Tired Legs, Job Completed
So I just got back from my first time ‘walking the neighborhood.’ I have a new subdivision I have been marketing to for the last month or so with a couple of other agents in my office. It’s a cute little neighborhood in Chandler called Twelve Oaks. We split the 700 or so homes in the subdivision up among the three of us and have put together monthly marketing ideas that we’re currently carrying out. This month, our idea was to deliver candy in small bags with our business cards in a sort of reverse trick-or-treat.
In the real estate business you hear of lots of agents who walk their neighborhoods monthly delivering information or goodies to promote themselves. You also hear of lots of people who pay someone to do this for them. I have done lots of mailings, but hadn’t yet attempted a large door-to-door campaign, until today.
Oh my lord, those agents who do this every single month are either saints, masochists or liars. I had exactly 244 houses to cover. The other girls and I assumed this task would take a couple of hours. It took me 3 hours and 45 minutes, almost exactly. Um, ow, my legs hurt. And also? The place on my arm where I tied a tape dispenser so that I could carry a box full of almost 250 bags of candy and still be able to get a piece of tape off to attach the bag to the door without setting everything down at every house (one of the other girls brought a rolly suitcase, she’s so smart!).
And just in case he’s reading, I would like to let the man who at first refused my candy because his sister-in-law is and agent and he has to use her, and then took the candy when I told him I had one for every house, and then when I came back around the block to do the other side of the street, complained that the candy was melty because I’d been walking in the heat too long, that I hope his sister-in-law has a hearty constitution and God love her for having him as a client. I have this feeling he’d be the kind of client we like to call “High Maintenance.” (And if I see him ever again, he will receive no candy from me.)
Anyway, it was an interesting experience. I do feel like I have a better idea of my clients in this neighborhood, and of their homes. It’s a neighborhood with large lots, RV gates and even actual RVs (there is no HOA!). It’s a neighborhood where the majority of people have Halloween decorations out and kids play football in the cul-de-sacs. It’s right next to a park, a school, and airpark (Stellar) and not far from Chandler Mall. I feel like I would like to live in this neighborhood (just not next to the melted candy guy). So I guess it was a good day after all. But next time I do it I’m going to enlist the help of my husband. You think he’ll take payment in homemade eggplant lasagna?