Did you know Realtors also have a poetic license?
Check this MLS ad of a house for sale:
Cozy bungalow in a desirable neighbourhood. Sunny corner lot with a low maintenance yard. Ready to move in! Updated kitchen and bathroom. Many upgrades throughout while keeping the original charm of the house. Must see inside!!
Here is the translation:
It is a small bungalow, overpriced thanks to being located in a snobby neighbourhood. It is on a busy intersection with no trees or grass, but gravel or concrete instead. They refaced the kitchen cabinets and put a new fridge and stove and the bathroom has a new toilet and shower head. The house has a new electrical panel and it has been painted, but the old plaster walls and old baseboards are still there. It is very ugly outside!!
What you see in an ad is not necessarily what you get. Here is another description you see often: Needs some TLC…….what do you think that actually means?
Can you think of any other words or saying Realtors like to use?
When I bought my house, I will admit the listing was rather poetic. But poetic went with the house. It was a log cabin on a section of land and it did need some TLC but that was obvious by the price. Most of the listing was veiled truth. But the listing did say you can sit on your porch and see for miles and that was 100% true!
This is absolutly priceless! I was all excited over a property I saw on the internet and the pictures were so beautiful. When we went to see it, we couldn’t find it and had to call our agent. She told us she could see us and to just pull over. The only way that monster could be the pretty house online is with photo shopping the you know what out of it. Do some realtors not realize that getting people there that way hurts their reputation in the long run? I won’t look at anything from that one ever again and I have a real good memory.
I have seen “recent” TREB – MLS pics with SNOW on the front lawn!! When did Toronto last have snow …. two years ago!??! LOL
I have alluded to this before, there are over 38,000 registered agents on TREB in the GTA. A “lot” of part time agents working for challenging brokerages.
@ iampeebs, that’s funny!
I cannot believe that you were right in front of the house and you could not recognize it! LOL
I love this article, simply because it’s so true about the stretching that agents do to sell a house.
I love the way they take a picture of a home, and say it’s private and no neighbors, and it does look this way in the picture, but when you go to see the home….there will be homes ontop of homes everywhere.
Home needs some TLC. That’s a laugh. That pretty much means, home needs a bulldozer.
Realty agents are storytellers of the best kind.
@ Charlotte
…Needs some TLC is one of my favourites! It can mean anything from needs a coat of paint to needs a bulldozer! lol
Real estate agents who use poetic license are doing what any clever marketer does. You need to seduce prospective buyers with the language you use. At the same time, different people like different things. The agent might be surprised when the home buyer likes features that are typically considered unlikable. That concrete lot would have been great for my neighbors who paved over their yard!
Well, interested buyers should learn to see beyond the ad. Most likely, the ad exaggerates the positive attributes of the property. This is also the reason or the fact that highlights the importance of an actual inspection of the property. The inspection should verify the accuracy of all features stated in the ad. We should be careful and not be gullible on everything said in an ad.
You are right!
“The inspection should verify the accuracy of all features stated in the ad”
Also don’t forget that your Realtor is the first line of defence against exaggerated claims and fancy property descriptions. A good Realtor will catch many of these half-truths and point them out to you before you put an offer on a property.
The “needs TLC” gets me every time. We viewed a property that looked very nice on the outside, the listing claimed that it ‘needed some minor TLC’, but the interior was something else. Bare wires hanging from the ceiling, the ceiling in the bedroom was caving in. The clawfoot tub had sunk through the floor. When my husband leaned against the livingroom wall, it actually moved. The detached garage had two walls, the rest had fallen in. On top of all this, the listing agent never veiwed the property in person before accepting the listing. (strange but true). That was ten years ago, and the house is still standing. We believe it has been worked on, but it really should have been bulldozed years ago.
LOL your experience is somewhat funny yet so true …. unfortunately!! ;-(
This takes me back to my comments on the 38,000+ registered real estate agents in the GTA.
A full time, professional agent might have a different interpretation of TLC …. hopefully!
I would say some realtors are not only poets but also master photographers. With many people doing their house hunting online, the need for photos has become a necessity and a work of art. I have been absolutely amazed at how some realtors know how to take a picture to make the room look huge, and then when you get there in person it is quite the opposite.
I’d like to see more creativity. I can’t believe the number of times i’ve seen “excellent view”
I would have to agree with Greg on this one. The real estate game has grown boring, with the “excellent view” scene and what not. Of course I suppose they must pertain to some degree of professionalism.
Lol, if it weren’t true it wouldn’t be as funny! Part of our Sunday morning routine consists of reading the real estate descriptions and translating them into “plain English”. When compared to the photos — and some of those get special recognition as well — this makes for a fun filled morning filled with laughter! My personal favorites are the photos which are cropped so tight that the yard and neighbors are nonexistent. That immediately sets off alarms in my head.
This really shows off how agents can be so creative just to close a sale.
This is too funny! I always love to see “handyman’s special” in listing descriptions.
TLC to me means to run the other way. I like how house hunting has turned to the internet and you can rule out houses in a much quicker time than driving to them all. What really scares me is when there is ‘no photo available.’ I question that more than I question needs TLC.
If you want to lose a buyer real fast, show them a crappy property. An agent should always preview a property prior to showing it. I once showed a property that people who were given me by another agent, who coud not continue with them because of physical problems.
They put an offer in on a house, which needed work, when we went through on the inspection, nothing was done. I kept asking them if they really wanted the house. They thought about it and decided they did not. We had to go to court but they received part of their deposit back. As a result of my trying to protect them, the buyer referred me to a person who used me as her agent for the longest time. She was the head of a corporation and had to purchase buildings for them.
Looking out for your buyers can pay off nicely.
A really great article, showing how words could create illusions of grandeur.
The TLC one we get quite a lot, and then the place turns out to be a total wreck.
Another line that is sometimes is uttered is lots of potential, which means, you have to spend a pond full of money just to make the place livable.
When house hunting ignore the poetic approach, and open your eyes to what is in front of you.
LOL very true!!
haha needs some TLC more like needs some demo and a lot of cash!
I have always noticed the poetic nature of housing ads. Being someone who studied English, I find it very amusing. One of my favorite words that housing ads often use is “rustic”, which usually means the property/features are old and worn down.
Well, one can think of many other words do describe such a property, but nothing and nobody is tronger that the market. It is all about location, location, location.