Sunday, September 13, 2009

My Realtor

I have a wonderful realtor. He is just a natural salesman! You should hear him when he gets going and reads what is on his mind! One day he stopped in one evening to try to sell me a house. This is what he said, "Justin, I want you to trust me. I have a house for you that I know that you will love. It is a nice big house with adequate living space that I think you will just love! It is just the size that you need... I just know it!" He then said, "On top of that Justin, I have built it myself... Well actually the construction hasn't started yet. I have my team of contractors that haven't successfully built anything recently. Once it passes the inspection phase I know that it will be MUCH better than other builders... my competition."

So you can probably see that I was pretty pumped! This guy has only been my realtor for 9 months and already he is saying he is looking out for me and wanting to build me a house even though he has little to no experience in that area... This guy must be looking out for me right?

Anyways... he continues talking to me saying, "Justin, no matter what you say, even if you disagree with me, you need to buy this house from me. I am determined to get you this house even though you and your family have told me that you don't want it. You tell me that you don't trust me, but I am asking you to trust me with this. Besides... you can't handle it yourself... You need me! Even though 80% of your family is completely satisfied with your current house I REALLY want you to consider moving into my house! There will be long hallways with really large rooms. You will have a basement where people off the street can come in and live with you. You will have a back yard where people can just come and hang out...at your expense!"

At this point I had to tell him that he was a liar! I called him out on this, but he just told me that I was wrong and that he wasn't a liar. My neighbors were overhearing this and they thought that I was rude for calling my realtor out like that! (I later learned that they were wanting to kick me out of the neighborhood because of this.)

After I said this, he said, "Justin, I know that there are a lot of specific details that need ironed out, but trust me on this... you will love it!"

In the past, he has given me blue prints of a house but then he threw those away. Then he had another set and then threw those away. So right now I know that he doesn't really have a plan for this house.. just ideas! He then told me, "Justin, on top of that, this house you won't add anything to your debt. The house costs $90,000 dollars. I know it isn't money that you have but I won't let you buy it unless you are able to pay for it. What I recommend you to do is stop paying your car loan and your credit card bills because we know that is going into the crapper anyways and use that money to pay for your $90,000 house! You see Justin, you will have a balanced budget! You are swapping your payments from your $90,000 in car loan and credit card debt and just paying on a $90,000 new house! See how easy that is?"

Well... the point of this story is that someone who thinks they know me, my family, and my neighbors, thinks that my family and the rest of my neighborhood needs a better home. He is hoping that the rest of the neighborhood will stop on the side of the highway and pick up the homeless person off the street and put them up in our basement and take care of them... at our own expense.

So far my realtor hasn't proven to me that he can do a sufficient job in handling his current affairs. He has already broken promises. When I tell him I disagree with his past decisions I am told that I don't understand good business and that I should either agree with his decisions and proposals or come up with a better solution. I recommend that I just want to stay in my current home for right now, as we plan for a different solution. I tell him that I don't want to be pressured into making a decision right now especially since it will be 4 years until my house is going to complete.
This is what I am afraid of... I am afraid of promises that can't be kept. There isn't a blueprint ready to be approved by the architects. All I am hearing is a promise after a promise.


I am afraid that my new house will be something else entirely than what he promises me because so far he has absolutely nothing to show me that he is true to his word. I am afraid that the house will turn out to be this:


If you haven't picked up on it yet, my realtor is Obama.