Real estate professionals share the crazy, funny, and poignant experiences that have happened on the job.
Cockroaches at the door cartoon
© Steve Musgrave

House Sitters

After I put my client’s rental property on the market, the home got immediate attention from a family visiting the area and looking for a vacation home. The listing was a great starter home in a nice location. The excited agent called for instructions on how to operate the lockbox key. These were her very first buyers, a married couple with kids.

I was surprised when the agent called right back in a panic. The home had recently been vacated, and I knew the tenants had tracked mud around the house. My first thought was that a part of the home had not been cleaned sufficiently.

But the agent proceeded to tell me that she and her clients were greeted with a battalion of cockroaches in the entrance. I asked how her clients had reacted. They were cool, she said; their two kids stepped right over the intruders and the parents laughed their hearts out.

Not only were the buyers unfazed, but they wrote an offer for the home. Unfortunately, they weren’t the only ones who wouldn’t let a pest problem deter them: They were outbid by another buyer. And I was left with a “creepy” story to tell at client appreciation events.

—Lory Valderrama, Century 21 Primetime, REALTORS®, Rancho Cucamonga, Calif.

Necessary Sleep Disturbance

One of my seller clients was out of town and returned on a red-eye flight. We spoke shortly after he landed.

A few hours later, a buyer’s agent called me and asked if he could conduct a showing in the next two hours. I called and texted my seller every 20 or 30 minutes to get approval for the showing, but he wouldn’t answer. I knew he would want his home shown, so I told the agent I would make it happen.

I got to the listing 15 minutes before the showing, and I could see the seller was home. I opened the front door and yelled his name. No response. I started walking down the hall-way and yelled his name again. Still, no response.

I saw that the primary bedroom door was half closed, so I opened it gingerly and found the seller passed out on the bed. I said his name again, and still, he would not get up. So, I shook his foot. He woke with a start and asked, “Is there a showing?”

Apparently, to decompress from the flight, my client had stopped at the bar for a couple of drinks before heading home. He was certainly relaxed when I arrived. We laughed at the situation, and he thanked me for waking him up. We got him out just a few minutes before the prospective buyers arrived.

—Lilli Schipper, ABR, GREEN, Hollywood, Fla.

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