Chaos Calls for First Principles

I recently spoke with a young CEO of a proptech company. After talking business, he asked me, “Why do you stay in this crazy industry?” It was clear that he had hit the point that every proptech entrepreneur hits once they’ve endured the mind-numbing stupidity of some people in real estate.

My answer, which I have repeated often in these pages, is that I stay in real estate because some of the best people I have ever met work in real estate. They are genuine salt-of-the-earth good people who always try to do the right thing. Some might not be book-smart, but they are street-smart while being really good caring human beings.

I was reminded of this because of one of life’s perfect storms, when one event over here unconnected to another somehow resonates. Over on Twitter, I got into (and am still in) a debate with good smart people over “forgery” of showing agreements. (Long story, but it starts with this Industry Relations podcast episode.) One of the criticisms leveled my way by someone I respect, Melissa Savenko, was this:

Rob, don't you constantly advocate for agents to BE BETTER. More educated. More thoughtful. More client-focused. More ETHICAL.

How in the H-E-Double hockey sticks does your advice — "Just forge the BAA!" — square with that advocacy, for agents to be better? Seems SUPER hypocritical to me.

I see where she’s coming from, but it led me to think bigger thoughts.

For the TL;DR crowd… well, just skip this missive. If you don’t have the patience to read these thoughts, I doubt you will have the patience to think about the issues to your and our benefit anyhow.

The ultimate conclusion, however, will be this: in times of chaos, in times of uncertainty, when nothing seems solid… that is when we need to return to first principles, the Big Why, the reason why you do any of this in the first place.