIVES" NOV 24th @ 9:00 PM on the FOOD NETWORK

Okay, this is going to be fun. It's one of those stories I sometimes get accused of making up but honest to Pete, it's almost entirely true. And although this is a fish story of sorts, it's not the kind you're probably expecting. It is, however, a 'keeper' in my yet to be written book of tall, if not historically accurate, tales.

A few months back a close friend of my lovely wife Mona's called the house and invited us out to a 'group get together' at Glenn's Diner in Ravenswood. I happen to like Glenn's but not nearly as much as I dislike 'group get-togethers.' I dislike them so much I insist on putting quotation 'glyphs' around the very phrase. Glenn, a close friend of our close friend, is the proprietor of one of the hottest fresh fish joints on the North Side of Chicago. He had just been booked for a feature on The Food Network's 'Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives' and requested our attendance for the shoot date. This 'group' he was assembling was to help provide the basic background noise, scenery, and some local neighborhood color to the filming. But since none in our invited party actually live in that particular neighborhood, and since it was one of those after work kind of 'get-togethers' (which I really dislike), and since we were all battling the same late Friday afternoon Chicago rush hour traffic coming from different directions of the city by car to get there on time; because of all these reasons...and then some... our entire table was late when the scheduled shoot time was upon us. Quite late, in fact, according to cell phone records.

As I was serpentining (flying over speed bumps) eastward and southward through every shortcut alley I know on the north west side of this bumper to bungalow speed bump ridden city, the little 6 year girl in my back seat (our friend's otherwise charming and precious daughter pictured below) was getting...well, a little queasy. Maybe queasy isn't the right word. She was getting car-sick. Actually, car-sick isn't even the right word. She was throwing-up all over my back seat is what she was doing. That's the right word. Throwing-up. And I'm putting it as nicely as I can recall (which is every time I reach into the back seat for something) even these months later.

Sooo...we were terribly late for our reservation, the crew had been filming around our empty table for an hour, people were standing in line to get in, and the back of my neck was... wet. Maybe wet isn't the right word. Whatever, I wasn't exactly in the mood for fish as I barreled down the final side street, hit the air brakes, and emptied my carload of 'get-togetherers' out on the curb in front of the restaurant. I spotted a Good Will Drop-Off dumpster in the alley under the El tracks at Montrose Avenue (Go ahead, drive by. It's there) that was brimming with donated clothing, and quickly tore off in that direction, doors still ajar. I threw the SUV in PARK, jumped out, and grabbed a few torn summer dresses and a Van Huesen button down shirt from the top of the over flowing charity heap.

I proceeded to wipe down the back seat with my new found tax deductible evidence; make that the back seat, both back doors, the headliner, seat belts, the little things you click the seat belts into, windows, headrests, carpets, mats, briefcase, glove box, CD collection, Open House brochures...It was all just kind of smearing, if you know what I'm saying.

I frantically (good word) looked around until finally spotting a garden hose in the backyard of a Two-Flat but the chain link fence had a Beware of Dog sign on in. And since I was now very possibly reeking of whatever that child ate for lunch that day, I thought better of throwing my hat in that particular back yard, ass biting, proverbial ring and considered Plan B. ( Let me say right now that the scene from 'Pulp Fiction' where The Wolf gets Vincent Vega and Jules to totally 'clean' a back seat in Jimmie's garage before Bonnie gets home in 20 minutes is, well...pulp fiction.)

So I reached back up into the Drop-Off and grabbed another soiled rag, this time a double knit pant suit that smelled worse than the back seat of my Bimmer. I soaked it in a puddle of muddy water that had been stagnating under the El tracks since the last rainfall and sopped up as much as I could considering my tattered resources. I then circled the block four times before finding a semi-legal parking space. I parked the vehicle leaving it unlocked with the windows and sunroof wide open, just hoping an unsuspecting car thief would stick his snout inside.

I walked coolly into the restaurant some 40 minutes after splash down and gave the waitress my order. Fish. Yuck. Everyone else was already on their second cocktail. And I, being the lifetime designated driver for such (and all) 'get-togethers' from now until my last sober breath on this Earth is exhaled, ordered my fifth and final coffee of the day. A little wired... Ya think?

Of course, the camera immediately zooms in on Mona and they ask her all the good Food Network fish questions about her dinner, and the flavor, and how it compares with fish from Hawaii, and the wine pairing, and all these other 'foodie' (hate the word) things. She answers and beams with such a sweet southern accent you have to smile. Meanwhile, they don't ask me anything although I'm pretty sure the camera that was stuck in my own silent face half the time caught me almost choking on a fish bone as I was staring down the six year old across the table, war now declared. Anyway, if you watch the show this Monday night, I'm the one in the blue floppy hat that isn't smiling.

So the dinner tasted like fish, which is good I suppose since it is the best fish joint in Chicago, but then another couple (who I never met before) sat down and more food and drinks were ordered and then, as quickly as it all began, the action was cut, the lights dimmed and the final check was presented. Silly me. I thought it was all going to be free.

But instead...the bill was almost $500 with tax and tip (which in Chicago is over 30% combined and another post for another morning). I barely knew half of those 'getting-together' that evening so the final math (division of who ate--and didn't eat--what, and who drank the most--not me--and who just came for dessert, blah, blah, blah) was excruciating. Several of us pulled out credit cards then were immediately informed that the check couldn't be spread over more than two cards. And that they didn't take American Express, which I was holding out in my hand like I was hailing a taxi cab in Montana. No takers. My lucky night continued. Priceless.

The two strangers (to me) got up hit the ATM a block away for some much needed cash but one of them never came back. Thirty minutes later we still hadn't resolved the bill and it was getting embarrassing. No embarrassing isn't the right description. Humiliating is better. Actually, humiliating and pissed-off is probably most accurate. And sobering (for me, that is). Luckily for everyone (including Glenn, I suppose) the members of the film crew had packed away the cameras, struck the set, and were already bellying up and throwing back at the bar, having their own 'get together.'

Glenn, the gentleman proprietor that he is, stepped up and quickly whacked a hundred off the bill (and his profit, I'm sure) but by this point my mind and the evening were both quickly dulling. My wife, however, was glowing. She is soon to be a Food Network star, at least in our own household kitchen, where Channel 72 is the only programming ever on that particular screen.

You can see her (and the rest of the above mentioned cast of characters) on the Food Network this coming Monday night, November 24th, at 9PM. Like I said, I'm the one in the blue floppy hat. I would have taken it off but my neck was still a little... sticky (yeah, that's the right word). Also, the shirt I'm wearing in the show was the only decent thing I came across in the Good Will Drop-Off. And like the old man on the radio has been saying almost every weekday morning in Chicago for the last 50 years...'And now you know the rest of the story....'

Geno Petro

God F.S.B.O. in Chicago

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 11:48:24 -0500

I suppose it's how one defines 'Good News' (or even God, for that matter). Personally, I'm getting mixed messages here. As I snapped these shots I couldn't help but feel a little put off that The Owner chose not to use a realtor or more critically, that He didn't see this whole economic downturn thing coming in the first place. And what's more, He's trying to save a few points on the commission by selling it Himself. Good luck with that Master Plan, Big Guy.

Also, since He created everything to begin with, one would think He'd have picked a better location to set up shop but maybe this is just sour grapes on my part. I haven't been feeling the Love lately even though people have mentioned to me from time to time that I am a 'miracle' although quite possibly, tongue in cheek. I gave the number on the F.S.B.O. sign a call just for the hell of it (pun) and some guy named Peter picked up. Hmmm...

For Sale By Owner. Makes perfect sense to me. As I've mentioned many times over the years, I was a real estate consumer long before I was ever a real estate professional. And since moving to Chicago 13 years ago (OMG...I mean OMF.S.B.O., has it been that long already?) I've negotiated more than my mortal share of deals on both sides of the property fence so I don't begrudge Someone trying to save a buck or two by selling it Himself. Just be careful. There are a lot of unsavory characters walking around this Earth but then again, I suppose that would be preaching to the Choir, telling Noah about the flood, Jonah about the whale, et al...

Geno Petro

I think I thought (I saw you try)

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 14:41:05 -0500

'That's Me in the Corner'

My voter registration card came in the mail this morning, just under the wire as usual. And rightly so. I don't know what I think about politics these days, I really don't. It is one of those subjects I've always mentally deferred to the pundits who are supposed to know better than I---specifically politicians, elected officials (the actual winners, please), and those who objectively report and editorialize on the red, blue and green concerns of this culturally divided country. (Isn't there some uniform 'Objective Oath' everyone in the Media is required to take after journalism/modeling school? Maybe not. Maybe I ditched that day in high school and am just experiencing a time released Poli-Sci hallucination.)

Same thing, I believe, holds true with the medicine/health care industry that everyone is always yapping about. I just assume the doctors and everyone else involved in that profession--nurses, administrators, pharmaceutical salesmen--know what's new and shiny in the field and their word is, well...up. Word up, Doc. There is an Oath they all pledge to, I'm almost positive (although maybe not for the salesmen). In other words, I've always relied on sources outside my own subjective cranium (thick head) for the real, unfiltered, 'down low' (Oprah) on what is swirling around me in this universe of billions and trillions (population and national debt respectively).
For reasons too personal to delve into here, my own 'first thoughts' are usually self-motivated and thus, make me lack the objectivity needed to execute clear, unfettered judgments in areas where voices must be heard and votes counted. This is why I skim over 30 to 40 blogs each day--many more on a slow Chicago real estate day--for other peoples' opinions and insights (hey, I'm a fast if not totally retentive reader with a relatively short attention span and a fairly open mind...I think.). Oh, and I've always read into musical lyrics more than is actually there. Ah Music! Nature's muse....the true opiate of the peeps. 'Like a hurt lost and blinded fool, fool...'
Most bloggers (some professional but many more amateur and apparently lonely) I read are so out of their minds over one candidate or the other that the noise is just confusing me even more. I have to say, I'm a little worried about more than a few of my fellow scribes given the subjective, party line diatribes I've been perusing these past few weeks.

November 4th, 2008, will be the 14th presidential Election Day of my life; 13 of which I have at least a passing (vague?) recollection. And quite honestly, nothing much besides fashion, technology and music has changed from this man's vantage point. My own personal time traveling bubble that has been hovering 5 feet 10 inches above this Earth since the mid-1950s still can't push through the rhetoric and the political buzz that surrounds such red letter events as Election Day; dull, stale, and obtuse as its always been....
When I was four years old, there was a Kennedy family who lived in a custom Levittowner at the top of our drive. The father was a steel mill supervisor who wore a suit and they had a hundred kids running around their expanded, single level asbestos sided American Dream. In my small mind I remember thinking it was him everyone was talking about, this Mr. Kennedy. He was a man who lived at the top of our hill and just got elected President, whatever that meant. I remember wondering why my own father wasn't the one who got elected although he only wore a suit on Sundays. Maybe that was it, I thought. My wife told me she wondered the same thing about her own father when she was a kid. Ironically, the two most decent and honest men we both know are not on the ballot this year and never have been.

'Losing My Religion?'

Perhaps. I think Sarah Palin is cute (especially the Photo Shopped versions) although I've known much cuter, and Barack Obama is handsome and alert. Joe Biden and John McCain, both strained and blurry through these weakening eyes, somehow remind me of two old college fraternity rivals reminiscing back to a time when everyone wore coon skin hats and big Varsity letters on their sweaters. A Tom Collins society. Wing tips and tie bars. Mad men from another era. Someone is yelling into a megaphone..."Go Harvard! Go Yale!" No Ivy League child left behind...

There is incongruity along party lines. Both sides are mismatched, I observe. And I'm pretty sure at least one of the four in this presidential spotlight isn't even a real politician. (Guess who.) So my question to the universe is: Why do I even have to order off this menu at all? Chicken or Fish? Hmmm. Can I get back to you on that?
"Honey, don't RSVP my cousin's Vinny's wedding just yet. The first two times he got married the food was outstanding. But this time, well..."

"Maybe the loan sharking business is feeling the crunch too," my Honey retorts.
"Hey, don't be judgmental," I quip. "The politically correct term is Sub Prime. That side of the family is sensitive."
"Anyone offering only chicken and fish to registered gift-toting guests is not sensitive," she says. "This I do know, political, familial, or otherwise."

"They're Democrats," I whisper, not even knowing what party I belong to anymore. And by the way, where exactly have you gone, Joe The Plumber DiMaggio? (sorry, had to slip it in.)

'Just a dream, just a dream'

a) How has my life changed since I've been a voting adult? ... and... b) How much of this 'change' do I attribute to government interaction?

The answers in order are:

a) A lot.

and

b) Zero.

I make the money I make. I pay the taxes I pay according to the tax code that's in place at the time. I either do or do not have health insurance on any given day depending on who I go to and who choses to participate in whatever plan I subscribe to. I basically do what I'm told (not really) as mandated by the rules of life in general.

What I'm saying is I just don't feel strongly one way or another about any of the choices on my ballot this go-round. I'm not so sure those running for office do either. I've watched every debate with as objective a mind as someone who doesn't give a crap can. I'm telling you, juxtapose the sound bites and distort the voices and I'll be damned if they're not all proclaiming the very same thing--Utopia. Opiate. Bullshat....

I go back to the mail on my desk. I look at the voter registration card I just received and study the front. My name is misspelled. I glance at the wedding invitation tucked between the pages of a half read article about Cindy McCain in The New Yorker. The accompanying illustration makes her appear prettier than she really is. I pull out the makeshift bookmark and examine it. Chicken or fish? I finally come to a conclusion:
When improperly prepared, fish can actually taste like chicken. And what could possibly be worse than that? The opposite, I suppose. I check Will Not Attend and throw it back on top of the pile of other undecided rhetoric on my desk. Note to self: 'unjam the shredder.'

Geno Petro

assorted lyrics by R.E.M.

photo courtesy of C. McCain's medicine cabinet

Is it safe yet?

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 14:30:46 -0500

We are hunkered down. We've brought in supplies for the long November haul. Our new minds are set. Storm windows are affixed and our shutters pulled tight and locked. Our safes are stuffed with inflated tender; confederate currency for a later day perhaps, pilfered from the Dows, the Joneses, and the Banks of middle America. Our media scouts up on the Hill tell us there is hope on the fiscal horizon but the morning on this day is still dark and cool. We put our ears to the ground and sense apathy rumbling amongst our uncivil servants.

We've opened our garage stables and set our horses free to run in the solar wind, too expensive to maintain anymore. We are willing to walk away from our leveraged homesteads, settling for pennies on the dollar when our escrowed notes expire; Selling short. Falling shorter.

On the safe side of the glass we look across the plains and into the vortex. We count our blessings on one hand and await the new Obama Nation with fingers crossed, on the other. Our children join us on our financial corners begging for spare Euros. You can keep the Change. We want Service... and at least two weeks in Cabo (oceanfront) for the holidays. We are, after all, still Americans.

Geno Petro

Drove my Chevy II the Levee...

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 08:29:39 -0500

...then I left it there for 35 years. Nostalgia will not get the best of me. Not this time. It's back to the future, if anything.

You see, I went to my 20th high school reunion back in 1994--an event I had pondered for the better part of a decade prior--basically wondering how my peers were aging and succeeding in comparison to...well, me. But no, that wasn't enough. I had to go back for seconds 10 years later, even fatter, balder and more mediocre (but with a much better wife) than the first time. Few classmates looked even vaguely familiar during this second visit, and I spent most of the evening talking with someone named Chippy; a person I'd never seen before in my life (although according to him we were the best of buds back in the day... frequently skipping homeroom for higher ground, as it were. Hey, I don't remember nothin' but apparently, he graduated from Duke and I barely made it through Slippery Rock with a 2.0 average so he must not have been inhaling.). Anyway, the few people I did recognize were very happy to learn that rumors of my early demise 'were greatly exaggerated,' to paraphrase Twain/Clements/et al... as was I.

I left high school thinking I was going to be an actor or a writer or a movie director but ended up selling insurance for 15 years--my 'profession' when I made that first grand re-entrance to a gallery of uncaring eyes at the 20th gathering. A good many of my immediate peers in attendance had either inherited family businesses or were existing on some form of trust fund or another. Old money runs deep and wide in those Mid-Atlantic southern states or at least, that's how I've observed it over the years. All my rich kid friends became rich parent aquaintances--if even that.

When I hobbled into the 30th get together, 10 years later, I held the designation of 'Chicago Realtor.' Again, my immediate peers were either semi-retired or at the very least, identical clones of their own wealthy mothers and fathers, grandparents, etc.; good old boys in the richest sense. Old money is funny like that--it is genetically unforgiving. More so than ever, I realized that I was cast into a life where any success on my part would have to either come from within (i.e....selling lots of condos, houses and multi-units), or via the Illinois lottery.

And now it's 2008 and Classmates.com has informed me of yet another soiree---The 35th Reunion of the Myers Park Graduating Class of 1974. I emailed Chippy to see if he was going but he responded back saying he had no idea who I was and to take him off my list. (I email at least a half dozen other people every week I never went to high school with who tell me basically the same thing. The real estate business is also funny that way--quite unforgiving in its own right.)

The truth is, I don't have a list. I only approach those who have either happened upon one of my blogs or Googled 'Chicago Real Estate' and registered on our ChicagoHomeEstates.com site. These registrants are then assigned to me for follow-up. I don't send out direct mail or make cold calls or even knock on doors anymore. No farming. No magnets. No newspaper advertising, to be sure. No billboards. Only the Internet, dear friends (and the occasional referral or past client still residing in the overtaxed boundries of Cook County). The Internet holds the passcode to the future of Chicago real estate marketing as I see it. So don't worry Chippy, you'll never hear from me again. Same for anyone who has registered but apparently forgotten. Not a problem. I'm trying to reduce my oversized nostalgic footprint anyway.

And while I'm at it, bye bye to Miss American Pie as well. I'm sick of the refrain and you're getting a little long in the tooth, if you don't mind me saying. After a couple hundred million spins of the disk over a 35 year period this could very well be the day that I die and I don't want that tune stuck in my skull ad infinitum. Like I mentioned a few minutes ago...you can find my Chevy at the levee with a couple thousand cases of long ago emptied whiskey and rye. And if the good old boys still feel like singing around the yesteryear campfire, so be it. I'll be scouring the Chicago MLS on my laptop for price reductions.

Geno Petro

Chicago Real Estate: 26.2 miles of cinder

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 14:25:10 -0500

Carter Suggs and the rest of us slugs

In case you haven't been observing from the sidelines dear readers, this whole Chicago real estate diversion I've been a party to these past several years is a marathon--not a sprint. And while I don't recall ever actually running 26.2 miles consecutively or even un-consecutively (I was a sprinter when I last set foot on a track 35 very long years ago as you'll soon learn) I have been involved in some marathon-like negotiations as of late. And I'm telling you straight up, with St. Joseph as my witness, it's the last 2 /10ths (.2), that ubiquitous straw of camel back-breaking fame, that can tip the scales in either direction, for the better or worse. And it is this very, constantly shrinking margin between what makes and breaks a real estate transaction these days, that has me taking a short 'breather' to wax poetic before I re-double my efforts tomorrow and try to put together a deal that might actually involve a trip to a title company in the near future. Soooo....., allow me to digress...

My last heat

It was a blistering afternoon in the late Spring of 1974. The graduating members of our high school relay team, the mighty Mustangs of Myers Park, were slowly disembarking the un-air conditoned 1950's green and white diesel beast (our ancient, beloved, mascot emblemed school bus) for the final time, somewhere in the boondocks of eastern North Carolina, when we were suddenly struck motionless in our proverbial track shoes. We gazed in wonderment at the rural venue. Compared to our own hallowed stadium grounds of green and gold composite track surfaces, Booster Club sponsored electric scoreboard, and manicured white chalked and numbered playing field fescue back in Charlotte, the vision was almost other wordly. And myself, having only been recently relocated from the great sprawl of northeast Philadelphia where one could definitely see the air one breathed, I was all the more intrigued by the Nature of it all. I decided it was, indeed, time to take off my leather jacket and Ray Bans and get serious. People were jogging through the woods, warming up barefoot, for crissakes.

The burnt colored, coarsely raked, 440 yard oval cut-out that encircled the overgrown football/baseball/tobacco field we looked onto was a Milky Way of sooty glass specks and finely crushed gravel--cinder, to be exact. The infield, 120 patchy yards, elbow to elbow with other multicolored warm-up suited runners in different stretched positions alongside their own painted diesel transports; The Demons, The Eagles, The Orangemen--was a base of red, hard Carolina clay. Bushels of unharvested dandelion weeds lined the outer perimeter of the back country school grounds.

The air smelled of pine tar and lumber from a nearby saw mill. An uninterrupted trickle of sulphuric well water leaked from an old fashioned hand pump in the far end zone. The Home side bleachers boasted two separate, half dozen row sections of gray splintered wooden planks attached to a common bent, rusty metal skeleton. The Visitors side sitting area was cracked earth. We looked at each other with young, overprivileged, suburban eyes. No world records would be set on this May day we joked half-heartedly. What none of us knew at that moment was that we were only correct by a mere fraction of a second.

9.3 (seconds, that is)

In 1974, Track and Field events were measured in yards and timed in minutes and seconds. The Men's World Record for the 100 Yard Dash was 9.0 seconds and had stood, unchallenged, for years. I was blessed enough to be among a handful of other sprinters to break the 10.0 second barrier that day--9.9 to be exact, finishing fifth out of a field of 6 in my heat. A young, Tarboro, NC high school student named Carter Suggs ran a 9.5 in the same race. The memory is a blur as was the image of his posterior, all ass and elbows, 30 feet ahead of me from jump street. I almost gave up smoking right then and there. Twenty minutes later in the final heat, (as I looked on from the cracked earth Visitors area with the rest of the slugs) he blazed a 9.3 on the cinder track--.3 seconds off the world mark.

Just so you know, the difference betwwen a 9.9 and a 9.3 is about a city block spread at the finish line, or in less urban terms--from grill to tail pipe--the entire length of an old green and white painted school bus, diesel, unleaded, or otherwise. It is most certainly the difference between a shot at a professional athletic career and one that entails slinging residential property for a living. At the very least, it provides a margin of posterity for all to ponder. (I've been Googling myself off and on for the past 3 years and while I can't find any virtual proof of my personal 9.9 second sprinting effort back in the glory days of 1974, I have no trouble unearthing almost every residential listing I've ever advertised during my Chicago real estate career--good, bad, or indifferent.)

I think I missed the Google "High School Track and Field Statistics" long tail search engine cut-off by considerably more than a few tenths of a second (bus lengths, city blocks, whatever...) in the same manner my last buy-side deal died over a couple thousand dollar closing credit and a furnace tune-up. It would probably be in the same manner I'd collapse at the 26 mile mark, just .2 miles shy of the golden ring, should I ever be daring enough to enter a marathon in the first place---which of course, is what this whole real estate business is---isn't it? Or shall I digress...

Geno Petro

image by billingsgazette

Oh, that Sears...

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 10:31:40 -0500

I don't believe I'm all that different from most people who live in Chicago proper (i.e. not the 'burbs) in that I rarely take in the downtown sights except in accidental passing or escorting the occasional out of town visitor. My relocation referrals and I are usually zooming by each landmark, three minutes behind schedule, taking a 'pass' on the touristy stuff in lieu of a Starbucks stop.

"Was that the Sears Tower?" They ask.

"No. Hancock Building," I answer.

"It looks smaller," They say.

"That's because we're going 72 MPH down a one way side street." I kid. I look down at my speedometer, an even steven 60 (hyperbole, still).

'Were you ever a taxi driver?' They wonder, I'm sure...

Chicago is a settlement of over 200 unique and cloistered neighborhoods (with Madison Street being the great divide betweeen north and south 'hoods and State Street sundering the east and west communities) and we Midwesterners don't like to stray to0 far from the homestead unless we really have to. Chicago was originally a city of parishes; Saint Gert's (Edgewater), Saint Mike's (Old Town), and Saint Pat's (West Loop) being but a few examples and historically, people socialize and procreate where they pray (I am told). But as usual, I digress.

So I am walking out of the Sears Roebuck store (shopping for appliances, not clothes, thank you) on State Street last Sunday when a group of foreign visitors approached me. I could tell they were foreign by their attire and I knew they were visitors by their cameras.

"Sears?" The tallest one asked me

"Yes." I answered.

"Sears?" A little more emphatically this time,

"Yes. Sears." I say again. I turn around and point up to the sign in the window. "See...Sears."

And in an instant flash of flashes; like a rapid spray of friendly fire, or a Tiger Woods 18th hole gallery, or a Lindsay Lohan papparazzi locust swarm--a half-dozen smiling, second city visitors turned their cameras upward and let loose a digital stream of gigs and pixels onto the side of the unassuming 4 story building.

They thanked me very much. I told them they were very welcome before attempting to explain for 5 unsuccessful minutes in my own broken English (I don't know why I always end up assuming the accent of the misdirected foreigner I'm speaking with) how to get to Navy Pier. They turned in unison and headed in the opposite direction. What can I say?

Mona and I had taken the Metra in from Forest Glen for a late Father's Day lunch and a little downtown Chicago shopping. As we strolled west down Adams Street on the way back to Union Station we stopped for a few minutes to check out the Rookery before approaching South Wacker Drive. There they stood, the whole group of them, heads tilted back at 45 degree angles, clicking their digital cameras 110 stories into the clouds above.

"I think they meant that Sears tower," said my wife.

The tallest one caught my eye and shot me a dirty glance. I pointed toward the exit ramp down to Lower Wacker, home of the homeless and the cardboard box Abandominium...

"Navy Pier," I mouth with an animated whisper.

Mona punches me in the arm for being a smartass as we run across Wacker, over the Chicago River bridge, and down into the diesel fumed catacombs with 3 minutes to spare before the 5:55 heads north.

DISCLAIMER

{I recently posted a picture and an accompanying story on my primary Blog and was informed by another site's SEO that my duplicate content might get me banned from Google! Wow, I had no idea. But I reminded myself that ignorance of the 'law' is no excuse. The content apparently needs to be 25% different (am I there yet?) and thus, a commentary before or after should be in order. (Obviously this is an example of a commentary after a duplicate post. All previous AR entires I have already submitted will soon have commentarfies after the duplicate post as well---but I suppose they {the commentaries} will each need to be 25% different) I don't know nothin' about nothin'. It wasn't me. Why didn't you tell me?

The truth of the matter is I stumbled across Active Rain by accident while checking out Sellsious. It wasn't sure anyone in the blogosphere was even looking at my primary Blog since I had a total of 1 comment from a friend and 1 comment from my wife and 1 comment from an insane person (a diatribe, actually) the first 3 months I was up an posting. I didn't think my stuff was that bad so I decided to start posting here as well. So from here on forward and backward, this is my 25% Difference Non Duplicate Discalaimer, and I'm sticking to it...unless its a bannable offense from Google in which case I'll sell my overpriced Google stock and show them! I'll ban them from my portfolio. See how they like it when I give them no page rank! Now I know 'I'm double dog daring' a big guy on the playground (Jean Sheppard reference for my Philly friend, Brian Brady) but right now according to Google, I'm not even another Bozo on the bus. So Thus I Disclaim and wait for the axe.}

Geno Petro

A Realtor's Tale (part one)

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 08:54:48 -0500

The seller thinks she's being robbed. She hasn't actually come out and said it but I can tell. I can always tell. The Chicago real estate market has not responded well to her little corner of Uptown these last 365 days and the MLS listed 2 bedroom, 1 bath condominium she is trying to sell is now hovering close to the price she bought it for in 2004. She reminds me again that it's already priced below the last 'closed comparable' in the neighborhood. I gently remind her that I represent my buyers and that the 'market' ultimately determines what things sell for--not her or me.

She has also dropped the original list price $40,000 (in three spaced out increments) over the past several months. The Cook County tax records indicate that indeed, even at her present asking price, once commissions are paid, closing costs covered, present mortgages satisfied (there are two) and tax pro-rations escrowed---a flat-line, break-even, zero-margin net-sum-gain scenario is almost certainly in the woman's future. I advise my clients to make a move.

We come in low and hard. The seller tosses back a cookie the following day. Two days later we toss it back with two big bites taken out of it. The seller waits a day then reluctantly slips below the net-zero-sum line she's been stradding for the last 90 days and into the realm of capital losses and cookie crumbs as she goes directly to her absolute bottom number--a little below, actually.

My buyers, however, feel we can still get a better deal--after all, we are, in essence, the Chicago real estate market on this particular property in this particular point in time. In other words, we have the only bona fide offer on the table. Everybody involved is very nice but there's a pink elephant in the sunroom and at this stage of the process, no one cares to empathize with the other side or acknowledge the squatting beast in the corner. Money is involved--big, fat, pink, sunroom money. We all want the deal to happen but no one wants to say as much. Not just yet.

Final counter offers have been exchanged and presented. We stand $3,000 apart on a $250,000 property. We are now going entire days without talking, each side waiting for the elephant to make his move toward foyer, down the hallway, and out of the building forever. I imagine the pink pachyderm trouncing past the motorists on Montrose Avenue, across six lanes of traffic on Lake Shore Drive, and into the depths of Lake Michigan to swim away like Puff the Magic Elephant, freeing up all of our futures in this Northside real estate allegory.

It just so happens that the seller is also the realtor and is representing herself in the transaction. At this particular point in the pink elephant game, I am merely the messenger working on behalf of my buyers. It's not my job to spend my clients' money. My job is to guide this deal to the closing table with their best interest in mind. I ponder big Pinky in the sunroom...

A wise man once posed the question to me, "How do you eat an elephant, Geno?"

"Huh? I dunno." Big, dumb me.

"One bite at a time," said the wise man. "You eat an elephant one... bite... at...a...time." A wise man, indeed.

to be continued...

Geno Petro

Hot Doug's...Chicago Style

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 18:42:29 -0500

For months now I've been following with growing interest...no, make that great intrigue, the shaggy chic (if not downright haute) North Side neighbor-hood 'foodie' chatter surrounding a certain hot dog stand at the no-mans-land corner of Roscoe and California Avenues in the Avondale section of town. Location, location, location (the ubiquitous Chicago real estate mantra) my arse. I kid you not, dear readers...the joint is in an annexed tract of light manufacturing sprawl where you might still be able to get some land for free if you stake a claim with the City of Chicago and know someone at City Hall. (And yes, as always I exaggerate.)

It's "Hot Doug's this" and "Hot Doug's that...." say they all; at dinner parties, over cocktails at unhappy hours everywhere from the Gold Coast to Rogers Park, in churches all across Chicago (I'm guessing). Everyone's talking about it but nobody I know has actually ever eaten there.

Like Yogi Berra (the Ronnie Santo of the East Coast malapropism) once proclaimed..."Nobody ever eats there...the line is always too long to get in." Ahem.

On two previous occasions I attempted to stop in for a taste of their famous Chicago hot dogs and accompanying 'Duck Fat' Chicago fries, mainstays both. Each time the line to simply get in the joint nearly wrapped around an entire city block. Once inside, an equally tedius wait is in order before you actually get your food.

It was raining farm animals yesterday morning as I awoke and since it was indeed Friday, one of the only two 'Duck Fat Days' (along with Saturday), I figured I stood my best chance of finally sinking my chops into a Hot diggity Doug dog. After all, what other knucklehead would be willing to drive through a torrent in a Mini Cooper for a mere taste of encased meat and shoe string potatoes deep fried in foie gras? Besides me, that is...and about 75 other knuckleheads? (See picture above)

I waited in the rain outside of Hot Doug's for 30 minutes as the gentleman behind me, (pictured left) actually intelligent enough the bring an umbrella to a rain storm, refused to share his shelter...or even make eye contact. I waited another 10 minutes in the vestibule with 12 other people, and when I finally did place my order---a Keira Knightley (super hot...get it?) with 'everything' (in Chicago 'everything' means mustard, neon green relish, grilled onions, tomatoes, pickle, hot peppers and celery salt), an order of Duck Fat Fries, and a Coke Zero (watching the calories, you know)---I waited another 15 minutes for the food.

Also on the menu that day were Alligator Dogs, Parsley Infused Weisswurst Dogs, Chipolte and Cilantro Smoked Chicken Sausage Dogs, and a half dozen other varieties of blended meat Dogs; bratworsts, sausages, and kielbasis. Sadly though, Friday's Special 'Celebrity Sausage' was the Harvey Korman (may his funny soul rest in new found peace)---Sun-Dried Tomato and Basil Chicken Sausage with Vodka-Cream Marinara and Burrata Cheese. Oh yeah, just so we're perfectly clear, only non Duck Fat Fries are served up Mondays through Thursdays.

John Lennon and Yoko stopped in (also pictured above) and ordered two Pete Shelley's (a Vegetarian Dog if you can even Imagine such an animal). 'It's easy if you try...'

Finally my own name was called and I grabbed my satchels of charbroiled snouts with all the trimmings and raced home to my bride to share the feast. My dog met me at the door, already having sniffed the duck fatted vittles from two blocks away. I emptied the food from the greasy brown bags onto white paper plates. The kitchen immediately smelled like duck liver. I almost gagged....

Now I'm not quite sure why I would even fathom liking anything prepared in duck fat, or foie gras, or any kind of liver for that matter. (You ought to see what I've done to my own liver over the years, for crissakes.) I was clearly caught up in the hype. Sure, the dogs were good but all dogs in Chicago are good. Hot Doug's makes a darn good Chicago style hot dog, this much is true. And I suppose if you don't hate ducks and liver then the fries are pretty tasty, as well. But if you ask me, people are just looking for an excuse, any excuse, to stand in a long line to say they've done the new 'In' thing. It was Monkees tickets when I was 10. It was Tickle Me Elmo when my niece was 4. It's my wife and her friends tonight for that whole Sex and the City and Cosmo hoopla. It was me yesterday (along with 75 other zombies) in a torrential downpour....

So I digress. As I was about to finally exit the restaurant, the guy with the umbrella, my fellow line standing follower of the masses, made a snide comment as to my constant picture taking during the previous hour.

"Tourist" he muttered.

"No, blogger," I snapped back.

"I'm a real estate blogger," I wanted to say, but didn't---stopping just short. He simply looked at me with his perfectly dry face without making eye contact; collapsed umbrella in one hand, CTA Bus pass in the other, awaiting his own name to be called. I wanted to add a little something extra about him being a professional duck loving line stander, what with his Bus Pass, premeditated umbrella, and all but I let it slide. It was raining farm animals outside and I had my own real estate challenges awaiting my attention. And as I sped off toward the old homestead and the oily waft from the brown paper satchels filled the interior compartment of my Cooper, I wondered what my dog thought about duck liver, the $13 I just spent on hot dogs, and if I really did look like a tourist...

DISCLAIMER

Geno Petro

The Low Art of the Graffito

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Fri, 16 May 2008 21:12:00 -0500

I've always looked at it this way; as long as it's not painted across the side of my house, I can live with it, even sort of appreciate it. Sort of.

Hey, I reside in a big, grown up city so who am I to judge what is and is not a proper canvas for an aspiring artist? After all, I'm just a Chicago realtor trying to do my own thing in the same concrete jungle and am hardly a patron (of the Arts) myself. Anyway, Art (low or otherwise), iconoclasm, and vandalism have always made for strange bedfellows. Think Jean-Michel Basquiat. Think The Splasher.

And again, as long as it's not scribbled or sprayed across the side of my own crib...or my fence, (or my car, for that matter) I'm Kool and the Gang, nowatimsayin? (Do you know what I'm saying?) You see, true Grafitti, in my opinion, is not a random act of vandalsim. There are a whole heap of obstacles and factors to overcome before the multi-colored Word ever reaches the eyes of the pondering public, those haters. There seems to be some thought behind the ubiquitous late night deed that goes beyond mere 'tagging' (which is vandalism and does warrant a crack in the knees with a ball bat). Kool is not with the Gang on tagging, nowatimean?

First: The young, urban artisan must obtain his materials; aerosol cans of mulit-colored spray paint (a behemoth feat in itself according to City of Chicago ordinance). Clearly, there are laws in place. I tried to buy Rustoleum at Home Depot the other day (to touch up a rusty porch railing, not paint my masterpiece under mercury illumination) and almost got arrested. I was ordered to the city limits then escorted over the township line into the suburb of Skokie where Rustoleum is just another can of something that is marked up double the MSRP because it is not available (10 feet away) in the city. Okay, I exaggerate, but not overly. It's not unlike making a quick trip over the state line to Indiana twice a year for fireworks.

Firecracker in Hammond, big fun.

Firecracker in Chicago, big fine. $200+.

Not that I care one way or another about firecrackers either... although, I actually enjoy them on occasion in small, festive doses. Just so long as they are not exploded inside my: mailbox, front porch Halloween pumpkin, or cat, I am, as well, once again...Kool and the Gang.

Secondly: There has to be a space. The artisan must also seek out his venue. Under a bridge. Across an abandoned warehouse alley. On a billboard. Not on Geno and Mona's fence in Forest Glen; all very good options requiring at least some forethought and planning, I would imagine.

Thirdly: There has to be a degree of covertness. Now think; how much grafitti have you seen in your own lifetime? And now recall... how many times have you actually seen an act of grafitto in progress? My guess to your answers would be, in order... a lot... and none.

Lastly: There has to be the inner vision. The idea. The final twisted images of color, dimension, and phonetic spelling with its blend of loopy and angled penmanship, at the same time balloonish and severe, threatening and poignant, painted across anything I don't personally own or pay property taxes on. As long as it's all that....I am, like I said, Kool and the Gang. (Okay with it.)

postscript...pictures taken by me, under a Forest Preserve viaduct, a little too close to my house for either comfort or appreciation.....

Geno Petro

Flip This Garage

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Thu, 01 May 2008 17:35:05 -0500

An earthquake measuring 5.2 on the Richter Scale (the 'It' source when it comes to earthquakes from what everybody says) hit downstate Illinois last Monday with an ensuing aftershock that actually shook the house I live in, 200 miles north in Chicago (not pictured, thank you). This was exactly three days after a 125 pound wild cougar was shot in a nearby neighborhood alley by Chicago police and one fateful day before 20 separate people in 20 separate incidents were shot in a single weekend with handguns on the city's South side. Correction: a few were actually gunned down with an AK-47 which, from what I understand, is more of an assault rifle than a handgun. But what do I know? I only own a baseball bat and a big dog.

The City of Chicago owes me $4300 for an overpaid Property Tax Refund and is making me wait 60 days for the "checks to clear" although the semi-annual bill was paid (TWICE) via electronic transfer and deposited into the city coffers instantly. I have receipts with timestamps. I have bank statements.

The Voice in the County Assessors office speaks after finally locating my file:
"Receipts and bank statements don't make a difference Mr. Genoa Petrol, (the way Spellcheck corrects my name according to Kris Berg and others) ...Everybody waits 60 days. Try back in a few more weeks."

"You're kidding me, right?" I say to The Voice on the phone. "You guys didn't wait 60 seconds to post the deposit. Twice."
"This is the City of Chicago, Mr. Petrol.... Why would I be kidding?" The Voice has the last word.

My Mini Cooper hit a pothole the other morning on Elston Avenue that cracked my head on the glass sunroof and almost shoved the engine up into my lap. I called the City of Chicago Streets and Sanitation number to report the crater. I was put on hold for 10 minutes before getting transferred to The Voice. I hung up.

I'm currently involved in a deal where the buy-side attorney thinks he's prosecuting the Monkey Trial. His paralegal (the real attorney is too busy lawyerin' to take my calls) tells me that 'Realtors' involved in the deal are not the clients of the attorney and thus, are not privy to to all the super secret, very classified, inside information concerning a single Xerox copy of a Water Certification document that I need for my files. Her advice to me was to call the City of Chicago. Which I did...

I called them and told them that I believe the Richter Scale earthquake damaged a structure on my street and could they please send someone out to take a look (see above picture). Now I'm fairly new to the community but neighbors tell me that the delapidated building, (a garage actually) has been in that same lean-to condition for at least 15 years. A mean dog chased me away before I made it to the alley for a sharper angle snapshot (with much more daylight coming through the roof). It was either a dog or a cougar, I'm not certain.

While on the phone I also asked how the cop who shot the other cougar was faring emotionally, inquired about the pothole/sinkhole on Elston and whether or not a baseball bat needed to be registered as a weapon (see The Untouchables). I mentioned that I did have a valid license for my dog, however. I asked if they could check how the Water Cert documentation was coming along for my Supreme Court case studio apartment deal, and also inquired about a certain missing, lost in cyberspace, $4300 Property Tax Refund with my name on it. I got transferred a half dozen times until finally...
The Voice, "Mr. Genoa Petrol...is that you?"

I hung up.

Geno Petro

untouchables photo by reverseshot

Gray Skies and Cheap Shoes...

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 14:46:48 -0500

First thing, the sky here is very gray--the weatherman says it may thunderstorm tonight. Secondly, the red and yellow advertisement on the bus stop bench at Clybourn and Ashland avenues indicates shoes can be had for $9.99. Lastly, Premium gas is $4.09 per gallon--and rising. I'm not even going to mention what else they are reporting on NPR this morning but I'll give you a hint; marshmallows and fairy dust are not in the week's forecast and traffic is, as always, unbearable.

We should have seen this coming. I took the above snapshot only as an ex post facto exercise; simple documentation of an end result of existing fiscal uncertainty in our marketplace. To the untrained urban eye, the image is nothing but a typical north side Chicago intersection on a typical weekday morning. But for those of us in the know-- in other words, those of us who stayed awake during high school Economics class back in 1975--the picture validates what disheveled Mr. Finkle (Sprinkle Dinkle Wrinkle Finkle) in his short sleeve shirt and too-short soup stained necktie tried to warn us about; that according to the pre-printed Lorenze Curve on the back of his laminated pen protector, milk and gasoline would be $5.00 a gallon by the next millennium- a mere 25 years down the road at the time. A loaf of bread, too. Houses would become unaffordable to all but the very wealthy and pollution would kill all the birds and trees. China would rule the world, said he.

Personally, I couldn't care less at the time about any of that. I vaguely recall raising my hand and asking if the pen protector protected the shirt from the pens or the pens from the shirt. After all, five bucks filled up my VW in those days and bought a pack of smokes to boot. High finance meant burning one in the parking lot before class. Still, somehow, the concept stuck in my memory bank along with Meritime Influence, Supply and Demand, and how to recite that ridiculous Middle English Canterbury Tale, "...The droghte of March hath perced to the roote.." thing. Public school education, to be sure.

You see, I knew the price of gasoline would someday hover around where it is today. Mr Finkle told us as much back in the 1970s. And milk? We drank the powdered version at home when I was growing up so the liquid, or anything that resembles it, never touches my lips to this day. I know Lake Michigan will stay cold until July and warm until October (relatively speaking) and what goes up doesn't necesarily come back down. The birds and the trees are on their own--hopefully God will step in on that issue.

Chicago is gray 6 months a year and traffic is always unbearable, this we all know. I am even wrapping my mind (and business plan as a Realtor) around the whole unaffordable housing concept although foreclosures in my particular market have only increased a little above the norm and condo sales, if not brisk, are certainly occurring at a predictable pace. What I wasn't prepared for, and what caught my attention to begin with, is shoes for $9.99. Now that, in my estimation, is something to worry about. That, and possibly China.

Geno Petro

photo by me

Funny how? ...ps...I'm back!

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 12:35:38 -0500

imagery by a.j. pinto idea by ben osbun inspired by dennis hopper edited for content by mona petro edited for language by american express directed by joe pinto featuring geno petro

Having a great group of office mates to work with (and pull my leg)...priceless. Oh wait, that's the other company. What's in your wallet? No...that's not them either. Anyway, I don't leave home without it. And that's the Word on this Chicago street. Anyway, get ready...I'm back!

Peace,

G.

A Sign From God?

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 14:45:11 -0500

Personally, I would have thought for an incumbent, He'd have a slicker marketing plan and a little nicer digs. In fact, His headquarters building, shown here at Elston and Kimball on Chicago's Northwest side, looks a little shopworn to me but hey, who am I to judge? I admittedly haven't read Revelations so I'm not too sure of the 'Economic Stimulus Package He had in mind for this particular generation of Americans. I'm pretty certain though, Sacrifice must be stuck in there somewhere.

Perhaps it was attached as a congressional rider. Think about it; it makes a very good case for line item veto privilages for those in the highest office. But again, it's only me at the keyboard and as I've inferred early and often, Theology wasn't my strongest subject.

Anyway, since I've been known to give almost anything a shot, I pulled into the gravel parking lot on my way home, turned down NPR on the radio, and said a heathen's equivalent of a novena for world peace, the health of our own Nation in particular, and a couple of my Listings approaching the 180 day market time benchmark...for my Sellers' collective sakes, of course. (I'm already blessed in a lot of ways so no need going to that wishing well one time too many, if you know what I'm saying. I'm saving up those tokens for a free pass out of a real foxhole situation.)

Geno Petro

Taxes Schmaxes

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 08:41:35 -0600

I was half-listening to a lady being interviewed on NPR a few Tuesday mornings ago as I drove in a gazy daze out of the city and toward the general direction of Canada. I was running late for an appointment with my tax Wizard, a fourth generation accountant who fled from the tangle of the city 10 years ago to kick back On Golden Pond and perform his magic in a more bucolic setting. His father was an accountant, his grandfather was an accountant and every first born male for the last 500 years in his family were accountants--all pencil and paper sort of fellows from what I gathered. My guy however, has flat screen plasmas throughout his office suite with a different financial news channel on each, and the latest in electronic everything to get his fiscal point across to the rest of the universe. He also has an IQ that hovers around the batting average of a Major League 2nd baseman.

"Taxes, schmaxes," was his response to my initial phone inquiry a few months back. That, and something about $200 an hour. I thought he was kidding. The mutual business acquaintance who ultimately hooked us up would soon after assure me otherwise.

"He's pricey and a little odd but he's a genius. A tax genius. A wizard, really..."

"Yeah, but $200 an hour? I don't pay my shrink but half of that," said I, lying about the shrink part.

"Your shrink sounds about as good as your last accountant." Which was true. I was my last accountant.

The lady on the radio, a spry sounding 65 year old, was talking about being 'in oneness with the all,' or maybe it was ‘one with the allness,' I'm still not certain. I immediately shot over to the shoulder of the interstate to enter the lofty, if not misquoted, phrase into the Note section of my new iPhone for later review. This is my biggest gripe with my car radio; no digital replay-no RiVo, as it were.

Normally, I would have just continued along with the 70 mph flow, eyes darting up and over, to and fro, steering with my knees in and out of the morning suburban egression and typing the qwerty with my thumbs, but I have yet to master the nuances of my newest tax-deductible gadget with its slick, electromagnetic glass face and all those colorful, vascillating screens; shrinking, expanding and spinning sideways with even the slightest tilt of the wrist. Ah, iPhone...mere marconian radio is but a relic in comparason.

The truth is, I haven't had an original conveyable thought in weeks so I risked the morning rush triple lane change maneuver and found a semi-safe idling spot alongside the poor, frozen remains of some animal who wasn't nearly as deft at negotiating the northbound lanes of I-94 as me. I looked out the window and half-wondered if it too, was now one with anything besides the pavement and the ice and the rumble of the highway. Bad omen, I thought. I said a prayer in my own way for both of our souls, remembering again, for a quick nauseating second, the box of tax records in my back seat and the IRS auditor waiting my arrival in exactly 37 minutes.

She was attending Maharishi University and studying flying yoga or some type of meditation where one can eventually learn to ‘hover,' continued the lady on the radio. She went on about sitting in silence and levitating in her mind and, well...just becoming one with everything, or allness, and I have to say, at that particular moment, I felt pretty darn mortal. It was snowing very hard, I had a back seat full of bank statements; money long spent and barely accounted for, and to be quite blunt, an IRS agent was the last person I felt like encountering that day. I believe I also experienced a sudden sensation of levitation but it wasn't of the transcendental nature nor was it anything even remotely close to what the lady on the radio was discussing. Traffic screamed by my window while I took a few seconds to gather my senses, enter my notes of oneness onto its proper screen, then push hard and away toward the Illinois/Wisconsin border town of Genoa City for a few hours of fun and games at $200 per.

An Accountant, an Italian, and an IRS agent walk into a bar...

It was the wrong day. A Treasury Department representative was in fact, in the conference room but he wasn't there to see me. My own red letter day had been moved 'indefinitely into the future' according to my Wizard. Somehow, even with all the technology on both ends, I never got the message. This was fine. This was oneness, floating above the ground, with sugar on top, as far as I was concerned.

"Let's get some caffeine," said the Wizard, grabbing his hat and overcoat while motioning toward the conference room with a head tilt.

"Tell him he can come, too. His appointment just called to reschedule. Too bad, huh?" He said, chuckling away at 5.5 cents a second.

I froze. Why did I have to break the bad news to the G-Man? I was the one who drove an hour through a blizzard to stick my neck on the block for a tax year ending in a very foggy period of my life from a previous century I barely recall. And, I was on time, too. At $200 an hour I just wanted to about face and bolt.

We made eye contact. The IRS guy got up from the table and approached me just as my iPhone pinged my e-mail with a blast of news alerts; the Dow was fighting hard to recover, the foreign markets were going apeshit, Heath Ledger was found dead...

"How do you like that?"

What? How do I like what? Why is he talking to me? My appointment was rescheduled indefinitely into the future. I was on time. I prayed for a dead animal. My Wizard said everything was cool...

"Your iPhone. How do you like it?"

I forgot I was still holding it. The little fellow couldn't have been more than 30 years old. He wore a black shirt and wrinkled black tie with equally wrinkled pants and scuffed-up shoes. He had one of those haircuts that Starbucks baristas and bank tellers in grocery stores like to sport these days--kind of shaved, kind of not--you know what I'm talking about. He had a very soft voice. I handed him my phone for examination.

"Heath Ledger just died," was all I could think of to say.

He took my device, read the screen and looked me back in the eye. I thought he was going to cry. He waited a few seconds before speaking. The young civil servant, with his watery blue eyes and stark, unpressed attire indeed, appeared to have a soul. His face showed compassion and remorse. He fiddled with the screen for a moment or two before handing it back to me.

"Tax deductible if you use Schedule C," he said.

"Yeah. I know," I thought to myself. "It's my favorite Schedule. It's the whole reason I'm even here to begin with..."

Geno Petro

Conforming Mumbo Jumbo

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 20:11:36 -0600

Okay, this is my idea. It came to me the other night as I lie awake mentally tossing around all my deals and wondering how many of them might actually make it to the finish line (i.e. the Closing Table). Thinking as an Investor/Developer, I pondered this: Find a way to buy, construct then market a neighborhood project with an across the board price point that hovers precisely at the Conforming/Jumbo loan rate cutoff--in other words every Unit in this community would have a cost basis price of $417,000 out, or rather, 'in the door'--plus... whatever down payment the Lender requires. They can fight amongst themselves for that business. Also, all the 2nd Mortgage people who don't want to lend money anymore wouldn't have a thing to worry about because they aren't invited to this party.

Price increases can only occur if the Conforming Rate moves up. Want to offer less? The answer is NO. Want to offer more? That ultimate number would be between the Buyer and the Lender. In other words, the cost of a house in my utopian 'hood would be whatever the Conforming rate currently is plus whatever Down Payment the Buyer can negotiate with the Bank on his/her own. This amount would then be placed in Escrow in a different financial vehicle; something with both upside and guarantees, like an Annuity, or stock in Google, to be determined of course, at a later date when and if this economic flying machine ever got off the ground.

The Listing Realtor would get paid on the $417,000, The Builder would take his profit out of the $417,000. The initial Acquisition Cost of the Land would come out of the $417,000. Hard costs and bank fees charged to the Builder would come out of the $417,000. All future capital improvements would be 100% tax decuctible and thus, not added on the Price. There are no Appraisers in this near perfect model because the bank pre-appraised everything before the project began. Foreclosures would occur only because a particular Buyer no longer had the financial ability to make the payments on the loan, not because the Unit lost value and simply walking away seemed like the best idea. Oh yeah, want to sell? Fine. The Price is $417,000. The Seller's profit comes out of the side investment. They can also keep any paydown of the original (and only) loan; again, that would be the $417,000. The Bank makes its money on the Origination Fees, Ammortization/Interest /Yield etc...)

If Foreclosure is indeed unavoidable, the Bank would simply keep the Down Payment Escrow and put the Defaulted Property back on the market for....

Guess...

That's right; $417,000. Oh yeah, plus whatever Down Payment they negotiated with the new Buyer. There would be no Short Sales. Short Sales would be declared an Act of Terrorism and that would be left up to Jenna Bush, by this time the 46th or so President, to decide in the year 2024 or thereabouts, when something like this might make better sense.

Either that....

or...

Another idea of mine called Size 6. It would be a Woman's Store that only sold Size 6 shoes, dresses, bathing suits, etc., regardless of the height and weight of the female customer or how huge her feet are or the actual amount of material needed to construct such individual couture or footwear. The label would simply say... 'Size 6.' The Sign above the store door would say 'Size 6.' All Media advertising would declare...Size 6 is the new Size 14! Again, this would be all be subject to the approval and veto authority of Ms. Bush and whatever she decides is best for the country; she, and of course, Oprah.

I really do need to get some sleep...or something better Close soon, one.

LOL,

Geno

imagebypqbon

I'm not 'Dreaming of a White' anything...

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Tue, 01 Jan 2008 20:35:00 -0600

I reached for the phone but there was no one to call. The six inches of snow on top of the other six inches of last week's snow has made leaving or entering my house challenging, and access to my garage--(the whole point of having one to begin with being harborage from the elements), treacherous. And even though I am my father's son (and the apple never falls too far from that tree, as we are all well aware), it's not my intention this day to discuss the weather.

I'm ticked-off because I don't have a management company to complain to because my walkways are under a foot of snow and the City of Chicago snow-plows, buried my garage door. My mailman, (correction: he prefers to be called a letter carrier per his Christmas card signature...your letter carrier, Roger) Roger won't walk up my icy steps, from the sidewalk, to deliver my bills. I do have a phone number for the Post Office but...well, never mind...

One of the reasons we bought a single family house, nestled between the trees on three contiguous city lots, in the first place was to escape the clutches of condominium association and the ever escalating monthly assessments that are inherent in such an urban housing arrangement. In other words, we no longer wished to be 'One' with our neighbors nor did we wish to continue dropping upwards of three bills a month to participate in such a social networking community.

Six Months Ago

"Think of all the money we'll save in monthly maintenance fees...," I pitched to my lovely wife as I pushed the sales contract across the table for her signature then quickly refilled her wine glass. Ignoring the gesture, she looked me in the eye and asked...

"Do you even know how to cut grass?"

"Who me? Grass? Sure..." I declared. "I've cut a lot of grass in my day." That particular day being many, many years ago.

"What about leaves, and snow, and painting and..."

"Fine," I said, snatching back the paperwork. "We'll stay in the Dorm."

Actually, we 'stayed' in a lovely condominium complex surrounded by wonderful people amidst the great Chicago neighborhood of Lincoln Park. I called it a Dorm only because I was easily 10 years older than anyone else who had purchased there. I wanted a house goddammit, and I wasn't going to let a litte snow, grass or paint get in my way. So, I pouted...

"Give me the paperwork," she said, snatching it back. She signed, dated, and pushed the completed offer back to my side of the table. "So what...?" she finished..."Are you going to cut grass in a leather jacket and Dior sunglasses?"

I honestly hadn't thought about that. Yard work apparel...

Home Sweet Home

So in the three months since we closed on the new house (actually built in the 1890s and a whole different subject for an entirely different blizzard), I've spent:

$ 1737  Home Depot (all kinds of home ownership stuff I shoved into my garage and basement.)

$ 200    One Time Autumn Leaf Removal Service (although part of the above mentioned $1737 does include an actual leaf blower and a rake which, to my wife's delectation, I haven't yet found the time, energy or apparel to utilize.)

$ 100    Snow Removal Door Knocking Gypsies (who only shoveled half the agreed upon area before disappearing into the last flurry forever with the pre-paid loot and a magazine from my mailbox.)

$ 195    Water and Sewage Bill (which I forgot was included in our afore mentioned condo maintenance fee until my complaint was addressed by the City of Chicago Water Department-- that 'address' being a sharp city worker comment, "You live in an actual house, now, Mr. Petro. You pay the water and sewage bill yourself. Capisce?" Da Bears.

$ 200    Interior Design Consultation

$ 5,500 Custom Interior Paint Job as a result of the consultation.

I think I'll stop right here as I'm fairly close to telling myself, "I told you so." I just spend three years worth of assessment budget in three months and I don't even have anyone to call to make this snow go away. Instead, I'm staring out the window onto a winter wonderland--aptly named as I sit here wondering which kindhearted neighbor might show up with a snowblower. I honestly hope the deadbeat shovelers come knocking again. I'll pay them double.

At the end of the day...

I walk across the room and gaze out the other window toward the quickly setting sun. I forgot about all those bags of grass seed, ferilizer, mulch, and lime stacked behind the garage next to the six or seven 55 gallon lawn bags of twigs, tree limbs and branches (oh yeah, add a chainsaw, weed wacker, hacksaw and another $350 to the list) I keep meaning to do something with---but have no idea what. The City of Chicago garbage truck for my street refuses to haul it all away although they did take the case of beer I tried to bribe them with the last time I dragged everything to the curb on Christmas Eve. I suppose if the favor is never returned then it's not actually considered graft in this Administration. So much for the quid pro quo everyone is always yakking about in this town.

My Managing Broker Joe Pinto, gave me a high pressure power washer as a house warming gift. I considered hooking it up to the hose I forgot to pull in for the winter and blasting the snow off my walkways but after playing that mental tape all the way through, so to speak, I decided to take a pass. Besides, the hose is frozen to the ground and the sprinkler head is a block of ice--a slow leak or something. Probably a good thing, as I thought more about the idea and the potential rat's nest of a mess that might ensue.

"You know," Joe once mentioned over a typical afternoon lunch, "...people who complain about high assessments in condos don't have a clue how much it costs to maintain a building or a property. Anytime you drive down a street and see a single family homeowner cutting his own grass, washing his own windows or shoveling his own snow...anytime you see that, just know that there's a financial trade off for those efforts."

But how would I know? I've yet to do any of those things. I just bought all the accessories at Home Depot. Oh yeah, and the house.

Geno Petro

Word

Geno Petro (ChicagoHomeEstates.com) — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 12:44:49 -0600

Apparently, I now work in Alberto's crew. I haven't discussed this with my Managing Broker yet nor have I contacted the Chicago Association of Realtors for licensing specifics but you better believe both of these tasks are on my To Do list. If I have to pay yet another set of fees, this time to The Latin Kings, then I want to know what I'm getting for my money (although to be honest, I don't remember even joining a street gang). And I'm pretty sure the tax-deductible donation I made to the Jewish Defense League earlier this month doesn't qualify as 'kicking up' to a homey.

Or perhaps I'm just jumping to conclusions. Maybe Alberto just wants a little taste, so to speak. Perhaps a referral fee. Maybe he is the regional representative for the national relocation company I'm presently doing a deal with. I don't know. He wrote all over the side door as well. He seems pretty pissed about something.

The truth of the matter is, I don't really care who I pay a fee to as long as I get something back for my money. Some trackable results. Maybe Alberto represents some emerging market I'm not aware of. Maybe he's been trying to page me and just never got through. After all, the pay phone at the end of my block has been out of order for three years. He probably just got tired of playing phone tag and decided to tag a building instead.

And if what I suspect is, in fact, true---I hope that I can at least get CE credits for watching "Snoop Dogg's Father Hood" on the E! Channel. I'm not sure if Alberto is down with that or not but hey, that's life on the real estate streets of Chicago. And if Alberto is indeed a drug dealer to boot, I only hope he's not a discount broker. Or...maybe he's just a moron with a magic marker.

Geno Petro