Detained by the Police for DWR: DRIVING WHILE a REALTOR®
It was a quiet Sunday afternoon and I was dozing off on the sofa after an eventful drive through an upscale neighborhood on a private drive in rural Lafayette, Indiana after viewing surrounding homes for a possible upcoming listing.
I was half expecting the firm and purposeful knock on the door-no it wasn't the neighborhood canvas of out-of-town professional fundraisers wanting you to support their cause-as that was yesterday!!!
When I opened the door, sure enough there was the police-a deputy sheriff to be exact.! I knew what his first question would be, as I stood on the front porch being detained from my Sunday afternoon nap:
"Do you own a RED TRUCK?"
REALTOR® vehicle profiling???
Why was the deputy sheriff asking this question, which put a big smile on my co-Realtor® wife's face?
Earlier that afternoon while looking at the surrounding homes for the possible listing I turned my truck around at the end of a drive way of an expensive home that had a horribly twisted and dented garage door.
A car flew up behind us and stayed right on our bumper after we crossed the road into another expensive housing subdivision on a private drive.
My wife Sharon had the answer! It was my "less than professional" 1996 red pickup truck that prompted one of the housing addition neighbors to tailgate me while making calls on his cell phone and gesturing until his hand was about to fall off. Was I going to get "busted" for DWR because I was driving OLD RED, instead of a more "professional" vehicle?
As the car continued to follow us right on our bumper down the long private drive to view neighboring comps we passed a late model white Escalade that appeared to have pulled off the lane very quickly at an angle and the door was left open as if they exited the vehicle in great haste.
I did not think I was being profiled by the neighborhood watch, or now the Deputy Sheriff on my porch because of my less than fancy truck! Something else was going on, but WHAT?
The Deputy Sheriff then asked if we owned a white SUV and explained that the person whose drive I had turned around in was the victim of a road rage incident right before we visited the subdivision. In the haste to escape the pursuing white SUV the homeowner DROVE HER CAR INTO THE GARAGE DOOR BEFORE IT WAS COMPLETELY UP to hide before the white SUV could find her vehicle and home.
The family member pursing and tailgating me thought I might be part of the white SUV's CLAN coming to settle the score, and thus the reason for briefly being detained from my Sunday afternoon nap by the law!
Are real estate agents judged by what they drive?
Would I have been chased by the relative if I were driving a newer and better vehicle?
When we relayed the story to the prospective listing client and being questioned by the police she shared it with the road rage neighbor. The first thing the neighbor who was the road rage victim said after hearing the story was, "A Realtor® wouldn't drive a vehicle like that!", which made my wife smile proving her point!
After this I did begrudgingly agree to let Sharon look for a vehicle for me, even though in our parts it isn't WHAT you are that matters, but WHO you are! After looking for a month, my wife Sharon did find the perfect vehicle!
I just can't win, or can I ????
Sharon had found a nice Jeep for me and then she saw this Mercedes on the car lot that she just had to have!
So we ended up trading our 2011 Toyota Camry for this 2011 Mercedes and Sharon all of a sudden forgot to keep looking for a vehicle for me, because she had a new vehicle! Fine by me!!!!
It is two years later now and I will hit 200,000 miles on my beloved OLD RED next month, and with this post and some comments I will surpass 500,000 points on Active Rain before the end of the day.
Hmmm, which milestone is more significant????
Comments(232)