I recently went on a listing appointment with a seller whose home is located an hour from my office.  I don’t know the area at all and was very frank about that with the seller.  But as we talked, we hit it off and she still wanted to list the home with me.  I proposed that we co-list the home with an agent from the office that my company has in the town.  This agent is top notch and thoroughly knows that market, plus he lives nearby so could readily and easily show the home.

The other agent and I toured the home with the seller and he did what I thought was a phenomenal job describing her competition in that price range and pointing out areas in which the home needed to be improved.  I felt pretty good about the day until a week later when the seller told me she did not like the other agent – she was adament about not allowing him to be on the listing.  She said the other agent did not have a single good thing to say about the home.

In detail, when she talked about the great upstairs office space (complete with a putting green), he said, "Yes, but the spiral staircase would be dangerous for children."  When she said the the home was on an acre and a half and had a creek next to it, he said, "People in this price range prefer smaller lots."

It was a tough lesson to relearn … tell the truth, but don’t only see negative.  If there is something about a home that is an issue and can’t be changed, find a way to turn it into a positive.

I did send the other agent my sincere thanks and a gift card for all his work after having to tell him the bad news.  But I’ll probably feel bad about it for some time.