Relationships, Not Experience, Is What Matters
It’s a shame that so many “old-school” business people still rest on the tactics of hard-nose experience and a “get the deal done” mentality. What people in general can’t seem to understand, that when you create a strong, positive relationship with someone - obstacles that might turn up are much more easily resolved because of a trust and rapport that has been bonded.
For instance: in the process of buying a home, our appraisal didn’t come back as high as we wanted it to. This, as I understand it now, is typical as it really only “has” to match the selling price - which ours did. However, our goal in buying this particular house was to be able to pull enough money out of it right away in order to redo all the flooring in the home… so at first glance, this appraisal would not provide that extra value.
Now, our mortgage guy at the bank is a friend of mine - we work in the same building, talk Badger sports, take smoke breaks - he’s a nice guy. However, when presented with the idea that this appraisal was WAY off (I won’t go into the dozens of reasons why… bad comps, no interior inspection, etc), he immediately got defensive, argumentative, and actually said he’d be fine sending our paperwork to a new lender if that’s what we wanted.
Actually, what we WANT is someone to work for us, someone to make a phone call because the appraiser was hired by you, someone to look out for our interests. Based on some of the things I told him that our Realtor told us he had the nerve to say “your Realtor is VERY inexperienced.” Hm.
Experienced or not, our Realtor has built a relationship with us, she has held our hand through this entire process, every time we work with her she makes it feel like we are her only client. Not only that, when the mortgage side gets screwed up, she steps in and helps articulate what we need.
Sure it’s in her best interest - she’ll make a decent commission off our purchase - but the fact of the matter is that most business professionals are looking for the easy sale. The sale where no one complains, no one creates a “hassle”… they want quantity, not quality… NEVER realizing that QUALITY will not only bring them quantity over time because their customers will praise their work to everyone they know, but that quantity will be of higher quality. They’ll create more quality relationships over their career and sooner than later will never spend one dollar on advertising - ever.
Here’s the bottom line. Mortgage guy: great guy, calls you buddy, but when it gets thick - it’s obvious all he wanted in the first place was a check. Real Estate Agent: great lady, makes you feel like you’re the only client she has, and when things get thick - she steps in, let’s you know everything will be okay, and then takes the necessary steps to make them that way.
Inexperienced? I don’t think so. Not when you create meaningful relationships with people. I’d prefer to hire a mortgage guy who’s never done it before, but would move mountains to make me happy and learn as he goes.
P.S. I’ve decided that it’d be a good idea to share my agent’s info. Buying or selling, there’s no one else I would ever recommend to someone in the Madison, WI area. I won’t be providing my mortgage guy’s info. ;)
Tags: home, real estate, relationships
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