By Erik Hare & Teresa Boardman
Fridays are for fun and today we have a kind of he said she said thing going on. Erik isn’t a Realtor and I find myself having to educate him. He says that it is me who needs to be schooled.
Erik says:
We all know that REALTORS have their own language. What is less well understood is how the buyer translates it back into English when slightly dazed after several hundred showings in one day.
Here is a handy guide:
| What the REALTOR says: | What the buyer sees: |
| Hip neighborhood | A lot of kids |
| Exciting neighborhood | A lot of bad kids |
| Pet friendly | Reeks of cat pee |
| Amazing views | Interior shot |
| Recently renovated | Interior shot, but painted |
| Great curb appeal | They painted the front |
| Charming | Dank |
| Historic | Dank |
| Charming, Historic | Very Dank |
| Period fireplace | Fire hazard |
| Quiet neighborhood | Compared to very busy street nearby |
| Close to Downtown | Quiet neighborhood |
| Great neighborhood | Police sweeps recently completed |
| Starter home | Not exactly finished, but started |
| Move-up house | Needs to be jacked up, sinking |
| Fixer-upper | You don’t want to know |
| Great amenities | They replaced the 1970s fridge |
| Exciting opportunity | They didn’t replace the 1970s fridge |
| Good schools | (ignored – everyone says this) |
| Near parks | Near parking lots |
| Ready for your updates | Beat up |
| Well-loved | Beat to Hell |
| Close to Universities | Tiny, possible fire code violation |
| Active condo association | Insanely high association fee |
| Low association fee | Hello “special assessment”! |
| Motivated seller | In foreclosure |
Hey, a REALTOR’s job is to put the property in the best light. A satirist’s job is to put REALTORs in
the worst light. It all goes around.
T says:
Erik is just being bad, I would never misrepresent a property. I honestly can’t help it that they all look wonderful to me. We call it marketing so it is OK because it is not lying, which is never OK.
Honest Erik, we don’t make this stuff up. OK, we totally make it up, but so what? You are a writer, and an author, I am sure you make stuff up, and get paid for it too. We need to pay our bills. I have tried various jobs. They all start out fine, until someone tells me what to do and I don’t.
Erik doesn’t know all of our secrets. Currently there are some fall deals on new construction condos. When they say "hurry these won’t last long". What they really mean is we don’t have a snow balls chance in hell of selling these units anytime soon. If we can unload a few we won’t have to file for bankruptcy.
In the interest of transparency, and to be fair with Erik, I am going to start putting these words at the bottom of my marketing materials :"You know what I mean". Just bookmark Erik’s list and use it as a guide.
Have a great weekend, the fall colors are at there peak up along the North Shore, and the weather will be beautiful.
I just found your blog… there’s some great entries here! I can’t wait to read more. I also live in W. 7th and have never met an old house I didn’t like. We’re restoring ours and blogging about it if you were interested in checking it out. Happy Friday!
Nadia – very interested. We also have an ancient home and so does Erik.
Great investment opportunity in Costa Rica, beach condominiums, beach condos. ___ Apartment.
Visit us for more information at http://www._____
We call this comment spam. Loser!
I love the
>>When they say “hurry these won’t last long”. What they really mean is we don’t have a snow balls chance in hell of selling these units anytime soon. If we can unload a few we won’t have to file for bankruptcy.
We have a few in the mls here that have the same “hurry wont last long” and they have a days on market of 380.
Also I like
Active condo association = Insanely high association fee
Thank you for having such wonderful humor and insightfulness on the market! I’m trying to translate it all to my market in NOVA.
And I LOVE the R2 shot! You’ve inspired me to always have my camera with me.
Nadja:
Shoot out an e-mail to wabbitoid47 at yahoo.com and we can sit down to swap rennovation stories and the like!
Late Night Austin:
Thanks, and I love your town as well.
Remember folks, as a novelist, I’m the only genuine paid liar here, so I’m only funnin’ ya! 🙂
You blatantly stole this from Pophangover.com – pathetic.
If you found either of these photos on another web site I would like to know. I took both of them, I have the originals and can prove it.