The
Broker
Sometimes
I think the job of being the broker in a real estate organization is directly
proportionate in size and importance to the number of agents in his office when
it comes to solving problems. An agent, for example will have a question, any
sort of question or problem, he comes to the broker for advice. The broker of
course has to know all the answers, based on the rules of the game, and advises
accordingly. It’s pretty impressive; almost like a tribal chief.
But
that only holds good in a very small brokerage. As the company grows and takes
on more agents, a surprising phenomenon arises. Of course you have agents who
are new to the business and then you have others who have been around for a
while and joined our company for their own reasons.
Normally
my advice was not overly encouraging, but it was fact based according to the
rules set out by the board and/or the securities commission. I didn’t often get
into moral issues since that was another subject entirely and I generally kept
my own counsel.
It
wasn’t long before I began to notice complaints crossing my desk over things
happening against the advice I had given. What the . . . . ? Was I losing my
mind or were the agents just not listening? It turns out they were listening
alright, but just not to me. What they would do is go around the office
describing their particular situation to various other agents, all of whom had
different opinions, and then pick the one they liked best, and act on that one.
That usually ended them up in the kind of difficulty I had predicted in the
first place. Well, it did provide work for a broker to iron out all the
wrinkles in a crumpled agent’s life.
As
our company grew, so did the number of agents who were disgruntled with the
owner of the company. Well, he was getting on a bit and they wanted to take the
company in a new direction, so negotiations got under way and seven of them
bought him out. Can you imagine seven owners of the sort I just described
owning a company? It was sheer pandemonium.
I
wasn’t part of the partnership, not that it wasn’t offered, but seeing that I
was the broker and I was needed, that was good enough for me. I wasn’t going
anywhere anyway so we were all more or less well satisfied. The first thing the
new company did was take on the Sutton Group franchise which was probably the
best thing that ever happened. No, that’s not true. The best thing they ever
did was to hire Roberta as office manager. She came to us in an opportunity
resulting from mismanagement of a local Remax office. Well, their loss, our
gain.
The
partners meetings were loud and boisterous. There wasn’t a wall flower in the
bunch. But with all the diverging opinions, it wasn’t long before the partners
fell off one by one. It wasn’t so much the different opinions as it was the
expense of the company. It wasn’t long before there were only two partners
left. Nobody left the company but five of the partners just didn’t have the
wherewithal to foot the bill. We were growing into a family of sorts.
One
of the partners decided that he should become a broker so that we could open a
second office as per his agreement with the franchisor. These were rather
uncertain and tough times for the company, what with meeting the daily bills,
looking for a new office, recruiting new agents and so on.
I
was involved in very little of this except as an outside observer, just doing
my job as a broker and taking in all the machinations of the company. I’m going
to tell you that once Roberta got her hand on the tiller, it wasn’t long before
the company started moving forward. Of course there were discussions,
disagreements, insults and threats, but she prevailed and slowly it all came
together. I have to say I understood all these things and Roberta’s approach to
them. I have two daughters who have exactly the same personality, whom I admire
tremendously too, but I wouldn’t want to be caught in their crosshairs.
Finally
we got another office at the opposite end of town which I was the broker at
while Blaine presided over the original office. They sent me about fifteen
agents and a sweetheart of an administrator with a part time assistant. It was
quite a set up. Every once in a while Blaine would drop in to see how things
were going and we’d have a good chin wag.
One
day he showed up at our office and was talking to the girls when the assistant
administrator complained to him about my wanting things done. She wanted him to
speak to me about this attitude of mine. In other words, who did I think I was
being so demanding?
Well
Blaine, in his inimitable laid back style only chuckled, saying that she must
realize that I was the boss (broker) here and could easily fire her if her work
wasn’t up to snuff. Apparently her eyes widened somewhat and she busied herself
doing what I had asked in the first place. Nothing more was said. I only
mention that last bit as a point of amusement in the many adventures we had
together, especially at the North Kildonan office.
I
still go in once a year to look in on my real estate family, pretending to be
on inspection. Judging by the hugs I get, I think I am well remembered and am
still part of the family. I guess I had a good time working there.
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