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A Moving Tale
I listed a property for an elderly couple who planned to fulfill their 18-year-old grandson’s dream of moving from Florida to Montana. The grandson, whom they had adopted, had a disability that made it hard for him to walk, but he loved the mountains and spent hours researching the state online. The move would be difficult because they owned a menagerie of animals, including dogs, cats, chickens, and goats.
On the day of closing, I went to the house to retrieve the lockbox, and the grandson met me at the gate. I noticed a 1980s-era Blue Bird school bus, painted sky blue, parked in the yard. “What are you going to do with this bus?” I asked. He invited me to climb inside, and I noticed that the bench seats had been removed and there was a wall of stacked hay toward the back. He explained that his grandparents bought the bus specifically for their move to Montana. He and his grandmother would drive in their van along with their cats, and his grandfather would drive the bus with their two dogs and six goats. At night, they planned to pull off the road, and everyone would sleep in the bus. They left town before even securing a new home in Montana, but I always think of the grandparents fondly for living simply and doing what it took to make their grandson’s dreams come true. —Katherine Shalosky, MRP, Keller Williams Realty South Shore, Apollo Beach, Fla.
Short Notice Leads to Long Friendship
When I was a rookie agent in 1989, a prospective buyer came into the office and said he admired one of our listings, a house under construction on a golf course. I offered to show him the nearly completed home, but he said it wasn’t necessary. He wanted to make a cash offer for the full asking price, contingent on one thing—that it close the next day or the deal was off. I was skeptical of him at first, but he was a farmer from Texas who struck oil on his land. This is just how he did business; a handshake would have been enough for him to close the deal. We had no cell phones then, so I wrote up the offer and said that as soon as my qualifying broker was back in the office, he’d present the offer and we would be in touch. To my amazement, the seller accepted the offer and the closing timeline, and we settled the transaction in one day. The buyer and his wife lived out the rest of their years there, and I learned how lasting friendships can be made in this line of work. Once a week, the couple would stop by our office to deliver a bag of Werther’s butterscotch candies. We exchanged Christmas gifts and birthday wishes. When they died, it felt like I lost my grandparents. —Cindy K. Lynch, CRS, GRI, Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Lynch Realty, Ruidoso, N.M.