Waiting while your car is being worked on is a great time to write a blog - so here is one recent expereince I would like to share.

Even before I got involved in real estate I have always felt the notion that real estate agents are not highly regarded. In some surveys I read that real estate agent is like one of the least respected professional occupations.

Obviously I have a very different opinion on the matter. Helping people make one of the more important decisions in their life (buy/sell a home) is a worth while profession and the level of knowledge/experience of the agent involved with that can have long lasting financial implications for the customer.

That very knowledge though makes agents "dangerous" should they decide to by-pass ethics.

Just a few days ago I got involved in an appalling example of how agents in the know can take advantage of not so knowledgeable consumers. I have a friend that moved from Tennessee to GA but decide to keep her lease in Tennessee until the 1 year contract runs out. She has signed that lease with a friend of hers. So the contract expiration day came and she sent a notice to terminate. She called to confirm and the agent told her that she can not terminate unless she appears in person and the other person on the lease also comes and signs?!

Now, my friend is not a real estate specialists so she took the words of the professional for granted. She was going to pay another month worth of rent and go thru the painful logistical exercise to arrange a trip to TN and schedule her friend to be there too.

I am a real estate professional though and none of this sounded normal. So I get on a three way call, stay silent in the background and listen to the agent going over the same explanation one more time. Finally I get introduced as a person that owns a real estate brokerage in neighboring GA . I proceed to tell the agent that although I am not familiar with the Tennessee contracts there is no way what she is saying is valid. It took some going back and forth but at the end the agent mutters "I guess you are right, your friend doesn't really need to come in person".

What a disgrace! The agent is part of a respectable Real Estate company and she really sounds professional on the phone. To take advantage of a less educated consumer only so you can have one more month worth of rent is beyond comprehension.

Anyway, the moral of the story is that knowledge/expertise is our weapon in this rapidly changing industry. Lets make sure we use it for the customer benefit and not for ours.

Ivan Tchakarov