Another “soft landing” took place at a closing today with one of my listings. I looked back on that particular listing and sale and considered the little bumps in the road which were worked out without anyone getting their feathers ruffled. Having not ever worked with that particular seller before, I quickly brought myself up to speed with the time frames with a job relocation the seller was going through. Having a major employment transition as well as a home sale coming together in and around the same times, was certainly all the more stressful on the seller, but in the end all went quite seamlessly well. It makes everyone’s lives better whenever major sales and purchases take place, and in the end, all concerned parties are happy. That is what I consider a job well done.
I was teasing a secretary at an office today about my two most recent pet peeves I’ve noticed becoming more in use as of late. One of them is the “reaching out” that’s being used by many when communicating with others. The first time I read it in an e-mail from an out-sourced loan processor I thought, “What is that doing in business correspondence?” Now I’m hearing it from some Realtors as well as bankers and others in the business community. The words “reaching out” makes me think of someone out in the middle of a river with a life vest on and beginning to get water logged. They’re reaching out in desperation for someone to pull them in. Or, we could also consider it overly personal to where it speaks of crossing the line from business life to personal life. And lastly, it could even have religious overtones. Irregardless what everyone else thinks of it, I’m not at all fond of its mis-use in business communications. My second pet peeve is the use of, “hey”. Instead of saying “hi” or “hello”, far too many are using “hey”. The first time I found it annoying, was a number of years ago when a casual acquaintance used to say to me, “Hey Buddy!” After a while, I said to him, “I’m not a barnyard animal looking for my next helping of hay.” He thought it funny, but still continued. I believe he was originally from Eastern Iowa and likely they used it out there more as some sort of pseudo-endearing salutation. It’s being used so much in our community now that I’ve caught myself saying it a time or two. I promised myself that if I find me saying it one more time, I’m going to wash my mouth out with soap. Of course I’ve spoken of this before about when in a crowd of people, we very often find that crowd, or say not more that several, being addressed as “you guys” when there are women in the group. One of my female friends happened to bring it up several days ago and shared her intense dislike of its usage. I must agree with her due to the glaring dis-respect given to the opposite sex by the one saying it.
I was out showing acreages this afternoon and decided to take the above photo of yet another example of how thoughtless many of the landowners are in North Iowa. I freely mentioned to one of the buyers, “We are supposed to be stewards of the land rather than wasteful by allowing perfectly good home-sites to fall into ruin.” She answered, “You’re right. I can remember a building site or two in every mile but now they’re vanishing.” I believe much of this neglect is due to the refusal of land owners to give up 5 to 10 acres for others to have a country home. I say, “Shame on them for wasting resources.”
