Getting Ready to Sell a Tenant-Occupied Home

If a client needs me to tell a short-sale bank to #*%$-off, I have no problem doing so. I can be as tough as the next guy, and probably much more decisive. In a moment’s flash, I can size up the situation, analyze it, choose the appropriate reaction and, bam, just do it. But decide whether to carry an umbrella when it’s sprinkling outside, no can do. It’s a struggle. It’s more than a matter of take the umbrella or leave it, in Sacramento, it’s do I open the umbrella or do I wait until I am soaked?

There is a fine line between being a wimpy wasp or a tough-as-nails Sacramentan, I’ve noticed. For one thing, it’s perfectly OK to stick a travel-sized umbrella in your bag if it’s rainy weather. It’s another thing if you’ve got to stick your hand out to determine whether it is actually raining hard enough to open the umbrella. That’s why you see so many suited guys downtown running in the rain, umbrella clutched under their arm and a newspaper over their head. They don’t want to look like a wimp. They’d rather look ridiculous.

Kind of like I looked, standing on the steps yesterday and holding a clipboard over my head when it was raining. Yes, I had an umbrella in my bag but it seemed pointless to open it. I had not expected the tenant to lock the gate between the house and the street, but fortunately there was a doorbell right there on the wall, and fortunately, she quickly came out to let me inside.

This Sacramento real estate agent was inspecting two houses on a lot in Midtown that will most likely come on the market this week or next, depending on whether I rouse the sellers from cruising the beaches on vacation in Maui. When I first called one of the tenants, she was very reluctant to let me visit. Why, she needed more than a few hours of notice, and she hadn’t cleaned the house. She didn’t know if she would be home, no, probably, she would not be home, and she wasn’t sure when she ever would be home, if I wanted to know the truth.

I assured her it was OK. I would visit the house next door. Oh, and did I mention that most likely an investor would buy the property, so she could probably just stay on as a tenant if she so desired. I let her know that when I finished inspecting the home next door, I would stop by, and if she was home, that would be cool, and if she wasn’t, that would be OK, too. I’d just catch her some other time down the road.

After I completed my initial agent inspection and shot photos of the first house, I walked over to the second house and knocked. Oh, my goodness. She was home. Imagine that. Somedays, I’m just lucky like that.