When I first got into real estate sales in 1985, things were similar to the way they are now in one important way: “Nothing was selling.” At least that’s how it was in our little town.
The big difference in the market was that interest rates were high (think 12- 14%) and banks demanded 20% down for all but FHA and VA loans. And in a town filled with old homes, getting one of those loans was a real challenge. Ever hear of the “earth to wood” issue?
The way we did business was also different – far different from today.
I’m sure practices were a bit more advanced in the cities and in large real estate firms. But here’s a little look back at small town real estate in the late 80’s…
To communicate with clients and prospects, we wrote letters – by hand, or with a typewriter. My broker really frowned on using the telephone, because someone might want to be calling in. So… we were instructed to “Stay off the phone unless it’s absolutely necessary to get information right now.”
We did have three telephones in the office – connected to two different lines that weren’t connected to each other. They were on LONG cords, so the person on floor duty could have a phone on his or her desk. Our broker rented desk space to the Chamber of Commerce and they had a phone too. 
I’ll never forget my first day at work – I had just come in the door and was there all alone when the phone started ringing. I was running around the room hunting for phones and hollering “Hello” into them while the ringing continued. Looking back, it was funny. But at the time I was completely frazzled.
Contracts that had to be signed by out of town buyers or sellers went in the mail, too. No FAX, no computer files to send instantly. In fact, no computers at all!
We did have a copy machine, but the copies were pathetic. We also had an answering machine, for those times when everyone decided to leave at the same time. (No, no secretary.) But, answering machines weren’t very popular, so few people left messages. And there was no caller ID, so if we missed a call, we missed it.
Office listing flyers were typed by hand – a tedious job for the person who had to do it, so they weren’t updated often. There were no photos included. Even if we’d tried pasting photos on the pages before copying, our copier would have made them look like mud.
I forget what year it started, but after a while an office supply business in a town 20 miles to the East got a color copier. So if we really wanted to mail photos to a client, we could drive up there and make copies. I think it was $1.50 or $2 per page, so we didn’t do it often!
Our bulletin boards held photos of the houses and land for sale – one picture per property with a short description – both mounted on a piece of colored construction paper. Remember – no computers, no digital cameras. Photo prints were expensive, so we didn’t take many shots.
Our listing and purchase contracts were one page each. The “fine print” was on the reverse, and very few people ever looked at it. We had no property condition or lead paint disclosures. No one required a pest inspection or testing for radon gas.
This being a rural area, we did often have to do a mortgage survey – have the septic tank and the well checked out.
Everyone represented the seller – either as an agent or a subagent. Remember “Buyer beware?” Buyers still sued for misrepresentation, however.
When we wanted to learn who owned a vacant property, we drove to the County Courthouse and did a search by hand. It was a day-long project.
Our small town didn’t have MLS. No one here was a REALTOR®. So, to learn about each other’s listings, we called or visited other offices and asked a lot of questions. One broker I worked for used to get angry when I’d tell other agents about a listing – his theory was that the buyers wouldn’t find what they wanted “down the street” so they’d come to us and we’d sell our own darned listings. We didn’t have lock boxes, either. The keys hung in the office.
ADA and Fair Housing regulations hadn’t yet stifled an agent’s ability to describe property. We could still say bad words like “see, walk, hear, and family.” But we were stingy with words when we advertised – because we paid for those newspaper ads by the word.
No one in town put their photo on a business card until 1994. That’s when my son and I went to the NAR convention and ordered some from a vendor there. Soon others followed.
They also followed when we started putting our brochures in a box outside the office door for evening browsers to take, and putting property flyers on our signs. I’m not so sure we started something good with that one, because I see so many empty ones when I’m out and about.
Over the 19 years that I held an active license, things changed drastically – but I see them changing even more since I left sales. For instance, in all the time I sold real estate, I only had to deal with a short sale twice. I was the Fannie Mae agent in town, and while there were a few times that I had more than one of their listings at the same time, usually many months went by between listings. Now dealing with short sales and repossessed homes is a major part of your business.
So… do you think it would be fun to go back to the way things were in 1985?
Computers have made communication and marketing easier and cheaper now. But the work I see you doing over and above what we did back then makes me tired. You have so many more regulations and so much more paperwork to do. You have cell phones that let customers and other agents find you no matter where you are – and they expect you to respond. You can do more in less time – and you push yourselves to do it.
I’m glad that I just write your marketing copy these days.
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