Chatting Up the Neighbors

An important part of keeping your vacant house more or less safe during all of the time you are not there is striking up a good relationship with your neighbors. They are a great source of "eyes" and may also direct their friends and contacts to the house as potential buyers or renters. Going into a new neighborhood can be difficult since no one trusts real estate professionals anymore, but being in the South helps.

I always enter a neighborhood with lots of smiles, waves and greetings; when the time is right, I put on the full charm offensive. This neighborhood gave me me some trouble though. The next door neighbor to the right has 2 dogs, one is a pit bull, that go completely batshit crazy whenever someone approaches the house. One of those dogs is the one that bit one of our contractors.

The next door neighbor on the left has two grim rottweilers that used to pop up and bark at me while he talked on the phone in the front yard. The dogs are bored of me now. They can barely muster a growl when I arrive. Rottweiler Phone Neighbor had been parking his and his friends' cars in the driveway of my house and though it made my blood boil, I knew it was a small offense. Besides, parked cars make the house looked occupied. So fine.

We wrote letters to and called Animal Control on Mad Dog Neighbor and now the dogs are no longer a problem. To help you keep the DogI don't ever see Mad Dog Neighbor. Rottweiler Phone neighbor, however, I see all the time.

ANYWAY, after the house had been staged and was looking fabulous, I started chatting up Rottweiler Phone Neighbor. He told me had been a resident of the street for 15 years. I wanted him on our side and I wanted to show him that we were doing good work and were not fly-by-night real estate parasites. Much to his surprise, on a rainy Wednesday afternoon, I invited Rottweiler Phone Neighbor (RPN) in to check out the house. He was blown away by how beautiful it looked and he started to let me in on the history of the neighborhood. Here's a brief rundown:

• 2 houses across the street have been owner-occupied for 20 years. That makes me feel good;
• One house across the street was vacant for 12 years (I just about fainted right there on the porch). It has just been rented (probably for $15 a month but WHATever!!);
• A house two houses to our left just rented for $600. I've seen pictures of this house online. Supposedly it has been renovated, but it looks tuurrrrrrible -- sloppy paint, unfinished floors, a messy yard, and an anemic kitchen. Am I jealous that the owner has beaten me and rented his house already? Yes! But we can't even cover our operating costs at $600 a month, so c'est la vie;

After these tidbits, the stories start getting interesting:

• The owner of the house directly across the street won the lottery a few years ago and sold his house. It turns out that he held title to the property with a wild deed (a wild deed gives the impression of a scroll running screaming through the streets waving its arms with its ribbon flying chaotically behind it. And that's kind of accurate. A wild deed is outside of the chain of title and does not confer clear title to the holder. Usually the holder of a wild deed loses in a title dispute. And that's just what happened here:) The new buyer ended up losing his purchase money and is now renting the house from the rightful owner. He cannot find the lottery winner to sue him. Of course, I have a little gem of a house to sell him if he ever wants clear title again; and finally
• About 10 years ago, back before our house had central air, it was rented to a family who left their air conditioning equipment on the wooden front porch (do you see where this is going? I've written about a similar situation). Well, there was a short in the A/C that led to a spark and according to RPN, the house burned to the ground. No one was hurt.

RPN would have told me many more stories, but I started to edge toward my car. At that moment the postman drove up and RPN and I walked down to the curb. We were standing together under my umbrella when the postman helpfully piped up, "You two kind of favor..." (that means we look a like). I just smiled. Angrily. But then RPN started selling the house! "You should see what they have done to the house up there, man. It's nice! Do you know anyone who needs a house?" And then to me, "Give him a card!" I gave him two cards. You never know.