Cannot Say This Enough

Time flies when you’re having fun they say, and so another week has passed by. I’m so incredibly happy I have found my thing after trying out so many other things that weren’t for me in the end. Teaching – check. Research – check. Nursing – check. Healthcare Administration – check. Real estate is finally my thing, for reals.

Saturday

I wake up around 6AM to prep for my interview as I didn’t have time the night before. I’m meeting a reporter and a photographer from Helsingin Sanomat, the Finnish equivalent to Washington Post with my clients to talk about our real estate market and how it differs from Finland. Pretty cool, isn't it! What does the process look like? Why do we have a buyer’s agent and a seller’s agent? What does a seller’s market mean and what does it look like? How does the process with multiple offers and escalations feel like to a client? We meet at 10 AM and chat for a while before taking a drive up the hill to my listing. That’s where we take the photos. Pictures of staging, the water in the pitcher that’s color coordinated with the pool and all the small things we do to create an illusion, an image of what it would feel like to live in that home.

Before my Finnish friends have left people start coming to the open house that hasn’t even started yet. My signs are not out and it’s definitely not time yet, but hey why not… and I let them in. I realize there’s no way for me to leave the house to get my signs out and I end up texting hubs for help. He drives by, pulls my signs from the back of my Volvo and drops them off to guide people to the house. Sometime after 4 PM I get a text from him saying that he has removed my signs. That’s awesome because otherwise I would probably still be there - today. The rest of the day I answer my phone to talk to all the agents reaching out to me.

Sunday

It’s another open house day. This time we agree before hand that he’ll drop off  and pick up my signs as I’m meeting at the house with an agent before the open house. We pretty much repeat the drill from the day before. People lining up to ask questions and me answering them; “Yes, kitchen has been done in 2015. Yes, the pool is heated. There is a cover and the chemicals cost around $700 per year. Yes, the lot extends to the lawn area behind the pool. Yes, I have seen the home that just sold… Have you seen the one across the road? It’s a bit different from this one and no pool."

Sunday evening, I answer questions swarming in through email and phone.

Monday

I run late from my coffee date with friends as my phone keeps ringing. In the end I sit at the coffee shop, listening to others talk, switching between my two phones, emailing and answering calls. On the side I’m prepping for a tour with another set of clients and two closings.

Tuesday

I have given up getting up at 6 AM. Instead my clock is now going off at 4:30AM. My phone keeps ringing during our business meeting and I keep running out to take calls. After the meeting I’m touring a few homes with clients, one of the homes has an incredible view over Seattle. I mean a true million-dollar view. After our tour I grab quick lunch, prepping for a listing appointment while enjoying my roast beef sandwich. Offer review starts at 3 PM and my email keeps telling me of offers coming in. One, two, three… still waiting for some… four, five… oh, someone we did not wait for… six… We sit, and we sort, and we negotiate No, we don’t read the love letters. We don’t look at all the family photos sent to us. We don’t even look at the names. We have offer #1, #2, #3 etc. All we look at is the terms, the finances and the money. Late that night the home is pending, we are under contract and the closing period has started.

Wednesday

When I meet my clients for another tour they comment on my early morning emails. I laugh, I’m not a night owl… I rather wake up early because my brain pretty much shuts down around 9 PM. We look at a couple of homes, talk about the process as car drives are awesome for educating buyers on the process and discussing potential terms.

I rush to the office to fine tune my listing presentation, print it out and hop in the car. Another gorgeous home, beautifully remodeled, lovingly maintained… and that view. Seattle is beautiful, the mix of mountains, evergreens and water.

A bit later I stand at a construction site with a client. We climb over cords, tools and leftover pieces of drywall as we tour homes to be. We are visualizing what these homes will become once drywall ends up covering the framing and those pipes sticking out turn into bathrooms and kitchens.

I get an email with recording numbers, awesome, finally closed after some teeny wrinkles and delays on the way. At home I work on an offer and send the draft to my clients.

As I check my email I’m brought in tears as I get the best reward one can get, an extremely happy client writing the most wonderful, heart warming review on my Facebook page.

"Thank you so much to the fabulous Muusa for her wise counsel, expertise and support in selling our home. She worked tirelessly to help us present our home and market it to the widest possible audience. We were incredibly pleased with the deal negotiated and would whole heartedly recommend her services!!"

Thursday

I dart out of the house before anyone else even wakes up. I stop at Starbucks to grab breakfast on the go. I’m the first one at the office. I print out the offer draft, grab a couple of notepads, make coffee and get ready to sit down and go over the offer, page by page, line by line, explaining what it all means and what we are doing to make us to hopefully look attractive in the seller’s eyes without giving away too much.

Two hours later I’m at Target buying closing gifts. All kinds of pretty things. All kinds of useful things. Soaps, dish soaps, kitchen towels. I remember when we closed on our home we got a sort of survival kit with basics. I really appreciated it and I try and create something similar for my clients.

Friday

I wake up around 5 AM even though I don’t have to. I make a cup of coffee, take the dog for a walk, read the news and sit down to write. Right now, it’s barely 7 AM and I’m finishing up here. The house is still asleep. I meet my clients at 1 PM to hand over the keys, the survival kit and a bottle of champagne. Today Martha gets to work with me.