A Day in the Life of a Realtor

Today was a awesome day. Last weekend I met a wonderful elderly Russian couple that were out looking for their “last home “. The home they have now is nice, but they wanted to have this last home be “Special” My wife Debbie Sargent Coe had met them at her open house in Sonata Hills at Syringa’s latest Park Home, but they wanted a bigger yard, so she sent them over to see me at my open house in Hazelwood Village. We were having a Winter Open House Day with several newly completed  furnished Model homes and a full page advertisement and we were swamped with people. Anyway this wonderful Russian Couple came in and looked at all 7 model homes and found the one built by Hunter Homes to be just the home they had been looking for - they loved the huge vaulted ceiling - the oversize Kitchen and the monster Master Suite. - The only problem is, just the day before,  two of our models had sold and of course …..it was one of them. ….so no problem - I suggested that we could build the home for them, for the same price, and that I had an even better lot than the model with an East back yard…. and Mountain Views ……and we could tweak the plan to make a couple of improvements in the process!  Yea! a triple Win- Win- Win… right?

 They readily agreed and I told them not to worry I would take care of all the details - That was the easy part - Monday as I set the build job in motion, the first problem arose and it was a Monster. The perfect lot that I had recommended was next door to the same floor plan that had already been built and was lived in. The developer had a guideline for the development that did not allow two identical homes to be built within sight of each other and “next door” to each other was considered about as close to “in sight” as you can get!

 I made a verbal plea to get an exception because I just couldn’t stand for my wonderful clients not to get it all - especially for their “last home”. I was told that they didn’t believe we could make it different enough to allow it, but they were willing to meet with the Builder - his Architect - the Project Manager and myself at 8 AM yesterday to see what we had in mind.

I had fears and trepidations about the meeting - No is not a word in my vocabulary - and I had the least power of everyone in the group. The meeting actually went great - even better than I had hoped. We all just sat down and talked about ideas and tossed around what if’s.  One hour and a lot of synergy later we had a New look for the plan that was not only a completely different facade, but a vast improvement to the original plan!  In addition between us we made a few improvements to the floor- plan to take advantage of the mountain views and tweaked the Kitchen and Master Closet at the same time.

Happy Time - Right? …well almost ..the next problem was the changes needing to be made - of course - added about a thousand dollars (which was over their budget). I asked the builder if he would be willing to eat the overage for the opportunity to improve his plan and to be able to show people the new improved version which we all agreed would likely bring additional sales over the original model.  He agreed - whew saved again - another no bites the dust!

The builder signed our offer today! This is why after 36 years  I still love my job.  I get to serve - (not sell) - my clients,…. and I get to  take part in their lives ….and I get to use all of my experiences to improve their options. At the end of the day I get paid for doing something I love and I get to feel good about myself for improving my clients lives. …..Today the Russian’s Won! ..and they so deserved it :-)