{"id":7700,"date":"2011-09-16T07:00:32","date_gmt":"2011-09-16T05:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.iliaspapageorgiadis.ro\/en\/?p=7700"},"modified":"2014-03-12T16:38:50","modified_gmt":"2014-03-12T14:38:50","slug":"16-brides-the-owner-my-client-and-me-sitting-around-a-table-for-6-people","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.iliaspapageorgiadis.ro\/english\/2011\/09\/16\/16-brides-the-owner-my-client-and-me-sitting-around-a-table-for-6-people\/","title":{"rendered":"16 \u201cbrides\u201d, the owner, my client and me sitting around a table for 6 people"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tPart 1<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t(to read part 2, click here)<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tEvery Real Estate market has its own “urban legends”. The same is true for Romania. If you join our profession, you will soon hear about several “super properties” that “exist” somewhere out there. Usually they are described as “unique” and they are always difficult to reach. Sometimes “someone” (an intermediate, a broker or “someone who knows someone, who is friend with someone else”) gives you a small hint, or even an old sketch, but if you try to find out the reality, you usually reach a dead end.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tMy client: Investor in hotels<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter I established myself in the Romanian Real Estate market during 2004 and 2005, 2006 was an important and promising year for my activities here. Business was going well (probably not because I was intelligent, but because this was the same for the whole market) and I started travelling around Europe, taking part in exhibitions, promoting Romania, searching for new clients and learning much more regarding my profession.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tThis was exactly the case with that client of mine, whom I met out of the country. He was (and still is) a major investor in the hotel industry, with an impressive portfolio spread in many countries. He expressed his interest in entering the Romanian market as well and asked me to find him a “special” offer, not just “a box of cement with low quality and high price”. How easy was this to find? Extremely difficult, but I like difficult missions…\n<\/p>\n

\n\tAn “urban legend” revealed…<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tI was fascinated by the idea of having a transaction with this gentleman. He was a tough negotiator, but he knew his business very well and through our long discussions I learned a lot. It became a challenge for me to find the right property for him, so I… “dived” into the sea of properties. In a few days I had created a simple portfolio. (What a coincidence… most of the properties this portfolio contained are still available for sale. Their price was increasing every week and month till 2008 and it keeps on decreasing since then, without any visible sign of sale).\n<\/p>\n

\n\tI was not happy with what I found, so I searched more. This is when I heard about this “urban legend”. A super property, in a good location. “It needs renovation but it is worth the investment” as a collaborator told me. I kept on searching and asking around. I found out even more about it, including its past. But, as it happens with all the “urban legends” of this city, I could not reach the owner…\n<\/p>\n

\n\tDead end…<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tI kept on meeting people, trying to find the one who would take me to the owner of the property, “an important person who is not available for meetings with “normal” people”. Usually this meant that the person who said that did not have an idea of how to reach this owner, this was why he was trying to create a story and cover his inability. For weeks and months, I was meeting with people, they were promising to take me to the owner and I was reaching a dead end…\n<\/p>\n

\n\tI concluded a (minor) first deal with this investor and decided to do anything possible in order to reach the owner of this property. It was not about the money for my services anymore, it was a matter of pride (which is not always the right approach…)\n<\/p>\n

\n\t“The representative of the owner”<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tThe person across the table was around 45 years old. His small eyes were almost hidden, especially when he was smiling. His hands were always wet (bad sign) and he had just “given away” all his business cards. He claimed that he knew the owner personally and he would be able to make the deal happen, but he needed a Letter of Intent, plus some… “pocket money”.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tHe kept on coming for a while, but after the third meeting he changed the story:  – “I have a friend who is the representative of the owner”.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “So you don’t know him directly?”\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “No, but my friend is a very good friend of his and he represents his interests”.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “Ok, when can I meet the owner?”\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “Ah, you can’t do that. The owner is a special person, he does not meet with simple people like us. If you want, you can negotiate with my friend, he will transmit the offer and he will give you the answer”.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “Right and I am Stefan Cel Mare, preparing to fight the Turks, c’mon!”\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “What do you mean?”\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “If I don’t meet the owner myself, no offer will be given, to be transmitted etc.”\n<\/p>\n

\n\tFirst meeting… canceled<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tIt took me another 3 weeks, until they decided to “accept” my proposal. We signed the necessary documents for our collaboration, but 2 hours before the meeting, the owner “does not want to meet with me, only with the client directly”. I asked to speak with the owner of the property over the phone, They finally gave me someone to talk to. He confirmed that he was the owner of the property and he insisted that I should not disturb him again without the client next to me. I also asked him regarding the property papers (because the 2 guys who “represented him” had just a small part). His reply was “I will have them with me during our meeting with your client. In case we reach an agreement, this will not be a problem”.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tAn exception…<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tWhen someone tells me that the papers of the property are not available, this is usually a breaking clause and I simply stop the discussion. But it was 2006, the good properties were very difficult to find and I wanted to proceed. This is why I explained the situation to my client and kindly asked him to accept an exception. “Next time you come here, please let us go to meet with the owner. I don’t have the papers of the property, but it seems to be a unique chance to meet him. Needless to say that we will crosscheck everything, in case we reach an agreement with him”.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t“Isn’t it too much to have 5 people at the same table?”<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tMy client asked around and realized that this wrong and unprofessional procedure was the “usual” one in Romania of that time. Considering the fact that our collaboration was excellent and very professional for all the other properties I presented to him, he accepted my proposal.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “So we will meet the owner?”\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “Yes, together with the 2 intermediates”\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “Why do they need to come together?”\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “Probably because one does not trust the other and they have to be sure that everything will be ok”.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “Do we pay them something?”\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “My agreement is that they will receive their part from the seller”.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “Isn’t it a bit much to have 5 people at the same table?”\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “They say that “up to four, it is still love”, so let us make an exception to this rule as well”.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tHe smiled and gave me the right to confirm the meeting…\n<\/p>\n

\n\tArriving at the meeting place<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tI remember it like it happened yesterday. We set the meeting for Wednesday evening at 18.00, because “the owner will leave the city during the weekend, he wants to relax from all the hard work” (the weekend used to start from Thursday for some “high profile guys” back then). We agreed to meet inside the property we wanted to buy, which meant that we had to deal also with traffic in order to reach it.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tWe walked inside the building together with my client. He was looking around, trying to identify the quality of construction and the possible budget for renovation. We discussed a bit about this and I wrote down what documents I needed to ask in case of an agreement. We arrived in front of a lady, around 55 years old. She was reading something vital for her life (in a gossip tabloid) which is why she did not bother looking at us. Her English was worse than my… Arabic, so we did not manage to develop our relationship much. But in the end, she raised her right eyebrow (with an elegant make up of a fat dark blue line) and showed us with her hand to head right. I opened the door and found the 2 intermediates I knew, sitting around a table. “Here we go” my client said…\n<\/p>\n

\n\tAt 18.00: Part 2<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– 16 brides, the owner, the client and me, sitting at a “table for 6”<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– “It is not our fault”<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n

\n\t– Brides without a groom = no wedding<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Part 1 (to read part 2, click here) Every Real Estate market has its own “urban legends”. The same is true for Romania. If you join our profession, you will soon hear about several “super properties” that “exist” somewhere out there. Usually they are described as “unique” and they are always difficult to reach. Sometimes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":59454,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[204],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.iliaspapageorgiadis.ro\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7700"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.iliaspapageorgiadis.ro\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.iliaspapageorgiadis.ro\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.iliaspapageorgiadis.ro\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.iliaspapageorgiadis.ro\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7700"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.iliaspapageorgiadis.ro\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7700\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.iliaspapageorgiadis.ro\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.iliaspapageorgiadis.ro\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7700"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.iliaspapageorgiadis.ro\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7700"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.iliaspapageorgiadis.ro\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7700"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}