Don't Flatter Me With Your Cut and Paste!

I recently had an interesting experience with a "professional ?" REALTOR in my market.  I share this because I think that often the public perceives us as "order takers" and often we are to blame for that perception!

Last summer I listed a beautiful property and I went about marketing the property in a manner and in places that I felt would appeal to the target buyer pool.  I spent a good amount of time on the MLS listing input and considered my comments carefully attempting to describe the unique features of this property. I also spent time to take photos that told the story of this property.

Fast forward a few months and suddenly my sellers are in bankruptcy and letting me know that they are leaving town and essentially abandoning the property.

Recently I received a phone call from my fellow REALTOR late in the evening.  He calls to ask me if I will drop a key for the property off at his office!  REALLY?  Are you kidding me?  Apparently he can't make it over to my office!  When told that I didn't have a key, he asked for the past owners' phone numbers.  Further, when told that I no longer knew their whereabouts he asked me how I thought he was going to access the property on behalf of the bank!  I'm not kidding! 

OK, so all of this may seem only somewhat annoying on a late night as I'm trying to relax.  Only it just keeps getting better!  Recently I was doing some research on properties for a buyer client and remembered my previous listing which might be a good fit so I pulled up the listing on the MLS.  To my surprise I find the listing looks almost identical to mine!  My carefully crafted comments have been cut and pasted exactly into his listing!  It's clear imagination is lacking here! 

I emailed the agent to suggest that he "consider writing his own comments on the listings that he takes and refrain from using those of others".  His reply was to thank me and let me know that he would discuss it with his assistant! Apparently that discussion went no where since all the comments remain unchanged.

I'm not flattered when you take my work and attempt to make it look like yours!  Have you no creativity of your own?