“Well is there someone else in your office that can show us this home?” “No probably not”
The above question came from a lady who called me today and my response is shown right after her query. Let me discuss how this all came down. I might sound like am ranting in this blog. Just ignore the rant portion when it shows up.
My cell rings this morning and of course I see a number I do not recognize. I answer and a lady is speaking very quickly about wanting/needing to view a home. The call sounds like she is in in her automobile. The listing agent cannot show her the home as she is too busy. The caller of course never tells who exactly is the listing agent or where the home is located. Caller tells me she already has a Realtor without saying their name but her agent is unavailable or too busy or too lazy as I am not sure which it is. She wants me out the clear blue to drop everything I am doing and show her this home. If she is in Katy Texas it would have taken me about 90 minutes plus of driving time (round trip) gasoline plus tolls and at least 30 minutes to show this home if not longer. My response was I am already engaged doing other work and cannot show you this home. My statement is absolute fact but I still cannot get over her pushy style and chip on the shoulder attitude.
The caller then blurts out in a very nasty and mad tone “Well is there someone else in your office that can show us this home?” I am now completely flabbergasted and looking at my cell phone in disbelief. I calmly respond “No probably not”. Now I am certain the caller is totally agitated and she responds with “Well I can I ask why not”? I do not try to even discuss this issue any further and tell her well you already have an agent and showing you this home takes any agent’s time and costs that agent money. In a very sarcastic tone she tells me well thank you.
There are so many reasons why to me this whole dialog is wrong. Right off the bat is the safety issue. I have no idea at all who this person is and where she wants to go to view this home. I will only show a home after first meeting a potential client at my office. In addition, unless someone appoints me as there agent I will not show them a home. I have had past experiences where a Realtor friend asked me to him a favor and show his client a home. I obliged as the same thing could happen to me some day. The key word here is my friend had a client and not just someone who wanted to supposedly view a home.
Second point is the basic bad attitude of the person calling as she is acting like I have nothing better to do than show her a home at her convenience. I am not on any given day including weekends just sitting around stuffing my mouth with food and drink waiting for some obnoxious person to demand that I show her a home. Really what are you thinking?
Third point is basic economics of being a Realtor. I will not go into all the details of what it cost to be a Realtor. The basic premise is this if any Realtor does not close a purchase or sale or rental of any given home they do not get paid. In my above example I would have been spending at least 2 hours of my time, using my gas, putting miles on my car and for what? To do a pro-bono favor for someone I have never heard of and would never see again. Realtors do not have some big company which reimburses them for any of their expenses. All expenses come right out of my pocket. We are all in business to make a profit and pay our expenses and feed our families. We are not charitable organizations or related to some government funded program. Do you work for free? Of course you don’t and then why do you think Realtors should work for free?
My final point is why would I try to pass on this unknown person to another agent in our office? What about their safety issues? I really do not have the time to search for someone to do a totally unknown person a favor without even considering safety. My question back to you is why didn’t you ask the listing agent to have someone in their office help you or for that matter how about another agent in your own Realtors office help you?
The attitude of person who spoke to me just totally set me off as I guess the public thinks Realtors are here to help them similar to local government worker.
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