Greg Swann: Duty, Honor, Country

by Brian Brady

Commercial Real Estate Finance Expert
Structured Debt and Equity
Licensed Real Estate Broker in AL, CA, and FL

Author website

I wasn’t born when General MacArthur gave “the speech“, at West Point but I’ve read it a hundred times.  I delivered it as an exercise for a public speaking class in college.

Duty, Honor, Country: Those three hallowed words reverently dictate what you ought to be, what you can be, what you will be. They are your rallying points: to build courage when courage seems to fail; to regain faith when there seems to be little cause for faith; to create hope when hope becomes forlorn.

When I think of Greg Swann…my friend, my partner, my brother if you will, those three words, spoken by General MacArthur, come to mind:

Duty: If you have the good fortune to engage his services, you’ll find few real estate professionals who live the duty of “real estate advocate” like Greg Swann.  I once thought Greg’s definition of duty impractical; I was wrong.  Few real estate brokers or agents will choose Greg’s high standard of customer care.  That doesn’t make those brokers or agents immoral nor does it make Greg Swann impractical but it does define the relationship you, a buyer or seller of Arizona property, would receive should you choose to employ his brokerage.

Potential home buyers should read:

Dual Agency Smack-Down: Real estate in real life . . .

A consumer’s guide to the divorced real estate commission: Why buyers and sellers each paying for their own representation is the most significant reform that can be made today in residential real estate

Potential home sellers should read:

How single property websites promote your property in Google.

How custom-made yard signs stop traffic

Honor: Few real estate brokers wish for lesser competition for the sole purpose of raising the standard of customer care but Greg Swann does.  Greg organized three online real estate marketing conferences and is organizing one for this fall in San Diego.  Over 150 real estate and lending professionals have been introduced to a higher degree of customer care through his carefully organized curriculum.

The unbelievers will say they are but words, but a slogan, but a flamboyant phrase. Every pedant, every demagogue, every cynic, every hypocrite, every troublemaker, and I am sorry to say, some others of an entirely different character, will try to downgrade them even to the extent of mockery and ridicule.

The result?  We’re writing the book on consumer advocacy for real estate and lending.  A new, dare I say better, breed of professional is ‘walking the walk” that Greg talks (and walks).  This “new breed” is perfectly suited to the changes facing our industry.

You now face a new world — a world of change. The thrust into outer space of the satellite, spheres, and missiles mark the beginning of another epoch in the long story of mankind. In the five or more billions of years the scientists tell us it has taken to form the earth, in the three or more billion years of development of the human race, there has never been a more abrupt or staggering evolution. We deal now not with things of this world alone, but with the illimitable distances and as yet unfathomed mysteries of the universe. We are reaching out for a new and boundless frontier.

Country: During a time when capitulation to the crowd could conveniently cure a bump in the road, Greg Swann stands unyielding to the cause of capitalism.  This is a man who fights the very union that attempts to guarantee his income to the detriment of the American taxpayer.  While Greg abhors the progressive elements that attempt to marginalize the productive, he remains confident that the spirit of the American entrepreneur will eventually remain triumphant.

Let civilian voices argue the merits or demerits of our processes of government; whether our strength is being sapped by deficit financing, indulged in too long, by federal paternalism grown too mighty, by power groups grown too arrogant, by politics grown too corrupt, by crime grown too rampant, by morals grown too low, by taxes grown too high, by extremists grown too violent; whether our personal liberties are as thorough and complete as they should be. These great national problems are not for your professional participation or military solution. Your guidepost stands out like a ten-fold beacon in the night: Duty, Honor, Country.

You may wonder why I chose a “farewell speech” to laud a man who’s greatest days in business are but ahead of him.  It is because I feared his admission of missing a few mortgage payments could have been a prelude to a career change; HIS farewell speech…and his departure is something I will not tolerate. Rather I chose this speech because it’s title defines the character of Greg Swann.

I’m doing what I know he’d never do himself.  I’m endorsing Greg Swann…as a REALTOR…as an instructor…and as a patriot.  He is a “temporary casualty” (he’d put a bullet in my head if I said “victim”) of a real estate recession, who subordinated his interests to his customers’, his colleagues’ and his country’s…and THAT is worthy of your consideration.

PS:  I won’t speak for Mr. Swann but for what I know to be true about him.  The generous outpouring of support is amazing but, like the mythical John Galt, Greg is a man who preaches the gospel of egoism.  You might do well for yourself by introducing your past clients to the investment opportunities avaliable in Phoenix and the representation of Mr. Swann.