Real Estate and a 5th Place

Have I mentioned how much I love real estate agents? Almost as much as I love some lawyers.. Actually there are some great people that are real estate agents it just seems the bad ones you notice.

We have had our place up for sale for about 4 weeks which is probably the longest its ever taken us to sell. I know the market is not the greatest except for certain price ranges but when we put it up we had a about 3 showings and then nothing for 2 weeks. Suddenly this week we have had 4 showings. So things are picking up a bit. All the real estate agents so far have been good except for 2 instances. The first is pretty minor and that is the real estate agent forgot to lock the door so basically anybody could have come in stole us blind but really I guess that's a mistake I can overlook. What happened last night was very unprofessional.

What happens when other real estate agents want to show your house is they make an appointment with your agent who then phones you to confirm the time and then responds back to that agent saying its okay to bring people through. They usually like an hour time frame to bring their clients through which is more than adequate. You of course have to tidy up ,take the dog and leave the house empty for the hour. The agent gets in through the lock box on the door. So last night while I was poker we had a showing from 630-730. The wife took the dog and left and got back at 730. Started making her lunch and doing other stuff. At 10 minutes to 8 the dog started barking and there were people in our house. Now this agent didn't knock, just used the lock box and in he came. The wife was shocked and quickly grabbed the dog and left but she was pretty upset. She could have been in the shower or in bed or whatever. The agent mumbled something about that they were behind schedule. Yea well if that's the case how about a courtesy telephone call to let us know. Then it would have not been a problem. That would have been the professional way to handle it and we would have understood as things happen. Even knocking would have been good but that didn't happen either. I think some agents need some people skills. It just like when you are out house hunting yourself and go to open houses. Some agents are great they chat you up tell you about the place etc. while others just sit there and pass you a sheet and barely smile. Its amazing how much more of an impression a friendly,professional agent can make.

I Played a live tournament on Thursday night and with 55 people I managed a 5th place showing so that was okay. Not a lot of memorable hands but I managed a good lay down on one and bad one on another. The first one was I was dealt A10h in the BB. It was raised to me and with everyone else folding i just called. Flop comes A86. I bet Liking my Ace with on Okay kicker and the original raiser went all in. HMM. It was fairly early on but I had him covered if I called but only by a few hundred chips. After a lot of thought I folded face up. He showed and had AJ. Good fold on my part.

The second memorable hand I was dealt Pocket 10's UTG. I raised 3.5 times the BB hoping to take it right there. I got one caller the lady in the BB who is ultra aggressive and a good player. Flop comes 854 rainbow. She makes a pretty large bet which screams that she either has an over pair or AK or is trying to buy the pot. I just couldn't pull the trigger. I even asked if she would show if I folded. She said yes which even more likely said I was probably good. I folded. She had AQ suited.
Terrible fold although she could have caught her Ace or Queen on the turn or the river I guess

Other than that I managed to win my share of pots and ended up going out in 5th when the chip leader caught his straight on the river and that was my night. Still a decent showing.