Match Maker and Wedding Planner

I recently ran into a quote that caught my eye, I even posted it on my Facebook page as I found it very real in many ways. It went something like this: “A realtor is not a sales person but a match maker, and once the perfect match has been made she becomes the wedding planner.” That is so very true, there is no way anyone could or should talk someone into buying a home. No, we don’t sell homes, we travel along, offering options, narrowing it down until we walk through the door with our clients and everything stops for a moment… we don’t sell, we give room, we give room for that match to be made. Then comes the offer, the negotiations and if all goes well, there’s the “engagement” and I start planning the events leading to closing. Yes, a cool quote but during past few days, I have realized how very true it actually is.

Every now and then I see a home that I really, really like. I mean there are beautiful homes right and left but for someone that views hundreds of homes a year, most of them are just houses. Nice houses, great houses, smart houses, funky houses. Great matches for my clients, beautiful new construction, perfect for remodeling, and the list goes on… and then all of a sudden, I walk into a home that I find fascinating. A house that I like. A house that I will remember for a long time. Many times, it’s not the right home for my client though, not what they are looking for, not in the right neighborhood, not the right floor plan, just not “the” home. Our search continues, the home that I liked so much finds its person, my clients find the home they were looking for and life goes on. A match has been made.

Until. One of my clients sends me a picture of a home that they like. It’s a picture of reference as this home is way too big for them with 5 bedrooms, and kinda on the pricier side, more than they would be willing to invest. More than anything else though, it’s just too big, but they have fallen in love with the feel of the home and wanted to find something similar. I look at the photos. I take another look and a third. I ask questions, and I keep thinking in my mind… I am so very sorry guys, but your perfect home sold a few months back. It was one of those homes that I really liked, yet something that wasn’t quite what my client was looking for. It sold in a heartbeat, and now it’s gone.

So, we start our journey. We date a lot, meaning we look at a lot of homes. It’s like speed dating and the answer tends to be “no, not this one.” Some of the homes we have a second date with, even a tiny little crush but that’s it. We see a few, where we start considering moving forward but there is something that holds my clients back, it is the image of the first home, the one they sent me, and we return to the wish: “If there only was something like that one, but a tad smaller…”

Then comes the day when I check new listings in the midst of making breakfast for my crew, as always I discard the ones that I know won’t work for a multitude of reasons; location, age, style. There’s one left, the home looks a bit familiar in the photos but without thinking much, I forward it to my clients as it looks like something they would like. Later, before we go on a speed date with this house I pull it up to take a closer look and I realize this is the home that sold, the one that I had deemed as their perfect match, the lost opportunity. Call it Karma, call it fate, call it whatever you want to but sure enough. It was for sale, only months after it had sold.

It wasn’t speed dating anymore. It was love at first sight. It was a match made in heaven. This home was exactly what they had been looking for. There was not one thing that needed to be changed and in a beat of the heart all the maybes, the second dates, became something that had never truly been even an option. This home was meant to be. Yesterday we got mutual, in other words my clients are now happily engaged, and I have become their wedding planner.

From the Residential Real Estate Council