I am not here to talked about real estate sell your product sell you a service. I'm here to talk about Realtor® safety.
Before getting into real estate over six years ago I was a police officer. I was a police officer for 18 years. A long time I know. Once I got into real estate, after my career as a police officer, I came to realize that I felt a little vulnerable in some instances. May be at an open house or a showing or different things. That was something that I hadn't really felt before in my life. Especially because I always felt safe and confident in my role as a police officer. However, I also knew that there were times that I would be at risk, but I felt like I was prepared or had plans in place to help me get through whatever situation I was in.
As a realtor I had my shiny shoes and my clipboard or my phone or whatever. you know papers or cookies I had at an open house and when strange things started happening, I did not feel prepared. I did feel less prepared than I thought I would but more prepared than most.
I talked to a few ladies in my office, and they told me that they had been stalked by this one fellow in a couple of their open houses.
I mean imagine opening a house for your client inviting people into show this lovely home and you're being stalked in your role. It's just not OK! These two gals both had long thick, brown hair, but she they were a bit shorter same body type. Same type of physical look to them. This fellow was coming to their open houses. He would stand there he would stare at them they didn't know what to do. They felt uncomfortable they didn't ask him to leave. We sat down and had lunch one day and I said “Hey tell this guy to fu** off. “ Tell him to get out of your open house. Maybe do it in a nicer way than what I just said. Use clear effective communication. But if he's not going to go, then you need to go. You need to leave that place. You need to call the police.
There are a lot of options of things that you could do. For some reason the real estate agents didn’t think that they could address it like that. Because what if he was a client. Well, you know, there will be another client out there. Let's be honest about it. There is enough real estate business out there for everyone.
I also came to realize that this is an issue. That Realtors® will meet people that we have never met before in secluded places, in an empty house, in a house of a semi-rural neighborhood, or in the evening. In the dark in places that are unfamiliar to us and people that are unfamiliar to us.
We don't want to be paranoid, but we do need to be safe. I started talking about safety within my brokerage on Vancouver Island, within the communit at the real estate board, and trying to get it across the province. I'm going to be doing a little bit of a talk in Las Vegas at the LeadingRE conference next week. This will get the message to 1000 agents from across the world.
I want to start sharing more information, more videos, more safety tips; more ways that we as real estate agents can keep each other safe. If you're a client and not a real estate agent maybe that there's things that you can do to help your agent and those women and men in your community, feel a little more safe.
Stick around over the next while and will start talking about this more. I'm very passionate about this real estate is how I earn my living, but this is important to me this will help protect the people in your community and you know what if you not a realtor and you don't need this for your business, even in your own personal life some of these tips may help keep you safe. Or your son or daughter that is going off to university or yourself after a night with cocktails downtown at a club. Something we all can use a little bit more information to help keep us safe I hope to see you all soon and be safe everyone.