Monday, June 25, 2007

The big step

Well, this is the time for new beginnings - my daughter Hillary started her new job today, going back to the work she loved which is legal research. She is now working for a law firm specializing in Intellectual Property cases, one of my daughter's favorites.

My daughter Jessica was just promoted at the place she works. She is now a career advisor in a group home near where she lives in Connecticut. So far she seems to love it. She has worked there between overseas assignments for several years.

I took the big step and turned in my Real Estate license last week. I have spent the better part of the past three days taking inventory of the supplies I accumulated going through a sort of triage. One pile is stuff I will keep for future use (large), one pile is stuff that is getting trashed (even larger), and one pile is stuff that I will try to sell (small).

It is really amazing how much stuff I have accumulated in just four short years. Lots of printer materials, most of it was personalized for my Real Estate business so it wasn't easily reusable and thus got trashed. This morning I took out four very heavy plastic trash bags of stuff. I also trashed several dozen personalized directional signs.

This last I considered trying to sell, but at last decided to trash since whoever bought them would have to cover over the personalization (my name and phone number) which might not make it worth while. Fortunately the garbage men take everything.

The nice folks from Comcast installed my cable phone service last week, and the quality of the sound on my phone doesn't seem to have changed much. In as much as I only use one phone regularly I didn't check any further. Saturday morning I accidently set off the alarm. As a habit I turn on the alarm when I go to sleep, and turn it off from the pad in my bedroom just before I come down stairs. Well that morning I forgot, and when I went to open the sliding glass doors in the living room, the alarm went off. Nice to know it works. I entered the code and didn't think anything more of it, except that I got annoyed that Brinks did not call to ask if there was any problem, Then the key pad started to beep and the red trouble light started to blink. I checked the manual and it said, sysem needs service. OK, I picked up the phone in the kitchen and tried to dial. Nothing, tried again, still nothing. After trying several other phones I realized that I had no service on any of the phones in the house other than the one in my office.

It seems that the installer forgot to ask me some questions and thus set it up incompletely. Long story short,they will be back tomorrow to do it over.

Tuesday, June 05, 2007

rumor mill

The more things change, the more they remain the same, but on the other hand the only thing constant in in life is change. Take your pick!

The Real Estate Market has gone to hell in a hand basket. Listing agents are spending a fortune market their seller's homes and holding open houses with no takers.

People wonder where all the home buyers are, that is easy, almost all of them are waiting to sell their current homes before they can look for a new one. In this market they just can't afford to carry two mortgages. First time home buyers are having a rough time in a money tight market.

As I have written previously, mush as my company may trumpet stronger sales, the wave of agents interviewing at other brokers looking for a better deal, or looking for jobs that will bring in some income to pay the rent, has reached tsunami proportions. Rumor has it that my broker, is not out ill, but has in fact quit. She has been at it for decades and I guess she had enough. Company pressure to produce sales, cut budgets and recruit new agents must have been intense.
As the keeper of the phone list I haven't seen a new entry for quite some time. I have seen several agent removal requests

I congratulate my oldest daughter on her new job (not yet started) and wish her the best of luck. Coincidentally my youngest daughter has also started a new job and I wish her the very best of luck as well

After four years of being a Real Estate agent, I have come to the realization that I am not a sales person. I don't have the temprament for it, so I will continue until I find something els to do. My initial thoughts are that I will look for work (probably part-time, hopefully from home) as a writer or editor. Lots of places with jobs being posted so we shall see. First up, create a resume.