The $100,000 Freezer

According to the Bible, Sampson slew 1,000 Philistines with the jawbone of an ass. Every year thousands of real estate transactions are lost with the same weapon. In a previous life, I was fortunate enough to work in the home office of the world’s largest company. Very interesting dynamics and we never knew who was going to show up to a Saturday morning meeting. On one Saturday it was Garth Brooks and on another Saturday it was the president.

During my first week, I was at lunch in the cafeteria and one of my colleagues posed an unusual question. He pointed to the nice gentleman across the table and asked me, “A few years ago he cashed in a small part of his stock options…Guess what he bought?”

My first guess was a motorcycle, “Guess bigger,” he said.

OK, my next guess was a car. “Guess bigger,” he said.

My next guess was a house. “Guess bigger,” he said even louder.

“Bigger than a house?” I asked. Then he replied, “The Kansas City Royals baseball franchise.”

“Hi I am David Glass, Nice to meet you,” the nice fellow across the table said. Didn’t see that one coming. The conversation continued.

Then my colleague pointed to the guy sitting at the end of the table and said, “Ask him to tell you about his million-dollar shop.”

Everyone was laughing hysterically but me. This was an inside joke and obviously, I was on the outside. The entire table erupted. Apparently, this guy wanted a shop so he cashed in some shares and bought his shop. Bad timing. Shortly thereafter the stock split and the stock continued to gain value. A few years later those shares were worth over a million bucks. Not the best decision.

Recently I was visiting with a real estate client who I had consulted with on a home sale and I inquired how the sale was progressing. When he replied with, “You are not going to believe this,” I knew it was not good. He said he had the house sold but the seller did not remember the freezer went with the house. The seller became emotional and would not relent. On a million-dollar transaction, the seller would not let go of a 10-year-old freezer worth less than $200. The seller was insisting on blowing up the deal over a freezer. Lucky for him he had a strong Realtor who stood firm and saved the deal. The market adjusted shortly thereafter, prices dropped, and had that sale not gone through the seller would have lost over $100k and had the pleasure of making house payments through the winter.

Every gambler knows that the secret to survivin’ is knowin’ what to throw away and knowing what to keep, You got to know when hold ’em, know when to fold ‘em, Know when to walk away and know when to run – Kenny Rogers

This was not the time for emotion and the seller needed to listen to his agent. He had a great agent that provided him with great advice. As the proverb goes, A wise man learns by the experience of others; an ordinary man learns by his own experience; a fool learns by nobody’s experience. If you have questions about your home or real estate I would love to hear from you.