I’ve had the good pleasure of encountering a ton of realtors through my 27 years to date here in Portland, Oregon. And while times are surely changing with the shift in technologies, both in how we all do paperwork, and surely how we communicate, I thought I’d share some perspective of our brothers and sisters in real estate, in other parts of the country. But first, I’ll talk about what I view as a proto-typical broker here in Portland, Oregon.

Portland Market

For Portland, you tend to get tech savvy agents overall. Communication is good, but can be sporadic in process, meaning some texts, some emails, and some phone calls too. With the growth of our city, it’s a phone call in my world, if we are experiencing windshield time. Outside of that, good realtors won’t take a call in a meeting, but most will text during the meeting :), at least to say I’ll get back to you.

The real deal makers, or volume agents, come in one of two varieties, either text only folks, or phone call folks. And a lot of that has to do with the type of deal volume they do. Without me delving into price points and so on,  brokers who practice real estate deal by deal, are phone callers. Those that proffer total transactions at year end as keeping score, they are the texters. Neither way is better as long as it gets the job done for the client. I tend to edge more to the deal by deal type broker. I’ll text for sure, but these are rather large transactions, texting to me seems just out of scale given the importance of amount of money. Said another way, I want to talk to my stock broker, not get a text about my IRA!

Down South Realtors

In the Southern part of the US, is a predominantly 2nd home type area. In my dealings down there, what I’ve found are realtors who are either very professional and will text/call as you do. Or the other subset, well…it’s more of a hobby than a real estate practice to them. I suspect that in many 2nd home markets across our country, it’s probably the same. The brokers are either working it full time, or they are just, dare I say this, fiddling around with a listing here and there.

I also believe most 2nd home markets are not huge metro areas, but perhaps more boutique in nature, and surely have an appeal that is destination specific too. I just can’t help but think if every agent approached the market with the emphasis on getting the “deal done”, you’d end up with a much more navigable experience. And if the end user of the approach is the consumer (client), then really everyone wins time and time again. But as I track the one market in particular, most properties don’t sell. They just sit and re-cycle back on the market the next year. I don’t get why anyone would give away time like this, but to each their own.

East Coast Realtors

Now over to the right hand coast, while I would sworn to the fact that the east coast moves faster than the west does, this is not so. Outside of DC and of course, those cities to the north of DC where I’m sure speed is king, I’ve experienced just the opposite…..down home southern coast charm, and the same in speed. Things just move slower, and the sense of urgency on details is vastly different. I have surmised over time that the pace is this way because their markets tend to be slower moving, and so it goes, the pace is matched with that velocity.

This particular market, is a metro area similar to size of Portland, but price points are 50% or even lower, if you can really believe it, but trust me, believe it. Houses in this region, that would be $600k all day long here, $250k there. It’s so hard for me to understand it, but alas, there was a day in Portland, that $250k would buy you a really nice house for sure. Where I find realtors in this market perhaps better than we are, all seem super professional and nobody is stepping on anyone’s toes. They work together a bit better than perhaps we do in our market, a higher level of collaboration appears to be the case, rather than a me vs. them approach that has been more the story here on the left coast.

So to offer a conclusion of sorts, in all areas, I’ve been lucky to find realtors who are practicing brokers, and highly capable too. But I’ve run into plenty who I know just seem to labor for the sake of laboring, I just stay clear of those folks and all seems to magically work out as it’s supposed too!

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