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Anthony: All right, we’re live. Katie’s favorite part, we are live folks. We are talking about Realtor safety. We have our guest here, guest speaker Mr. Matt Bernard, Littleton PD, who just did an awesome job. Folks, did he do a good job?
Anthony . He talked to us about several things that can help keep Realtors safe. One of which caught my ear that was a bit of a surprise. We talked about obvious things with open houses, like telling sellers to hide prescription pills and things like that, but you mentioned checkbooks. I literally never thought of that, I’m willing to admit it. Talk about that.
Matt: Any personal information that you have. We just showing, not too long ago, we were walking through the house and I’m like, “I can’t believe this person is leaving this stuff out.” A checkbook. Everything’s electronic, so you really don’t think about your checkbook very much, but if someone swipes two or three checks out of the back of a checkbook, those can be used without the owner of the checkbook or the person who owns account, knowing for quite some time. It could be one, two weeks before that actually starts to appearing.
Anthony: That’s right. We won’t talk about your cases, but you might have heard of that happening one time.
Matt: It did.
Anthony: All right. Then you also talked about going through the house, at the beginning of the open house, then going back through the entire house at the end, because some people try to lag behind.
Matt: Yes. One of the great features you guys have is a phone, get on your phone. You arrive, I’m guessing a half hour before an open house?- [crosstalk]
Anthony: Yes, a little bit before [laughs].
Matt: You go and do that walk through the house. Open the shades and curtains up. Open the dead bolts, make sure the dead bolts are working. Make sure the back doors are unlocked, that you can get in and out of it. Do a whole walk through of that house. Make sure that you know that house inside and out. Check the neighborhood down, which we didn’t talk about that really much.
Again, I ought to bring that back up. Did a wonderful podcast last week in regards to open houses and putting signs all over the place, instead of the two or three signs at the end of the road, putting seven, eight signs. That actually, is great for advertising, but it’s even better for getting you to know the neighborhood that you’re actually selling the house in. At the end of the open house, you want to make sure you go through that house again.
Again, call someone as you’re doing this, so there’s no one lagging behind, no one hiding in the closets. When you leave they’re going to rob the house blind or worst comes to worst attack you when you’re doing that.
Interviewer: Another item that you mentioned for showing houses, which, it sounds like a small thing, but it makes perfect sense. When you’re going into a bedroom or any room, tell the buyers to go in front of you, especially if you’re a female. Don’t walk in front of someone that you’re showing the house to and then you get attacked.
Matt: Exactly. Personal safety first. Again, open that door, let that person, “Oh, check out that nice bedroom.” Let them walk through, let them go in front of you. Don’t go in front of them, always let them lead.
Interviewer: Last, but obviously not least, was trusting your gut. Can you elaborate on that for 20 seconds?
Matt: We talked, prior to this, you guys have a little voice in the back your head if something’s going wrong. Every situation that I’ve gone to, where there was an attack, where there was some kind of fight, or something like that, they always said, “Wow, I had that feeling prior to that incident happening.” Well, then you should have acted upon it. Again, you should have acted on it. Whether it’s fight that person or flight, do something, get out of that situation.
Interviewer: You had mentioned, if you get a strange feeling and you feel like you should leave the room, you can fake it and act like you got a call. You also talked about, no one’s going to think you’re rude if you walk away, and then I chimed in and said, “Who cares if they think you’re rude?” Really, if you feel your safety is at risk, just leave. One of the realtors in the room just talked about, she was showing a property in a high-rise, and there was one buyer that lurked around and stayed there.
My attitude is, if your safety’s at risk just leave, and then call the police if you need to. That’s all, thank you very much, can you all-