Goodbye to my Sunshine Filled Sentimental Room. I've had to move my room this week. It was a tough decision. I have had this one office-room in the RE/MAX office for over two decades and through three Broker Owner changes. THREE! But ME? I stayed put in my sunshine filled sentimental room. I was glued, nailed and screwed to the corner sunlight streaming office at the RE/MAX Building in Dunkirk MD.
Goodbye to my Sunshine Filled Sentimental Room. I picked you when I first became a full time Realtor over two decades ago. You were brand new and a bunch of 2x6's. I would visit the construction upstairs and stand in each space to see where the light streamed in the most. I do the same thing in restaurants. I study the space and then head straight toward sunlight. Invariably someone will sit down nearby and ask me to pull the blinds down. It drives me nuts. But for a few moments, I get major sunshine.
So Southern Maryland Real Estate on the Run now means a different configuration of office space. More conference rooms that are group shared for agents with Home Offices. Less private offices. More Docusign. Less need for personal printers and laptops to stay at the office. More Realtor on the Run concepts. So the decision goes the way of the industry. Cut back on private offices and increase conference rooms. My wing is on the chopping block. I decided to do the move now rather than wait to do so in the BUSY Spring. Just so my Room knows, I would have never quit on you, but this was something I had to do. I really just plain liked you.
The difference in rent those six months pays for the new laptop and iPAD since my unexpected computer crash a few weeks ago. I believe you should replace a laptop every year or two. My main workhorse laptops are three years old. My crashed laptop only made it 18 months. It's time to face facts. It's a business decision. Holiday time is load laptop time is my Southern Maryland turf. The timing is right.
Anyway, it has been a great office. I have sold a lot of homes from that space. I have met a lot of cool people. It has been a home away from home when I have popped in to use it. It's always been clean and welcoming and sunny and bright. I understand how people feel when they leave their home of several decades. It is a kind of grieving process. It was mine for a long time but no more.
Anyway, fresh out of the chute I wrote my first offer in one of the Conference Rooms and got the hang of using the office equipment today. Not bad! We have an awesome, NEW super duper copier and printer right outside the conference room doors. We have a state of the art scanning monstrosity. We have more computers coming over for more plop down kind of office space. The future is here and I cannot or will not let it kick me in the rear. I was one of the very first agents to embrace the Home Office decades ago. But I always held on to my Room, too.
I am going to rev up my Docusign Learning curve over the next couple of months. That plays a big part of being more mobile. Contracts on the iPAD is where I am headed at 90 miles an hour. Also, wireless printing via the iPAD is in the new Apple software release this month. I am a Starbucks and Panera junkie so this all fits. What really fits is to be able to draw up the offer on the iPAD in the driveway and have it signed before you leave the home. Good Grief, Charlie Brown, that's better than kicking the football that Lucy always holds on to as near and dear. Kind of like I have held on to my Room.
Change is inevitable. Look at this new blogging impact on real estate. So it is with great sadness that I say Goodbye to my special space that I have enjoyed for several decades but it is with a twinkle in my eye that I embrace the new technology that really enables me to be a Southern Maryland Realtor on the Run. I had a Salmon Salad at the Chesapeake Grille today and had my iPAD up and running doing work. What happened? The staff came over to visit and peep at my PAD! My office has become everywhere and that could just become a very good thing for real estate sales in Southern Maryland. See you everywhere and I will be glad to show you my PAD!
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