If we believe well done, everything you need to sell the richest people in the world, the most expensive houses in the world is held in your lambo, shaking hands and opening a bottle of Krug.
But there is a dark side of the glamor of conclusion offers that you will not see on television, reveal the New York brokers.
“We are like a concierge service,” said Peter Zaitzeff de Serhant to the post. “People want restaurant reservations. They want to know where to take their children. We rub the toilet. “
A few weeks ago, Brown Harris Stevens Hotshot Lisa Simonsen had already completed his work for a client – selling him a unit of around $ 10 million in one of the “good construction” cooperatives of the Upper East Side – when he recalled by asking more.
“He asked me to get them a last -minute reserve for 12 in Casa Tua,” said Simonsen of Upper East Side Private Subservate Club, which is currently one of the most difficult tables in the city to be booked. “He wanted it in the next two hours!”
Endless requests go far beyond simple favors, Kvetch real estate markets.
On the high-competitive high-end sales market, their ultra-intimated master’s clientele in the universe is used to obtaining their path-and they expect services normally reserved for domestic staff and experts in experts.
This means that the city brokers are systematically informed of running for cafes, babyssits and / or walking dogs – while acting as Ersatz artistic advisers, interior designers, school consultants and even mariners. Those who dare to say “no” risk losing lucrative affairs.
“They think:” I just paid $ 10,000 to this person for this rental. I want to make them work for that, ”said Zaitzeff about customers.
Compass agent, Vickey Barron, remembered having shown a busy couple and their three young “exciting” children’s apartments in the Upper West Side.
“They asked that someone from my team will take their children to Central Park. During the following two and a half hours, a brother bit the other and the other wet his pants,” Barron told post. “They were beyond the savage. One climbed a tree and did not go down. They were on a sort of adrenaline summit. I thought I was going to lose the member of my team. Meanwhile, the mother had a crisis.”
Nadine Hartstein of Bond was also solid in babysitting for customers.
“They were 12 and 13 years old, very privileged, extremely rich, but extremely sheltered,” said Hartstein about the offspring of a foreign buyer with whom she treated. “The mother said her children should have American friends and the next thing I know, they are with my children Trick-Ou-Training. We had to take them to a horror house, then the mother made reservations so that her children dine with us the next evening. At least I have children, otherwise it would have been even worse for me. ”
According to Barron, pets are another pressure point, which said that sellers are often reluctant to remove pets for projections.
“I felt like a dog walk, but for a cat,” she said. “The customer says:” I have these cats and a cat is wild, and he will panic and escape. You should make sure my cat is safe. “”
As the door was opened for a projection, remembers Barron, the cat ran for this – going to the door and in an elevator open to the point of going down. After research on the scale of the building, she found the feline flying in an apartment whose door was cracked; The cat was under a bed, the hair noted and scratching for its life.
“I’m allergic to cats,” she said. “And that was a current problem. I said to myself: “Where’s my Benadryl? »»
But even Barron has limits.
She spent three hours cleaning a client’s apartment to prepare it for a photo shoot. But when the woman told Barron that she would better come back early before filming to redo her cooking, the broker broke.
“I watched it and said,” It will be exactly like this at T when I am here. Don’t think I’m going to arrive early and start again. I had to define an expectation, ”she said.
Nevertheless, most brokers agree that making an additional effort pays dividends.
“Nothing is under me,” said Zaitzeff. “I say to people we rub the toilet to live part -time.”
He said he learned to suck him and provide services, no matter how much the Madeline Hult Elghanayan of Douglas Elliman, wife of the real estate broker of Douglas Elliman and president of TF Cornerstone, Tom Elghanayan.
“She is married to one of the richest people in New York – and we would have open days and she was going to clean the floors,” said Zaitzeff.
So, when difficult customers make scandalous requests – if he takes advantage of his Rolodex to bring a client into an exclusive club or repair their John – Zaitzeff said that he was still comfortable, because when they want to sell in a few years, they know who they were going to call.
However, this economy of reciprocity is also ripe for abuse.
“It’s extortion,” explains Vincent Pergola from the Elegran real estate brokerage store.
This month, with a case suspended in the scale, the scion of a rich family which invests in properties through Manhattan asked Pergola to organize what looked like a festive business dinner.
“We have obtained a record rent for one of their units, and there was a chance that the tenant could also buy the apartment – potentially resulting in two commissions. The customer said, `If you succeed, you have to dinner ”, explains Pergola. “I say to myself:” Absolutely, I would like to do that, wherever you want to go. It’s on me. »»
But then, the conversation took a strange turn: “He sent me a text and said:” Hey, instead of dinner, buy me these $ 550 headphones “, said Pergola. “And I was like” of course – if the sale passes “. He responded with indignation. »»
