The Updated Chicken

    I was laughing with one of my team agents the other day, while good naturedly competing to see who could find the most ridiculous notes within an MLS listing.  She definitely won, finding one where the hapless listing agent had noted the home's "updated chicken" - no doubt meaning the "updated kitchen".  Or at least that was our best guess.  My best candidate was one where the agent remarked on the property's "curve appeal".  Yes, grammar is truly optional in real estate sales.

    All kidding aside, it made me think about how frustrating it is to have to differentiate ourselves from these other doubtlessly well intended, although inept, agents.  It is staggering to see the vast number of listings for properties that are no longer for sale, ill represented, and sometimes listed with outright unlawful notations as terms of sale.  It can make your head spin.

    If we are frustrated by this, then how must the buying public feel about it?  We see first hand every day how a well funded new agent (usually the one who has the spouse with deepest pockets) is marketed and quickly accepted as the newest and best thing since sliced bread.  We see these meteoric rises, raise our eyebrows momentarily and quietly go about our business, knowing that if they are committed and genuinely dedicated to their craft, we'll see them around in the coming years.  If not, then not.

  All I can do is thank my lucky stars that we are nutty enough, or nerdy enough, to be fascinated by the current market and its many rapidly changing guidelines to find this an exciting, stimulating, and yes even gratifying, time to be in this business.  Fortunately our circle of contempoaries agrees and regularly sends referrals our way.

   So if anyone out there wants to know which Orange County cities have First Time Home Buyer subsidies, if the state funded bond program for New Construction Buyer grants is fulfilled (yes, it is.) or how to reach the OC Assessor to better understand their property tax assessment, then we're probably the right people to call.  If you want to buy a home listed by a Real Orange County Housewife, then we are probably not for you.  Not that there's anything wrong with them...

    Check us out at www.AlisoViejoRE.com.