My First Real Estate Experience! I Thought It Was Always Going To Be Easy.
Many years ago, before I knew any better, my first real estate transaction(s) was memorable. My first sellers/buyers were dream clients. That experience was truly memorable. It also influenced how I relate to buyers all these years.
Be willing to give the clients, buyer or seller, the attention required to get the job done.
Pay attention to details and listen to the clients.
Be willing to work hard no matter how easy the first experience is.
It was my time for telephone duty one Saturday afternoon when a lovely young couple with two children dropped in. So, they were mine to work with. That's the way it worked.
I loved them the minute they came in an said the magic words: "Will you help us find a home?"
They didn't live in the area where my office was located, but that's where they thought they might want to buy. At the time, they owned an older condominium in another area of the county and needed to sell that to buy something new, a single family detached home, hopefully new construction.
TIME TO LOOK AT THE NUMBERS. I took them on a tour of new home communities in the area. Of course, they loved everything they saw. However, when doing the pre-qualification, it was clear that the new homes were far out of their price range. We also had their condominium to consider.
TIME FOR AN OPEN HOUSE. So, I ran an ad in the Washington Post for an open house for the condo the following Sunday. After an hour or so, a nice lady came in, walked around and said, "I'd like to buy this condo." Good grief this is easy I thought.
With their condo under contract, I took the buyers on a tour of homes in a community where their children went to school. We looked at a lovely older brick home typical of the neighborhood where their children's school was located and they fell in love with one of the homes. I prepared the offer and took them to the loan officer to make loan application. In those days, it took about 7-10 days to get a credit report, but the loan officer and the listing agent for the home they wanted to buy were satisfied that they were good to go.
Back to Back Settlements. Here we were with the condo closing and their loan in processing and everything looked good. We closed the condo in the a.m. a couple of weeks later and their new home later that afternoon.
A SALE AND A BUY WITH MY FIRST CLIENTS. My broker decided that I had mystical powers since these were my first sellers/buyers and everything went as smoothly as it possibly could.
To be perfectly honest, I'm not sure I really knew what heppened. It was so easy. Of course I was certain that every transaction would be just like that.
HA!
Courtesy, Lenn Harley, Broker, Homefinders.com, 800-711-7988, serving home buyers in Loudoun County, Virginia.
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