Home > Blogs > Cynthia Larsen > Living In Sonoma County, CA

Does Your Lockbox REALLY Know What Time It Is?

By Cynthia Larsen

Real Estate Broker/Owner CalBRE# 01433049

July 20, 2010 06:40 AM

supra ekey lockbox I received a call from a broker this morning, he was standing in front of the hottest listing I have had for over a year. It was 8:45AM and my lockbox is timed to open between the hours of 9AM to 10PM. This is a new lockbox and I hadn't bothered to re-program the access hours, they are still on factory default.

I wasn't in a position to get to my listing within 15 minutes, so we decided he was just going to have to wait. He wasn't completely pleased with this situation, but he ended up being a really good sport.

My phone rings again at 9:07AM. My lockbox still won't relinquish the key. Then it hits me. My lockbox doesn't recognize DAYLIGHT SAVINGS TIME. And why should it? My lockbox thinks it's 8:07AM, the broker will have to wait another 53 minutes if he really wants to see the inside of that house.

I've got my job cut out for me. I have some lockboxes to re-program. At the moment, Daylight Savings Time seems like a really stupid idea.

Re-Blog

Featured

Comments(60)

Comment

Show All Comments

Sort:

Chris Olsen

Olsen Ziegler Realty - Cleveland, OH

Broker Owner Cleveland Ohio Real Estate

Hi Cynthia -- Interesting. In Cleveland, many agents don't even have the eKeys anymore due to cost and lack of use outside of certain suburbs....Interesting on the DST thing...If a phone and DVR/VCR, etc., can recognize DST, you would think these lockboxes sure could. After all...it's 2010.

Jul 20, 2010 05:13 PM

Christine Donovan

Donovan Blatt Realty - Costa Mesa, CA

Broker/Attorney 714-319-9751 DRE01267479 - Costa M

I wonder if mine are properly programmed. Unfortunately, the only way to change them is to take them off the listings and take them to the board to be reprogrammed.

Jul 20, 2010 05:46 PM

Terry Chenier

Homelife Glenayre Realty - Mission, BC

Cynthia,

What type of Lock-boxes are these? We have new state-of-the-art ones and we don't have this issue.

Jul 20, 2010 05:55 PM

FN LN

Toronto, ON

Cynthia - In the Toronto area, our board does not use electronic lock boxes.

Jul 20, 2010 11:54 PM

Irene Kennedy Realtor® in Northwestern NJ

Weichert - Lopatcong, NJ

Cynthia,

I had this happen to me at my own listing!!! Called my office and no one could explain. Then called the Supra number and learned about this little daylight-savings time issue. Embarrassed me bought those buyers breakfast at the local diner while we waited...

Jul 21, 2010 02:58 AM

Cynthia Larsen

Cotati, CA

Independent Broker In Sonoma County, CA

Christa - you and me both!

Kay - log onto Supraekey.com and you can find out what hours your iBoxes are programmed for.

Lane - yes, I'm going to open up the 'window' of time that an agent can access a vacant house.

Karen - one of our local agents had scheduled a broker's open and couldn't open the lockbox, he was really embarassed. Here, our brokerages own the lockboxes and the agents do not have control of them. Just another reason why I became a broker and started my own business.

Stan - I can't, MLS rules state that IF we put a lockbox on a house, it has to be one of these.

Jul 21, 2010 03:19 AM

Cynthia Larsen

Cotati, CA

Independent Broker In Sonoma County, CA

Mary Kay - My MLS dictates that I have to use these lockboxes. Checking out keys? Wow, I'm sure that goes back a few years :)

Janus - thanks for stopping by.

Denise - yes and they have a battery too. Nobody knows what to do when that battery dies. And these puppies cost $100 each.

Sara - SORRY!

Bob - yes, just one more thing to do to make sure your listing is accessible!

Chris - I guess there is a reason they are called lockboxes, not smartboxes :)

Christine - that is a good enough reason to sit for your broker's exam and start your own business :)

Terry - the company is Supra and they are called iBoxes. www.supraekey.com

Marc - as soon as the internal batteries die I'm sure we will be using something else as well. At $100 a pop, I'm trying to keep a limited supply of these.

Irene - this is something that Supra doesn't tell anyone until it happens to them. Nice.

Jul 21, 2010 03:29 AM

Tammie White, Broker

Franklin Homes Realty LLC - Franklin, TN

Franklin TN Homes for Sale

I had this happen in the first year of business. A client wanted to see a property before he went to work. The home was vacant and I made the appointment. Unfortunately, no let me know that the lockbox wouldn't open until 9. Fortunately, the buyer was a good sport and we went and had a cup on coffee until 9 a.m. Now I tell clients no showings before 9 a.m. or after 9 p.m.

Jul 21, 2010 05:15 AM

Jim Little

Ken Meade Realty - Sun City, AZ

Your Sun City Arizona Realtor

We use the supra box here in AZ. It comes from the factory timed 8am earliest. We tend to get started here, so I set mine to open as early as 7 am and time out at 8pm (this is an adult community). I do get aggrevated when I am showing and it is 8:05 and won't open.

Jul 21, 2010 05:17 AM

Jim Little

Ken Meade Realty - Sun City, AZ

Your Sun City Arizona Realtor

PS, not only do we have nice warm weather (109 yesterday) but we don't have to put up with daylight savings time either.

It was nice you put a Newby alert about what to blog about in your comments.

Jul 21, 2010 05:22 AM

Cynthia Larsen

Cotati, CA

Independent Broker In Sonoma County, CA

Hi Tammie - most realtors don't even know that these boxes are timed. When I was with a large brokerage, I had no control over lockboxes since the brokerage owned them.

Jim - that makes a lot of sense, it get so hot in AZ I can see why you would want to get things done early in the morning. It would be nice if all realtors assigned their lockbox serial number to the listing so other realtors could see the hours of access. Hmmmmm ... I think I'm going to call my MLS and Supra about this.

Jul 21, 2010 05:25 AM

Cynthia Larsen

Cotati, CA

Independent Broker In Sonoma County, CA

Jim - I love AZ, been there many, many times. I learned that AZ doesn't observe DST about 30 years ago. I was an hour late for a sound check in a club ... Phoenix I think. My piano player drove and her cassette tape melted in her tape player. HOT, HOT, HOT!! The shout out to Newbies came right after I had read a post by Katerina Gasset yesterday, she blogged about her first post.

Jul 21, 2010 05:41 AM

John Cannata

214-728-0449 http://TexasLoanGuy.com - Frisco, TX

Texas Home Mortgage - Purchase or Refinance

That would suck to have to wait around for an hour.

Jul 21, 2010 07:18 AM

Lee Ann Obenauer

Metro Roberts Realty - Buffalo, NY

I despise those lock boxes. My office does not use them. They never work when it is cold out. I have actually had to lean up against a box to warm it up so it would work. Very embarassing.

Jul 21, 2010 07:44 AM

Cynthia Larsen

Cotati, CA

Independent Broker In Sonoma County, CA

John - no kidding, that would be awful. It would be a nice excuse for breakfast though!

Lee Ann - oh, you've got to be kidding! I had to take a look at where you are from ... NY does get COLD! I never knew we would need lockbox warmers in our realtor toolkits :)

Jul 21, 2010 07:50 AM

Jane Peters

Home Jane Realty - Los Angeles, CA

Los Angeles real estate concierge services

We SHOW our properties :)

Jul 21, 2010 02:34 PM

Cynthia Larsen

Cotati, CA

Independent Broker In Sonoma County, CA

LOL - Jane!!! We are not allowed in our own listings once we put the lockbox on! YOU SO SILLY!! Must be all that smog!! You need a vacation, maybe a place where you can get some fresh air!

Jul 21, 2010 07:31 PM

Elizabeth Weintraub Sacramento Broker

Elizabeth Anne Weintraub, Broker - Sacramento, CA

Put 40 years of experience to work for you

We can't program our lockboxes ourselves. We have to go to the Sacramento Board of Realtors, to its Metrolist store, and have them do it. I poked around on the website for hours trying to figure out how to do it when it dawned on me that I could not. Supra runs a great site but our Board sort of messes that up.

Jul 22, 2010 04:44 AM

Bill Travis

Captain Bill Realty, LLC - Gilbert, AZ

Broker/Owner

What is daylight savings time?

In Arizona we have "Arizona Time", which stays the same all year long.

Jul 22, 2010 09:33 AM

Cynthia Larsen

Cotati, CA

Independent Broker In Sonoma County, CA

Elizabeth - I can't even imagine not being able to program my own boxes. Some people only want showings between certain hours and it only takes 2 minutes to program.

Bill - I wish we didn't observe DST, it makes everything too confusing. We are 2 hours ahead of Hawaii unless it is DST, then we are 3 hours ahead. Why do we do this?

Jul 22, 2010 12:15 PM