Owners have to teach managers & sellers

[Stephen Masek]

As owners, one of the things we've learned over the years is that we often need to teach property managers and real estate agents how to do their jobs.   There is some humor in the situations which arise:

1) We have a house in Lakeland, FL for sale, and the agent seemed disappointed this morning when we rejected the first offer. Lowball on price (we have solid comps on the same street), they want us to pay all of the high closing costs, they only want to give $1,000 as an EMD, and they want a long escrow. What does all of that mean? They have no money! More importantly, they are unlikely to find any money.

2) We have a house in Acworth, GA and recently switched property managers. The new managers claiming great experience, wrote ads which started out with a long list of restrictions and rules, not positive things about the house and neighborhood! We had to educate them. The first potential renter they find is a group of unrelated graduate students, completely forgetting that the house is in a HOA and intended for single family occupancy, not use as a dormitory. For all of this they and all of the others in Atlanta demand 10%. However, we get the last laugh, as the thing has almost doubled in value and is still appreciating.

3) Numerous times over the years we have had to tell managers and selling agents to take good photos, not lousy ones which make the garage door the main feature of the image.   

Do you have any funny stories to add?