Greg Swann can be an insufferable bastard sometimes — but that doesn’t mean he’s wrong . . .

by Cathleen Collins

Realtor, Staging Consultant

Author website

Okay. I’ll admit it: Greg is more efficient than I. Of course, that will surprise no one. He is able to communicate great big ideas with an economy of words… prolifically. While I have to sweat out each word, then use too many to get my point across. Sweat might just be the difference. Greg doesn’t sweat the small stuff, but I’m always flitting here and there to make sure I have everything covered. Don’t misunderstand – Greg nails all the detail on his real estate transactions, but that’s because they aren’t small stuff… they’re the kind of stuff that does matter to Greg. Just don’t leave it to him to see that our water bill gets paid! Those are the types of details he won’t sweat. He leaves those to me.

This comes up again and again in our life. Early this morning when we awoke, Greg made a beeline to his iMac, and I dashed outdoors to find out how many feral cats I had trapped during the night. You see, while we’re both great animal lovers, Greg is perfectly satisfied knowing and loving the ones that are known and loved — the ones who have names. While I’m always on the lookout for the nameless ones, the ones who have been lost, neglected, forgotten. So one of the organizations I’m involved with is AZCats, which lends me traps to catch feral cats and helps me to get them spayed or neutered, so I can turn around and release them and care for them (as much as a feral will permit) and know they won’t create even more feral kittens. One who I caught during the night was a kitten, too young to be neutered. So after I rounded up all of the traps and took the older cats to the vet’s, I took the tiny kitten to a neighbor to see whether she would take him in. She did. All this before breakfast. Greg was still sitting, working, writing at his computer when I settled in to work. He wasn’t interested in the kitten; it was just one in a million. Greg’s too efficient.

This made me think of a disagreement we’ve been having lately with respect to real estate agents. I’ve been generally annoyed with what I think is a pervasive bigotry against Realtors/real estate agents. A person’s animus against Realtors might be based on a bad experience with an individual Realtor, or perhaps on a Snopes-worthy telling of an “acquaintance’s” bad experience, or probably more likely on a mob mentality that reviles an entire group of people just because, well, it’s easy… Painting with a broad brush is more efficient. You don’t have to spend time getting to know the individuals who you are lumping into the group.

Our disagreement (not an argument, more like an ongoing debate) specifically dealt with Greg’s comment on a recent meeting of a local association of Realtors, called to discuss the slow seller’s market in the valley southeast of Phoenix. I argued that without having been there to hear the real-time conversations, Greg couldn’t possibly know the motivations of the meeting participants. Had I been involved with this association, I might have attended the meeting, if I thought I could have come away with any good ideas to help my selling clients. I argued that by drawing assumptions on the character and motivations of the individuals who attended, Greg was behaving no better than the silly bubble bloggers who toss out small minded remarks at real estate agents like ignorant “witch” burners of old slung mud balls at ancient widows, like bratty kids tease abandoned cats today… senselessly, and with mean spirit. Why, I had even ribbed Seattle Eric for making broad assumptions. No way was I going to settle for Greg to not “do better.”

Then I read today’s article in the Arizona Republic, Builders work to mend fences with agents, which Greg commented on this morning. Arghhhh! We may not always agree, but I will admit that sometimes drawing conclusions based upon someone’s associates can be more efficient.

I live with him. I work with him. I love him even more than I love our animals and all those feral cats. It’s not the easiest thing in the world, because he can be an insufferable bastard sometimes. But that doesn’t mean he’s wrong…

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