Skip to main content

Be a Breed Apart (Posted October 3, 2016)

Driving along a local road recently, I spied a sign that read “Dog Waste Removal Service” with a phone number handwritten below.  Somewhat bemused by this advertisement, I began to guess at its meaning.  Is this is a service that comes into a home and cleans up after your Shih Tzu has a weekend-long kegger, and the new boss is coming over for dinner tonight?  Failing that, the other mental image I got was of two guys hip deep in someone’s backyard just shoveling load after load into a large dump truck.  Either way, two questions leapt to mind: (1) How many friends can Chairman (Bow) Wow have, and did he invite ALL of them over last weekend?  (2) How much fiber are these people feeding their dogs?

Regardless of the answers to these questions, it’s clear that we’ve fully played our hand in the universe.  We’re done!  We’re obviously starting to go backwards.  Humankind has broken the hold of earth’s gravitational forces and escaped our stratosphere to explore outer space.  We’ve created nanobots that are so tiny that about a million of them can fit on the head of a pin.  We’ve created a great technological mountain, ready to take in the grand vista of the future and all that it promises, and yet we’ve allowed the creation of a “need” for a dog waste removal service?  Perhaps I can sum up my utter bewilderment at this development with a quote from Bill Murray’s character in Ghostbusters about the impending apocalypse: “Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together . . . mass hysteria!”  Okay, before you call the nice men with the padded ambulance and a crisp white jacket with arms that buckle in the back, I’ll get to my point – and I do have one, I promise. 

All kidding aside, I actually applaud the fact the person behind the sign in question saw a niche and wedged her or himself right in there before the corporate fat cats saw the chance to exploit yet another industry and ruin it for the little guy.  Ha ha.  But seriously, good for them!  So, with that said, I put the question to you: what are you doing that’s slightly different than everybody else either to make yourself stand out or create a niche?  If you’re a prospective seller or buyer of a house, I would highly recommend that when you interview agents AND lenders, ask us what makes us different.  What do we have that’s going to make your transaction as successful and smooth as possible?  And then ask us to give you concrete, real-life examples of what we claim we can do.

Let me give you an example of an agent I know who does something to stand out.  I’m not going to give away his “secrets” – that would be bad manners.  He’s had a number of his clients come to him after their transactions (buying AND selling) and tell him almost an identical story: other agents, when they found out that these clients had gone with my friend, had asked if it was hard working with him.  All of his clients were stumped by this question and responded that their dealings with him were phenomenal, and then they asked the agents why they would ask such a question.  These agents, with a sort of crooked smile, would say, “Because I’ve been the agent on the other side of some transactions from him, and he’s . . . tenacious (fill in your own adjective for a “no-holds-barred” approach to getting the deal done).”  Before my friend can say anything about these comments coming from his fellow agents, his clients say, “I’m glad to hear that you fought so hard on my behalf.  I never would have known that by the way you were always so calm when I dealt with you.” 

I’m not suggesting a client should expect dog-waste-removal services from her agent.  But agents (and mortgage folks) need to break away from “the pack”.  In other words, if they’re all being Shih Tzus and Poodles, we need to be Labradors and Jack Russell Terriers (that don’t lick ourselves in public, EVER).

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Financial Nearsightedness

Years ago when the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was created, we had some wacko thought that part of the job of the folks filling its ranks would be to . . . protect the consumer.  In some people’s view, this would mean that builders of new homes would no longer be able to dangle the carrot of “free” incentives if the buyer would finance the purchase through the builder’s in-house or preferred lender.  To those same people, it just made sense that the CFPB was created to even the playing field and make it so that the consumer got the very best deal available.  Well, we were wrong. Builders ARE allowed to offer incentives for using their in-house and preferred lenders despite the fact that sort of goes against the idea that the consumer is getting the very best deal available. And for most consumers, all they see is the incentive, and this computes to less money coming out of their pocket at closing  –  and they’re right (sort of).  The purpose of today’s article is si
Post a Comment
Read more

Topless Professionals - Nope

Fads come and go, certainly, but you can’t always tell the difference in the moment between a fad and a trend  –  because refusing to adapt to the trends can be limiting . . . if not disastrous.  Let me share a couple of examples where failing to see where things were headed didn’t turn out well.   An engineer presented the idea of a “filmless camera” to the executives at Kodak back in 1975, but they laughed him to scorn.     In 2012, Kodak was forced to file for bankruptcy because they failed to adapt to the digital world.     We all know Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, but how many of us recognize the name of Ron Wayne (and, no, that’s not Batman’s brother)?     Ronny was the third founding member of Apple, and he sold his 10% stake in the company in 1976 for $1500.     His shares would now be worth over $50 billion.     WAY BACK in 2000, Reed Hastings approached Blockbuster and offered to sell Netflix for $50 million.  Blockbuster turned Hastings down.  Netflix is now wor
Post a Comment
Read more

Sitting on the Fence Only Gives You Splinters

“I woke up this morning and couldn't find my socks, so I called information.   She said they were behind the couch.   She was right.”   Reading the words of comedian Stephen Wright isn’t quite the same as actually hearing them with his deadpan delivery, but they’re still funny.   The same can be said for timeless wisdom: whether you hear it coming directly from the lips of a wizened old sage or you read it in a little missive such as this, it’s still wisdom, right?   They say a picture’s worth a thousand words, so you’re about to get 2,000 words’ worth right here: I’m going to show you two graphs that are going to speak volumes about buying power and interest rates – far more than I could convey if I tried to write over 2,000 words (and probably put you to sleep).   Obviously, this first graph shows how even a slight change in interest rates can affect someone’s buying power in the real estate market.   There’s a fairly big swing between what someone can a
Post a Comment
Read more