As Realtors®, we seem to have a lot to say about our reputation. In fact, one of the big benefits of our National Association of Realtors® is that we get the reputation-laundering effects of a Code of Ethics, which according to official reports makes us more reputable than we would be if we hadn't had our ethics coded.
One of the big draws at Bubble Blogs is Realtor®-bashing. It's an Internet version of dunk the clown. Recently, an agent in my company who's an avid blogger in her own right found herself surrounded by angry bubblers for whom just her being a Realtor® wasn't enough -- they had to go after her on racist grounds. She lasted a lot longer than I would have -- I would have been engineering extra delete keys for all ten fingers if I had to for the bigots and their pals.
Also recently, I was working with a buyer who was telling her friend about the offer we'd worked on, and I mentioned how a second offer the listing agent mentioned hadn't materialized. The friend assumed the listing agent made up the other offer in order to pressure her friend, the buyer. My response was along the lines of, "Well, I know how people like to see Realtors® as crooks and liars, but inasmuch as I am one, I try not to."
I do know that part of how I got to be comfortable in this job was developing a rather thick skin about being disliked. Strangely enough, around the time I stopped giving a hoot very much about how much I could be hated, I started getting along with many kinds of people quite famously.
I know what kind of service I give people, and I hire people who maintain the same standards. One time I had a buyer pretty much ready to pull the trigger on a condo for a 3.5% commission, but I found one down the street for her for a lower price and 3% to me that she hadn't seen. She was from out of town, so I could easily have not told her about it, and she probably didn't have the computer access to find it. I told her about it, and she bought the cheaper one.
I wouldn't trade that $1,200 bucks or so I "lost" on that transaction for what that $1,200 bought me. I've slept like a baby ever since. Whenever some ax-grinder on either side of the argument runs around the Internet saying Realtors need a "reputation facelift" or some such, I just crack up.
Not this Realtor®. Peddle your reputation cure on someone else's street corner. I'm good.
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