Jeffery Stevens wrote a post listing the five must-have items that y'all should be carrying. He had some good items on that list: a mallet for pounding "for sale" signs into the ground, some light bulbs for your vacant listings, sign riders (of the sold, under contract variety), a broom/dust pan to clean up the occasional "mess", and some cleaning supplies... he suggested "wipes". Good suggestion.
That's actually a nice list of things you should oughta carry.
So it made me wonder what I was carrying with me... real estate related, and of note... I checked my trunk. Keep in mind, I live in the Chicago area.. it gets cold here. Here's a list of what I found, in no particular order.
1) Open house signs. These are not the single most important thing I carry in my trunk, but other than my spare tire, they take up the most space... and akward space, at that. They're like a sleeping great Dane, spreading out on the bed, taking up every corner of the trunk with it's lanky spread-out.
2) Booties. They're handy to have around. They work for open houses, or just for inclement weather whilst showing.
3) A spare pair of "new construction" shoes. I learned this one the hard way, when I was working with a developer doing new construction showings... I figured, no problem. I can walk the site with my new Ecco loafers without stepping in any mud. Needless to say I was mistaken. Sadly mistaken The shoes were ruined.
4) A decent emergency kit including a good flashlight, an extra pair of winter gloves, a Leatherman multi-purpose tool (pliers, saw, knife, whistle, scr\ewdriver)... basically the swiss-army-knife of your trunk, mylar blanket, matches, flare, etc... I know this isn't solely a list of real-estate related stuff... but you'd be surprised how often I've used many of these things for real estate related purposes. And since we're in our cars so damn much...
5) A leather portfolio with blank contracts, disclosures, extra pens, business cards, etc... I always like to have a pen and a contract on me. You never know when you're going to need to write a contract on the hood of your car.
6) Mole food. For some reason my kids started calling people who were "grumpy" 'cause they were hungry ... Moles. And thereby, high protein snacks to ward of grumpiness became "Mole Food". I carry a fair collection of Mole foods in my car
7) Little packets of Kleenex, you know... the travel size... to give to clients whilst touring. I know... I could carry Kleenex in my car, but I like being able to hand them their own personal packet of Kleenex.
8) Those damn reusable grocery bags. You know the ones that the stores sell you for 50¢-$1.00 in the hopes that you won't completely ruin the planet with plastic bags... I know, these aren't real estate related at all, but there are so many loose ones in the trunk.
9) Lots and lots of loose listing sheets, brochures from my old listings, and open house sign-in sheets. I know... I need to throw those out. I'll think about that tomorrow.
Update: I forgot to mention the small can of WD-40 I always carry... it's useful in sooooo many ways.
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