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Turning into the skid

Although I've lived in San Diego for several decades now, I first learned how to drive a car back in the northeast. In case you haven't heard, it snows in the northeast. It also gets super icy there sometimes. Occasionally it does both at the same time, which is how and why I eventually learned how to turn into a skid.

The first time you find yourself skidding on ice and snow, with your back tires going where you absolutely do not want them to go, you are likely to do one very natural, very wrong thing. You are likely to grab the steering wheel and turn it the way you want your tires to go. Almost immediately, you will realize that strategy doesn't work at all. The road, your tires and your steering wheel have had a serious breakdown in communication and no amount of wishful thinking is going to change that.

The best way to recover from a skid is to do the scariest thing ever, to turn into the skid, to force yourself – however counter intuitively – to point the steering wheel in the direction your DON'T ultimately want to go, until you feel the steering wheel and the tires and the road re-engage. Then and only then do you regain control of your trajectory, slow your pounding heart and your tires and, hopefully, continue on the path you originally intended to go.

My job as your realtor in the home buying or selling process – any good realtor's job in the home buying or selling process – is to help you remember to turn into an icy skid.

What does an icy skid look like in real estate? If you are selling your home and believe that there is absolutely nothing wrong with the fuchsia wallpaper in the front entry, or that the high-voltage power lines that flank your backyard should have no impact on the sales price, or that the current schematic of six cats and one litter box is working quite well, you may be skidding.

If you are buying a home and decide that the cute barn door on the master bath is much more important than the leaky plumbing, or that the designer flooring offsets the cracked slab, or that the pendant lights over the breakfast bar will make you so happy that the freeway noise won't matter at all, there is a strong chance you, too, are well into a bad skid. Or you could hit your icy skid once the home is in escrow: when the inspection goes poorly, or when the appraised value does not match or exceed the agreed upon price, or when there is a financing problem.

In each and every one of those cases, you may be better off doing the exact opposite of what your instincts tell you to do. That's why you need an experienced realtor who will be with you through every step of the process. You need someone who can point it out to you when your wishes and your budget and your common sense are no longer communicating. You need someone who will remind you to refocus and turn into the skid despite your racing heart, so you can regain control of your trajectory and continue on the path you originally intended to go.

I drove on quite a few icy, snowy roads before I finally learned to turn into a skid without hesitation. My poor little karmann ghia had more than one 'car meets snow drift' dent to prove it. That's because it's almost impossible to be great at something you do less than a dozen times. How many houses have you bought or sold? Very few of my clients have been through enough dicey escrows to remember the best course of effective action when escrows start skidding. For me, and for all good realtors, it's already muscle memory. That's why you really, truly need to hire a realtor whom you trust to get you home safely. I can help you with that. Call me.

Nancy Schrimpf is a realtor with Coldwell Banker Village Properties. Contact her at (760) 717-2307 or [email protected].

 

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