Memoirs Of A Big Fat Liar

Lightning In A Bottle

   Actually, a bunch of big fat liars. I'll include myself in the group for this exercise (as an embedded observer, of course) although I can state here comfortably--eyeball to eyeball, without flinching and safely nested behind the double locked doors of my home office library--that my truthfulness in business dealings consistently falls within the soupy gray boundries of acceptable sales chatter. In other words, I try not to exaggerate or overblow my Real Estate accomplishments when things fall nicely into my lap nor do I whine and moan (or shriek like a little girl...anymore) at the first sign of a market correction or the foreshadow of a lenghty Listing stint.

   The truth is, the Listing Agent who has the signed Exclusive Agreement when the actual Buyer walks through the door is the hero. Period. Don't let them (us) tell you otherwise. We all know this. I once lost a deal (and one of my best friends) early on in my career two days after an Agreement expired. I had a lot of activity on the property--many showings, loads of interest--but on day 90, my about-to-be-married buddy decided that the unsold property was hurting our friendship and yanked the house from me. He fired me over the phone from Vegas--on his honeymoon. (I'd love to report here how that marriage ended up but that would be gloating now, wouldn't it?)

   The new Agent was literally taking down my sign and putting his own up when the eventual Buyer came tooling along with his wife. They wrote a deal without representation (a 'double bubble' for the Agent) and Closed in 30 days. That my friends is what we Realtors call, 'lightning in a bottle.' And I've been the recipient of such happenstance, as well. I've just learned not to gloat over it when it occurs nor do I stand outside in the the middle of a thunderstorm (or worse yet, a drought), arms raised to the heavens with coke bottles in each hand, waiting for it to strike again. I have other stupid things I do...

Promising The Moon
  ...And this is one of them. Not so much anymore but still...I want to be liked. Deep down, I don't want to be the person to break the bad news...

   "You see, Mr and Mrs Climbladder, your house is very beautiful. It's just 1.2 million dollar beautiful... not 1.7 million dollar beautiful. If it were 1.7 million dollar beautiful it would most likely be surrounded by several other 1.7 million dollar beautiful homes in a 1.7 million dollar neighborhood."

   blah blah blah.

   "Yes, I know it was featured in the local newspaper but no one is reading that particular issue anymore...except of course, you."

   blah blah blabbity blah! 

   "And yes, I see you spent a couple hundred thou on the bathrooms and kitchen and I'm sure you have enjoyed them but Buyers expect such finishes at this price point. Like I said, it's beautiful...it's just not 1.7 million dollar beautiful."

   blah?
   "Yes, Mr and Mrs Climbladder...I'm afraid so....blah."

   The point is I try not to promise the moon unless I promise a Price Recduction to go along with it. I'm very nice about it, though.

The Sunday Papers
   I once heard renowned newscaster, Sam Donaldson, state in an interview, "I don't go to the casinos because winning a hundred dollars means nothing to me but losing a hundred dollars really pisses me off." I concur. I also feel the same about newspaper advertising. IMO, it only brands the company name...it doesn't sell houses. Not here in Chicago, anyway. To spend money foolishly on a longshot bet is one thing, but to advocate such a strategy as a Marketing Plan is cretinous. (You can look it up if you like but it basically means stupid.)

   Marketing in this day and age goes well beyond ink on paper advertising. If it is disposable then it will be disposed of. Print advertising is untrackable, expensive, and passive. I'd rather pay-per-click any (every) day of the week though the cost of doing business is equivalent. At least I know my hard earned money isn't wrapped around a dead fish in the garbage.

   I am confident that Internet Channels, Digital Open Houses, and other technologies along these lines are the way of the future in Real Estate. And even as I restructure my own business model for the next five years I'll still make it a point to tip the paperboy every month when he knocks on our front door. (Besides being an enterprising young kid in the image of you know who, he's the best hacker I know.)

Ladybug In A Juice glass 

   I won't promise 'lightning in a bottle' to a potential client but I will pledge to use my resources (spend my own money) in the most efficient manner I see fit. Let's face it, the Listing Agent is in the hole the minute he walks out the door with the Exclusive and only collects when the property actually sells--correction: ...when the property actually sells under his watch. Phone calls from Vegas are never good under any circumstance, I've found.

I'll try not to promise the Moon no matter how much I allow myself to be manipulated by the situation (potential paycheck). And that is why we do it, you know. We Realtors are ironically, the easiest people to manipuate because we count the money before it's printed. We may say we don't but most of us secretly do. After all, we have BMWs and college to pay for. (It also stokes our Ego when we nail a Sold placard across the For Sale sign. I usually wait until rush hour so everyone stalled in traffic can watch me perform the ritual. It usually takes a good half hour depending on whether or not I have to find and unbury St. Joseph.)

I may be big, and I may or may not be fat depending on the season or what I'm wearing, but a Big, Fat, Liar I am not. Not all three. I won't promise 'lightning in a bottle' but I will do my best to catch a ladybug in a juiceglass. Oh yeah....and work for free until I get the place sold, just like every other self-respecting Realtor.


Geno Petro

The Eight Deadly Sin...

Fear Knocked

We've all heard tell of certain California and Nevada housing markets in recent years where simply offering 'List Price' on a property didn't cut it on the real estate trading floor. Demand had a strangle hold on Supply and only the earliest of pre-approved birds brought home the juciest worms to the nest. Even the economically horizontal section of the United States where I reside and conduct business enjoyed it's own vertical spike in new construction housing starts with six and seven figure price tags to go with it. The appetite for real estate--condominiums in particular--seemed insatiable and looking back I'm not quite sure if it was greed, gluttony, or some other deadly sin feeding the emotional frenzy. The market was big and it was fast and the word on the street was...the only 'losers' were the snoozers when it came to building a portfolio of brick and mortar. What we didn't realize at the time was we were approaching the top of a housing cycle. No biggie, unless you really overpaid.

Over the past 18 months though, the typical real estate Buyer has steadily evolved from the above mentioned 'Emotional' type to the more cautious 'Analytical' type, or so notes my Broker, Joe Pinto. It is a keen observation, I believe. No longer are young couples packing a 'back-up' checkbook in the glove box of the Hummer before beginning their weekly Open House patrol on Sundays. The day of the great American housing auction has gone the way of detente, it appears.

CNN reports that 'outbidding ambushes' in model units by the ubiquitous Jones clan (down the street) as well as Multiple Offers in general declined sharply in the Third Quarter across the Midwest. I heard Alan Greenspan sneezed during a luncheon in Washington and the market reacted accordingly. Sellers are jumping from first floor windows of their cul-de-sac ranch homes from Peoria to Padukah, says one suburban Broker. In downtown Chicago, Listing Agents just take the elevator to the lobby, head straight for the bar and wait for the Buy-side representation to serve up a lowball on the rocks....Ingredients: Identify a property, measure twice, Offer once, hold the urgency. No bubbles, please.

Faith Answered

Shame on anyone in the market for a home if they fail to make a deal at the bottom of this current housing cycle. One National Association of Realtors (NAR) report pointed to an 18 year high in housing inventory across the board nationally. That's a lot of meat in the freezer, as they say.

It is my observation that only the truly needy' are moving forward these days. And by 'needy' I mean just that--in need of a home. Be it a job transfer, domestic change (marriage/divorce), or unexpected triplets, there is a certain sector of the population always in the market for a new place to live.

If a thousand closed escrows a week was the Chicago average in 2004 and that number has been reduced by 30% today, this is still 700 transactions being negotiated, closed and recorded on the tax rolls. And while once wily investors are perhaps now standing in the wings licking their collective, speculative, and respective spreadsheet papercuts, I believe the path is clear and safe for those who purchase real estate for their primary residence.

No One Was There

The Cuban Missile Crisis. The Cold War. The Gas Shortage of the 1970's. The Double Digit Mortgage Rates of the 1980s. Inflation. Solar Flares. The Savings and Loan fiasco of the 1990s. The Killer Bees. The Killer Asian Carp. The Killer Asian Beetles. Recession. The Dot.Com thing of a decade ago. Health Care. The Y2K computer thing in 2000. The Housing Bubble talk of a year ago. Sub Prime Lending. The Credit Crunch. Over a dozen Presidential elections in my lifetime, both Republican and Democrat...all those panic driven headlines for the past 50 years and you know what?

Nothing really happened. Nothing that a little patience couldn't have remedied. Nothing that couldn't be attributed to some type of cycle except maybe that whole Y2K thing which was just plain stupid.

So Relax. Buy a house. I just did. In five years I'll be wishing I bought two at this price (like I always do). Only my self-proclaimed 8th Deadly Sin of Fear is keeping me from doing so. I admit it, I too am human and not immune from the media scuttle of the month. I keep one ear on the radio and one eye on the news channels like everyone else I know. And just between us, I do still wonder about those Killer Bees on occasion.

Geno Petro

Lessons Never Learned

While awaiting my turn in the checkout line (for the fifth time in as many days) at the Home Depot last Sunday it occurred to me that my wife and I alone probably spend as much money in a single weekend as my parents spent in an entire month raising a family of five. Even after backing out the present day cost of housing which borders on ridiculous, and adjusting the 1967 dollar to the 2007 equivilant, our lack of frugality is pretty close to shameful. We are 'consumers extraordinaire,' us Petros. 'Recycling' in this household means riding a bicycle we paid $900 for, more than once.

My mother used to run the house on around $100 of my father's monthly paycheck so it was Wheaties and whole milk on the 2nd and rolled oats and powdered milk by the 30th. Somewhere around the 15th, the 'milk' became a 50/50 powder solution, gradually increasing to 95% water by month's end. To this day, on the rare occasion I ever touch the stuff, I still shake a milk carton out of habit before pouring. And as far as ground beef goes... well just never mind.

The first house in my memory was a 3 bedroom, 1 bath Levittowner with a carport, in Levittown, Pennsylvania. Millions were built with three models to choose from, all with the same 3/1 layout. Everyone in the extended Petro family has either bought one or lived in one sometime in their (our) lives. Only the fronts of the houses, the color, and how they faced the street distinguished one from one's neighbor as many errant spouses claimed as a defense for Adultery in Divorce Court--or so went the neighborhood joke. "But your Honor, it was dark and I walked into the wrong Levittowner and..."

It was post WWII and the first modern suburban boom was sounding. $9999.99--which computed to $100 down and $69 a month for 30 years at a miserable interest rate--bought at least the first half hour of the not so great American Dream. And it was clear to anyone with even the slightest lick of ambition that the remainder of the Dream involved getting the hell out--which my parents eventually did 10 years later, selliing for a mere thousand more than they paid a decade earlier.

Our new house cost $26,000 in 1963 and was followed immediately by two additional children and the afore mentioned budget crunch. My mother stopped working and became a stay at home mom and in fairly short order I went from privileged Only Child status to the Oldest of Three in a single income household. In other words, it was Fruit Loops and cream to rolled oats and powdered milk in one fell swoop. No hard feelings or permanent damage, though. My sisters and I still shake our milk cartons one leg at a time to this day although the youngest, Liz, claims to have blocked a good portion of her early years completely from her memory.

On the ride home from HD I started to make some mental notes of my current spending habits and how these behaviors are most likely rooted in my past.---Brief Interruption---{Case In Point Number One (CIP#1): I'm downstairs in my home office writing this piece and my wife just calls my cell phone on her cell phone from the third floor of our house in her home office to ask me where I want to go for dinner tonight. Forty years ago I got grounded for using the wall mounted telephone in our Burnt Orange kitchen and if I ever dared to ask where we might be going for dinner that night, I'd probably get double grounded for being a smart ass-- which I was, BTW.} At any rate, I offer the following for your perusal:

* CIP #2: My mother would only drive the most basic of Volkswagons. No air. No radio. Roll-up windows. Stick-shift. Results: Both my sisters and I can drive any stick-shift vehicle of almost any non-commercial size variety with deft ability (my sister Margie can even drive a forklift) but if my car isn't made in Europe and equipped with power everything, I am an unhappy and discontented man.

* CIP #3: The whole living on a budget thing. Results: I check the price of almost nothing before I purchase and would rather throw-up on the table before ever presenting a coupon to a waiter. Even gift certificates bother me a little. I can only tell you in rough estimation what I have in any given bank account on any given day and our monthly American Express bill is so high that I can't remember the last time we ever had to buy airline tickets or hotel rooms with anything but Rewards Points--and we travel quite a bit.

* CIP #4: Housing then and now. Results: What can I say? I'm a Realtor. My wife and I buy places to live like other people buy basic transportation. Hopefully that pattern has been broken as I write this from our new (to us, that is. It was built in the 1890s) house in the Forest Glen neighborhood of Chicago. No, it is not a suburb. Yes, it's still within the city limits although it is an old established bedroom community with the Metra commuter stop (and all that goes along with that) just across the corner of our property line. It was by far, the biggest house on the market for the money. So what if nine hundred tons of diesel train and clanging bells come rolling through all hours of the day and night? One thing is for sure...it will never be mistaken for a Levittowner so all you errant men, stay away from my wife.

*CIP #5: Puppies in a box, $5. Year 1965. Results: Elvis, our overpriced 'Designer' American Bulldog/Boxer 'cross-breed' (i.e. mutt). Even he knows we got ripped off when we bought him a few years ago for $800.

*CIP #6: Family Values. Results: I think we're cool in this regard. A little spend thriftish? Maybe. But I truly believe my wife and I both took the best parts of our respective upbringings and integrated them into our present day lives. Neither one of us came from families of great or even marginal wealth. We both have Poverty-era parents who probably spend a lot of their silent time still worrying about money. My wife and I have a list of things from those wonder years that we ask each other and laugh about on occasion:

"Did you have to bring your brown paper lunch bags back home from school each day to use again the next day?"

"Did you have to refold the aluminum foil and bring it back, too? Pickle juice and all?"

"Did you have to drink 'Ting,' the cheaper version of Tang?" (I mean really...how expensive could Tang have ever been?)

"Did you have a 5 gallon keg of ice milk (not ice cream) in your freezer jammed between the rest of the 'side of beef'?"

"Did you have a lunch money jar? One Quarter, one dime, and one nickle...40 cents a day?"

And of course, my all time favorite: the above mentioned 'shake the milk bottle' scenario. I was talking to one of my childhood friends and his spouse at our 30th Class Reunion a few years ago who apparently had several children of their own. The ill fitting clothes and dull, pale pallor of the squat couple couldn't hide the years of sacrifice they themselves must have incurred. The college tuition alone must have set them back a cool half million. The subject came up in passing.
"Yeah," he remarked out of the blue. "What was with that milk thing at your mother's house?"

I ordered him a top shelf single malt scotch from the bartender to make up for the resurfaced mental picture from decades past and added that apparently his father got paid more than once a month. He didn't say anything. I then turned to my wife, the best looking woman in the room by everyone's standards and said in true Petro fashion,

"I'm hungry. Let go to Ruth's Chris."

Life is short and you're dead for a long time, as they say.

Geno Petro

Be Back Soon...

Yeah...like I know how to fish. Besides, it's a cruel sport. Anyway, I'll be catching up on my writings soon. It's a long, long story and involves a move from a condo to a house that needs work, a new computer that's apparently lost in DHL limbo, and a non-english cable/broadband guy who has my finger and thumb prints around his neck. (The latter is my fault I suppose, for never picking up the Eastern European languages in my younger years. And I'm just kidding about the neck thing.) If I can find a way to curb the profanity I think I may have a few things to say once all the construction dust has settled.

Ciao for now.

G

1520 N. Sedgwick--Just Listed In Old Town

2000 SQUARE FEET OF LUXURY ON ONE LEVEL. THIS 3 BED 2 BATH HAS AN AWESOME OLD TOWN LOCATION IN AN INTIMATE ELEVATOR BUILDING. DESIGNER FINISHES ARE THROUGHOUT THIS HIGH FLOOR CONDO. GRANITE & STAINLESS KITCHEN, BOSCH DISHWASHER, CREST LIGHTING. GREAT CLOSET SPACE. WALK TO LAKE MICHIGAN, THE NEW SEDGWICK EL, PIPERS ALLEY, SECOND CITY, AND HISTORIC WELLS STREET. OVER SIZE GARAGE INCLUDED IN PRICE. SEE THE AIR SHOW OR MARATHON FROM YOUR FRONT BALCONY OR JUST RELAX AND WATCH THE WORLD GO BY.





CLICK HERE FOR VIRTUAL TOUR!

LISTED AT $574,500

All Talk, No Walk

A Real Estate contract is generally not enforceable in the great state of Illinois unless it is a) Written, b) 'Signed-off ' on by competent parties (Acceptance), and c) Some form of Consideration ($$$) is placed in an escrow account to show 'Good Faith' on the Buyer's part. Think of it as the Holy Trinity of the home buying experience.

It's the 'Good Faith' part of the experience I wish to address here. The truth is, most of the negotiation process in this Northside Chicago market takes place verbally. Once a written Offer is submitted to the Seller's side of the deal, the details usually get hammered out by the respective Realtors involved via cell phone, text messages and email. Sometimes we are The Negotiators, other times, mere Messengers. Either way, there are at least four channels of emotion, rationality and objectivity that need to be successfully navigated--the Seller, the Listing Agent, the Buyer, and the Buyer's Agent-- not to mention the chorus, and supporting cast of Attorneys, Home Inspectors, Lenders, Appraisers, and Blood Relations waiting in the wings for Act II to begin. Once there is signed Agreement the 'experience' as it were, takes off in another direction altogether. Another story for another day.

So here's the scenario: A potential Client sits at her computer, Googles 'Search Chicago Real Estate' and of course, lands on Page One. After surveying the first 10 choices she decides to click on ChicagoHomeEstates.com because...well, it just sounds so right. Chicago...Home, no...even better... Estates. She then decides to choose an Agent so she can Register on the site for greater access, picks the best looking one and Voila!...she arrives at my Home Page. Once registered, she is free to search the Chicagoland area for a home or rather...an estate of her dreams. She requests a showing for a Condominium that piques her interest. I respond.

Now this is where the afore mentioned 'Good Faith' begins. Our website Features our own Listings while at the same time providing a Search Engine for the entire MLS of Northern Illinois. This is provided under under the guidelines of Broker Reciprocity and is about as clear as clear can be, in my opinionated opinion. Every Listing that is not in the Chicago Home Estates personal inventory has a clearly marked icon (a little house button to click for more info) stating so.

There is a question asked and a response box to be checked: Working with a Realtor? YES or NO.

Check NO, and I'm her guy.

Check YES, and her own Realtor will need to show her the requested property (and should probably also invest in his own website with advanced Search Engine capability). Just so you know, there are only two sides of any Real Esate transaction as far as Realtors are concerned--the List side and the Buy Side. There really isn't any more room in a deal for a third Realtor. We have a name in the business for such a soul. We call him 'The Unpaid One.'

It is at this point in the experience that I make it crystal clear to my potential Client that her Request For Showing either is or is not my own Listing (I have no intention of ever being The Unpaid One) and I proceed from there.

Now let's just say that we meet at the property, introduce ourselves to the Listing Agent, and take the tour. Thirty minutes later she decides the place is perfect and wishes to make an Offer. Whether I write the deal or not I have established what is called Procuring Cause on that particular property, thus avoiding any possibility of becoming The Unpaid One. We soonafter fill out an approved Board of Realtors contract, sign in all the appropriate spaces, forward it on the the other side of the deal, and wait for a counter-offer.

It is at this point that the verbiage begins. Several phone calls back and forth between all parties involved and hopefully, a middle ground can be found. Let me walk you through the dialogue of a recent negotiation attempt that mirrors my example above. The gender has been changed to protect the idiot,,,I mean innocent..

"The List Price is $639,000," I said. "I suggest we come in around $605,000 and hopefully get this deal done under $620,000. " Just so you know, while aggresisve in negotiations I am not a 'low baller.' If the Listing in ridiculous then that's another story but in this competitive Chicago market, most properties sell within 3% of the Asking Price in less than 120 days.

"We are obviously not on the same page," says my Client. "I will not consider offering anything with a '6' in it. Tell them $550,000 and we'll close in three weeks." (In case math wasn't your best subject in grade school, that's $89,000 under List Price.) I put on my Messenger outfit and prepare to deliver the news.

"Good news is...we have an Offer for you!" I say to the happy, happy Listing Agent. "Bad news is we are coming in 15% under List." Actually, I don't really say any of this. Instead, I just let the ink on paper speak for itself.

As expected, our opening Offer was met with dead silence by the other side. After 10 minutes of verabal resuscitation and another 3 or 4 minutes of 'point and counterpoint' with the Listing Agent I was finally able to persuade him to just give us a counteroffer. He called back an hour later. "$625,000. November 30th Close." This was good.

"Not good enough," was my Client's response. "$565,000 and we want our September Close date..."

FAST FORWARD ...

THREE MORE COUNTERS AND 72 HOURS LATER...

"They are willing to spilt the middle and come down below their 'Drop Dead Number,' I inform my Client. "$600,o00." I deliver the news feeling more like The Negotiator than the Messenger for the first time in a couple of days. I know that I am but $1 away from getting a deal done with no '6' in it. I am indeed, the man.

"Okay, but I want $10,000 more back in the form of a Closing Cost Credit paid to me at the settlement table," demands my Client. "Net sale price of $590,000. It's my final Offer. Make it happen Geno!" Bad Faith. Bad Faith, but I do as directed.

And I do get it done, feeling a little uneasy about throwing in a Closing Credit curveball so late in the negotiation (poor form, to be sure). The Sellers however, eventually agree after several more hours of persuasion, and I forward the good news to my Client.

And then within a matter of hours my Client bails out of the deal totally. The reasons and excuses were numerous but the real reason (and thus the point of this sad but true essay) is she could. The original contract was written over the phone and faxed to all parties (not unusual for people with busy schedules and allowable by law), no Initial Earnest Money check was ever collected (again, the initial check is but a token gesture and is not needed until Signed Agreement occurs), and the motivation to Sell was greater than the motivation to Buy in this case. My internet Client was just fishing around the bottom of the lake seeing what she could snag on the cheap. Looking back, it was just a lot of words accompanied by very little action, not the least important of which was the Seller's signature. Lots of talk with no accompanying walk.

Postscript: As it turns out the Buyer (no longer my Client at this point) tried to go around me and cut a deal with the other side on her own shortly before this all even started. When that didn't fly she then tried to persuade me to take my commission out of the Listing Agent's portion hoping to keep the Buy-Side Co-Op for herself. Again, failure to launch.

In the end, she had just agreed to use my proffered services as the great Negotiator/Messenger I am, and waste my time for half a week ultimately doing what she felt was in her own best interest. And I'm actually cool with that. Thus is the nature of the beast we call the internet.

The other three deals I'm presently working on (all internet Registrants on our site) are as sweet as blueberry pie--the people couldn't be nicer. Half of my annual business comes from a mixture of the ChicagoHomeEstates.com website and the Blog you are presently reading. The other half is made up of past Clients and referrals. And only a few deals a year come from people who can't talk and walk at the same time. C'est la Vie, say I.

Ol' St Joe Is Good To Go

When I walked through the big oak doors of the Archdiocese of Chicago's Holy Relic Bookstore a few weeks ago, I knew for sure that I'd be lying to a clergyman within minutes. Like many post-WWII children who hail from the eastern seaboard, I attended Catholic school for the first six years of my education and became proficient at an early age with all the loopholes surrounding Confession, Penance, and Absolution. I figured out pretty early on that if I had to tell a fib then I could just as easily get out of trouble with God by reciting a few Hail Marys and an Act Of Contrition. A quick Amen later, and I was off on my merry way to play and lie another day...

So by the time my poor parents figured out that parochial school tuition was a waste of money on a perennial 'C' student with little or no priestly ambitions, the imprint of Guilt (and all the psychological antibodies associated with it) had already left a permanent mental stain on my psyche. In other words, even at 50 years of age I still get a twinge of remorse when I hear my own voice speaking less than truthfully. You think it would stop me...but it doesn't.

"Do you have any statues of Saint Joseph," I asked the young, pale seminarian working the register. He was wearing black pants, a black collarless shirt and a black buttoned up sweater. It struck me funny that a lad similar to him, and no older than him for sure, had terrorized me well into my second year of grade school forty-three years earlier. Still, I felt a little guilty for my intentions and what I had mentally rehearsed in the car ride over....The statue would 'be for my boss (lie), whose name was also Joe (true), for his birthday (lie). He too, is a devout Catholic (not sure, but pretty certain a lie) and would be surprised at the kind gesture on my part (no doubt)'--just in case someone at the store happened to inquire why I was really there in the first place..

"Yes," he said. "We have three sizes of Saint Joe. The small one is $3.00, the big one is $8.00, and the stone statue for the garden is $49.00.

"I don't have a garden," I told him, immediately wishing I could snatch back my words from the thick, dusty bookstore air. The lie barely had time to dry as it floated in the silent space between us. I felt the frowns of invisible Guardian Angels looking on in judgement, if not downright disapproval. The young man just looked at me with his holy brown eyes.

I meant to say "My boss, Joe, doesn't have a garden" but you know how it is once you start lying. I decided to plod forward anyway, offering as little as possible to the web I'd already begun to weave, and just get the hell (heck) out of there---with my statue.

"The $3.00 one will be fine," I said, feeling like a real cheapskate. A cheapskate liar, actually.

"Cash or Charge?" he asked, writing out my receipt with perfect parochial penmanship. I felt like he was mocking me. I almost pulled out my American Express Gold Card but thought better of it.

"Cash," I said, my eyes fixated now on the $3.00 sticker attached to the small, cardboard box on the counter wondering if I was even allowed to charge something on Amex that was only $3.00. Saint Joseph looked a little Chinese to me through the small, cellophane window. I had a fairly good idea where it was made as I removed the statue from its box and examined the bottom of the plastic painted relic. Taiwan. Close.

The young man, back at the register now, charged me tax. I wanted to object---the Church being non-profit and all-- but I let it slide since I was there on such false pretenses in the first place. Although, according to the unwritten laws of Karma... as I understand them, I should be entitled, not only to any duty-free (and Guilt-free) religious purchase for whatever reason I choose, but also to a couple free cracks to the side of his head for retribution of his predecessor's cruel and usual actions back in the day. That too, I let pass without incident trying my best not to blow what was left of my Christian cover.

I was almost out the door with my sacred score when I heard him speak from across the room..."Good luck selling the house."

I froze for a second. God, or perhaps one of those invisible angels, must have whispered something into his inner ear. My true motives were now exposed. I should have dressed nicer--no boots, no jeans. Should have taken the diamond stud out of my ear. Of course I couldn't pass myself off as a decent Catholic much less be in possession of any friends named Joseph or otherwise, who might even appreciate receiving such a $3.00 Chinese statue from a heathen such as myself. What was I thinking?...I should have sprung for the $49.00 garden model and stuck with my original story.

"You know, we have a complete St. Joseph's Home Selling Kit for eleven dollars more," he said. "It's blessed, too."

He led me to a Patron Saints display aisle where they also stocked kits for St. Francis of Assisi (Animals), St. Adelard of France (Gardens), and a St. Lucy/St. Clare 2-for-1 package (Eye Disorders). St. Joseph, by far, had them all beat as far as inventory went. There was even a Discontinued shelf with one last remaining St. Christopher (Travellers) who apparently lost his Patron Saint status during a corporate re-org when Vatican I came to an end. I almost bought it out of pity (and because he was the only statue without Asian features) but I was already over budget for this folly.

Onward Christian Soldier...



Back at home I took out the instructions, along with the statue and remaining contents from my upgraded St. Joseph Home Selling Kit, and laid them all out on a tiny patch of earth in front of my Condo. I dug into the mulch area next to a bush where my dog pees every morning and placed the Chinese looking statue into the hole, upside down and facing west. I covered the treasure with mulch and walked back into my home feeling like the least successful Listing Agent on the North Side of Chicago--forty days on the market, no Offers, and to top it off---snickered at and upsold by a second year Theology student in a cardigan sweater. That was the weekend before July 4th.

I forgot it was even there until yesterday when I was talking to my mother on the phone. She mentioned an article in her local paper back east about the powers of Saint Joseph and how she herself, had been praying for the sale of our place for the past two months. I told her the bookstore story and we laughed until we almost cried. She's not nearly as irreverent as me but I gotta tell you...I learned it somewhere.

A few hours later my phone rang and I received my first 'second showing' in weeks. An hour or so later another 'second showing' request came followed by an e-mail later in the day from a suburban agent. She said an offer was on its way and that her clients had seen the place a month earlier and was hoping it was still on the market.

I opened my desk drawer and rustled through my papers for the Saint Joseph instruction sheet. I'm pretty sure I was supposed to be praying too along the way but I can't say for sure as the sheet must have gotten thrown out with the rest of the kit. That's just the type of Catholic I am--throw the instructions out with the box and hope nothing breaks. The truth is, I can't imagine that a saint as renowned as Joseph could care less if I ever sold my house regardless of how many of his kits I buy or how many prayers I say for my own sake. I know that advertising in the Chicago Tribune doesn't fare much better, either

An Offer has yet to arrive on my fax machine but I've since concluded that the real secret lies in those mother's prayers. If anyone has the Old Man's ear upstairs, they do. Think about it...what in this world is closer to God than words from a mother's lips? Put together a combination of that, a big enough lever, and a $25,000 Price Reduction ....and get ready to move some Earth, baby.

West of Western...(Avenue, that is...)

For the past two or three months I have been venturing farther and farther north and west in my Real Estate travels. I was pleased to discover, much like Columbus, that the world is not flat (contrary to what many believe) and that I in fact, would not sail my Mini Cooper off the edge of the Earth if I happened to wander a block or so past California (Avenue, that is...). That subconscious mother's voice that had been yelling into my inner ear these past few years (alright, all my life) ...

"Genie, stay away from those far west streets. You'll get side-swiped by a part-time realtor. Those 'west of Western' (Avenue, that is...) agents communicate by pagers and Supras (electronic lock-boxes for the laziest of Listing Agents) and every property has at least 2 kitchens with aunts and uncles everywhere. There's not a Starbucks to be found, Sushi is a four letter word (to them) and you'll be wearing a gold blazer with a name tag within a month. You'll have to put your picture on your business card. Please be careful son..."

...that voice...has finally subsided. It's safe now. The Northside spill-over has officially begun. My wife and I recently purchased a house in the Forest Glen neighborhood of the city (I saved my beloved spouse just seconds before she became an honorary Trixie, I am certain).

And by 'safe' I mean from an investment standpoint. With basic land values steadily hovering above $750,000 per 25'x125' parcel in Lincoln Park, most single family home buyers have no other choice but to expand their searches outward from the sweetspot of the upwardly mobile speedball of Chicago's Northside, and head west. And for those of you who are not from this topographic region, just believe me when I say that heading east is not an option--big, big lake....And while I suppose there are arguments to be made for meandering north or south, it is my professional opinion that northwest is indeed, the only way to fly. My last five deals have occured in this geographic annex of Greater Chicagoland and if it's good enough for my clients then it's good enough for me. I will soon have a yard to cut and a house to paint every 10 years.

The thing is, if you want a relatively spartan single family home in the neighborhood I presently reside in (Lincoln Park) then you'll have to spend around a mil. If you want it to be real nice then you'll need to spend around 2 mil; exquisite...3 mil. Exquisite and in the best part of Lincoln Park, 5 mil for starters; 30 mil if you want a Pritzker for a neighbor. If all of the above price points are not in your housing budget but you just gotta have the 'hood and all it has to offer, then guess what...? C.O.N.D.O.M.I.N.I.U.M.

Bottom Line: If you want to spend less than seven figures for an actual house--and you don't mind having a Petro for a neighbor--then by all means, sell the Condo, point your vehicle in a westwardly direction, continue 30 or so blocks past the edge of the Earth (California...Avenue, that is), and claim your stake before all the other Trixies and Chads get here first. A Starbucks is sure to follow--I'm betting heavily on it. Sushi, however, might be another story altogether.

Geno Petro

Postscript...R.I.P.

Earlier in the year I wrote about the mystique of the American Express Centurion (blacker than black) Card and how once, a few years back, I met a Commodities Trader who boasted of having one. For those of you not in the know, Centurion cardholders number in the mere thousands world-wide--10,000 or so is the estimated 'buzz' number that is floating around the web although A.E. never goes on record one way or another on the subject. The privileges associated with 'The Card' are other wordly from a layman's perspective and the fodder for many an urban legend. One example:

'The Card arrives at your residence accompanied by a security guard who passes on to you a big black, velvet lined box with two Black Cards and a mini-computer. One Black Card is the actual Card while the other is an exclusive 'entrance pass ' to some of the most prestigious clubs in the world. The mini-computer is yours to keep to track and record all of your purchases.'

"Hmmm...perhaps," say I.

Now my wife, who has worked for the company since 1990, has never seen one herself even though her particular area of expertise is 'corporate travel.' Apparently, Centurions get from point A to point B some other way--private jets, yachts, limos, astral projection would be a few of my guesses but what do I know? I only have a Gold Card and I'm pretty sure my status numbers in the millions. Which brings me back to the Trader I met who mentioned he had one.

To recap that story; A friend of my wife's new boyfriend---wait a minute....that doesn't sound right. Regroup; My wife's friend's new boyfriend was apparently a billionaire Trader---self proclaimed, come to find out (duh)---and in the market for a house in Chicago. A very big house--not just Trader big but billionaire Trader big. He had already wasted some other Realtor's time for several weekends (there was nothing in the 'up to 5 million dollar range' that suited him as he desired his new estate rest on at least four city lots) when I burst on the scene with all my best Real Estate mojo. We had shmoozed for an hour or so at a dinner party when I suggested he double down on his price-point. I told him of a particular Vanity Builder I knew (heard of) who would assemble a city block if necessary, to build such an estate. Average price: 10 million.

I was immediately annointed his new 'go to guy in Chicago.' He soon after married my wife's friend, adopted her already once adopted child, and to put it as nicely as I can...it was all downhill from there. When I shook his hand at the wedding I noticed the gold tone on his watch was rubbing away at the wrist band. Hmmm... Also, he was acting pretty drunk for a billionaire, I thought, but as I've mentioned often...I can be judgemental. I Googled him out of sheer curiosity--nothing. Not a strong indicator of a man with 9 zeros of supposed net worth behind his moncker. Cheap watch, drunk and no Google. Come on...even I got Google.

Nonetheless, we set the development machine into motion and the Vanity Builder, my new best friend, began to put together a deal to buy out all the owners of a particular condominium complex on one of the premier streets in Chicago. We would then knock down that structure and proceed into La La Land with the new project. "Money," we were told by my client, "was no object." Architects were brought in, designers retained and limestone from France was hunted down. And although nothing was actually put into writing (or signed) as of yet, my client decided a nice dinner was in order and thus, the moment of truth would finally arrive: my wife and I would once and forever see what a black Amex card in motion looked like. I ordered a bottle of Cristal and I don't even drink. (Read here later to see how the rest of that evening played out.)

The following Monday I set out to meet him and pick up the initial Earnest Money check. He instead, back pedalled out of the appointment over the phone and attempted to have me give him a check for $10,000 for a position on Unleaded Gas Futures. He told me he was putting the 10 million dollar house project on hold for a while and wondered if I'd be kind enough to let let all the other parties know, as well. Oh, and that we should play golf at his club sometime soon. He subsequently backed out of the whole project, packed up his new wife and child, and left the state. My new ex-best friend, the Vanity Builder, thinks I'm an idiot to this day. Whenever those months in my life come to mind, so do I. This is where the old story ends....

And the Postscript begins:

In August of the following year my ex-client left to go to a bank in another state and never returned, leaving his wife and child behind in a virtual panic. They were to close escrow on a newly constructed house the next day and he was supposedly gathering the needed additional funds from one of his private accounts. The Builder defaulted the wife at the closing table, kept the $100,000 Earnest Money (her retirement savings from before they met) and killed the deal and her credit for good. Shortly afterwards, a couple million dollars of other peoples money (mostly investors) went missing along with the remainder of his new wife's assets she had turned over to him in the early months of their short marriage. Her 80 year old parents had given him their life savings, as well. My wife's friend, along with her child, and her parents are now penniless. We haven't heard from, or of, any of them in months.

The other day on a whim, I decided to Google the Trader again. A few moments later I came across his name under the headline, Mystery of Missing Trader Solved. His badly decomposed body was discovered eight months after his disappearance, in a secluded area of a Midwest state. The article mentioned that the FBI had been searching for him all year, that possibly millions of dollars had been swindled from dozens of people, and that the one time Trader, a man with a 'tendancy to exaggerate' according to acquaintances, had apparently taken his own life leaving behind a wife and newly adopted child. One definition of exaggerate is 'to magnify beyond the limits of truth.' This whole sad scenario however, is almost magnified beyond the limits of belief.

I wanted to forward a copy of the article to the Vanity Builder but then I hesitated, examining my motives. Why? I asked myself. To save face? The Builder is a multi-multi millionaire in his own right. He couldn't care less about me or any of those mentioned above at this point. That deal is as dead as my client. Besides, all I lost was face and a couple hundred thousand dollar commission I never really expected anyway. Shame on me for spending it in my mind. The reality is, there's a woman and her child scraping out a living somewhere in the Midwest who has lost a whole lot more than face. And I should have seen it coming....


Geno Petro

True Story...albeit a little off the subject

True Story. I sat next to a one-armed girl in typing class back in the 8th grade. I know it shouldn't have... but it freaked me out and I couldn't ever really concentrate on the teacher's instructions. I forget the girl's name now although our surnames must have been similar (alphabetical seating, and all), but I do recall that she was the fastest typist in the school. That fact was well broadcasted and she received constant praise from the Faculty of Secretarial Curriculum. Thinking back I guess maybe she had two arms but only one hand. I can't say for certain. I tried not to look too closely but I do remember the way she returned the carriage with her left elbow at the end of each line or paragraph.. So yes...two arms, two elbows, one hand. I'm pretty sure.

Ironically, I would later in life lose most of my hair (to absolutely no praise or acclaim) and the majority of sight in one eye (drinking accident), and come to understand how one adapts to such curveballs Fate hurls ones way. Anyway, the result was I became among the worst typists in the grade.--me and everyone else that didn't sign up for the class to begin with, although I wasn't given that choice. As you might suppose, most of the guys who enrolled in Intro To Typing did so because of the obvious high 'girl to boy' ratios in such classes. Mine was just a bad handwriting issue and a mandate from my Guidance Counselor. Typewriters were 'the way of the future,' I was told. I didn't buy it, though. One armed girl or not, I hedged my bets and went in the opposite direction saving up my paper route money for something called a calculator. And even though they were $200 at the time for the simplest model, it was my only hope of getting through four more years of Math. I eventually bought a guitar instead and graduated in the bottom third of the class with all the other smart alecs.

So, I didn't become a rock star because of the hair loss issue (although I understand the drummer of Def Leppard has only one arm and one leg), a pilot because of the bad eye, an architect because of low Math IQ or a writer because of horrible handwriting and equally bad typing skills. And as luck would have it, typewriters were not the 'way of the future,' but computers were, leaving me on the sidelines in about every way imaginable from a career standpoint. Ultimately, I sold Insurance for a living until I was 40.

Add on another 10 years in the Real Estate arena and the mercurial cycle of life completed yet another revolution and landed me back to where I was in 1969--in front of a keyboard with a lot to say and only two fingers with which to say it. At this stage of the life game I would almost gladly give up a hand--or even a hand plus an elbow (no return carriages necessary on a laptop) to be able to spill out a couple hundred volumes of work at a 120WPM. There are not only Real Estate related blog posts floating around this shiny dome of mine, but novels, short stories, essays, and screenplays, as well--or so I imagine as I peck away in earnest trying to complete a sentence before I forget the driving thought. As a result, I am seriously considering enrolling in an adult typing class just to help extract these ideas from my brain to the screen via my fingertips in a speedier manner. It certainly couldn't hurt

I met a one-armed man on a cruise a few years back. Sat next to him in a whirlpool almost everyday on the pool deck as we cruised the Caribbean at Christmas for the umpteenth time each, it turned out---St Maartens, St. Kitts, who cares. Anywhere but the Midwest in December, is my credo. His too.

"Let the wives shop and we'll just get a tan on whatever is left of our aging bodies," my new friend said one morning, including me some way in his own personal quagmire of physical shortcomings. He probably meant the hair, come to think of it, or perhaps it was the slight limp from an old high school football injury that pops up every so often. He sold cars in Detroit. Judging from the gold Rolex on his remaining wrist he seemed to be doing pretty well for himself. I can only hope that my junior high school typing companion found a similar route to success in her life---or at the very least, simple happiness and a decent computer programming career.

Geno Petro

Send Lawyers, Guns and Money...

When I attended my very first Closing of my very first deal with my very first client I sat at the Title Company table feeling a little like a simple house cat trying to wrap his mind around calculus. Honestly, I never paid much attention to what I was signing for the six or seven properties I bought and sold as a consumer before I was an actual Realtor. I just always assumed that my agent and mortgage guy 'had my back' and figured that they wanted to get paid as much as I wanted to move in or out. If I learned one thing in my pre-Realtor Fortune 500 career it was the concept of 'Recruit and Delegate' and there was no reason to believe it shouldn't spill over into my personal affairs, as well.

I discovered during my 15 years in a suit and wingtips that a person can recruit, if not delegate himself into and out of almost any business situation. I was even going to write a book about it once but only got about as far as I've communicated to you here before I began looking for someone else to write it for me. I'm not sure how many words per minute I type these days but I've already been at work on this for 20 minutes so you can do the math if you like. An IBM Selectric typewriter was my weapon of choice in those days so without the technology that now rests at my fingertips (and that would be exactly two with my typing technique) the man hours involved in such an endeavor would be have been brutal. And as usual, I have digressed...

So at my first Closing as a licensed Realtor I was like that actor in that dream about to go on stage with a pretty good idea of what the play is about but not the slightest idea of what the exact lines are--a cross between that, and the calculus curious cat I mentioned above. I watched and listened in amazement as the real estate Attorney went through the scores of pages in both packets--first the loan and then the title. He explained in detail what each form meant; where to initial, where to sign, and what to expect if too many late payments occured or how to make an extra payment every now and then to reduce the principle and accelerate the mortgage.

"This goes to the city. This goes to the state. This goes to your broker," glancing my way with a nod and a wink. His voice and the occasional sigh from my client were the only sounds in the room besides the furious scratching of ink on shuffling paper. Like I just said, I didn't know my lines back then so I wasn't saying a thing although I did want to interject the fact that whatever was coming to me was actually coming to my brokerage office instead and I would receive but my mere cut of the proceeds. Whatever. I just looked on in silence as I've learned to do at every Closing since.

My point here is that a Real Estate Attorney is a 'must have' for any transaction in Chicagoland. Rarely do they come into the picture before an Offer is accepted but they certainly earn every cent of their flat fee, in my opinion, from the Review Period onward. And an FYI to those of you from neighboring states or places far beyond the boundries of Cook County; Title Companies here only record and check the paperwork and distribute the funds. It is the Attorney who does all the explaining. Even after witnessing a hundred or so of such escrow closing ceremonies myself, I would be remiss in thinking I could accurately guide a trusted client through 200 pages of legal documents. And since my transaction activity spans the entire gamut of six and seven figure properties, there are just too many zeros and virtually no room for error in these scenarios for this cat.

Same holds true with the banking end of my deals. I defer to my Mortgage Guru almost 100% of the time I write an Offer. He's helping one of my clients out of a jam even as we speak, as her 'low interest rate internet loan' suicide bombed itself a week before Closing. Recruit and delegate, I'm telling you.

So okay...maybe it's not enough subject matter for an entire book but if you are still reading this by now then I am happy I guess. As I often tell people requesting my advice in real estate legal matters, "I purposely didn't go to law school because I purposely didn't want to be a Lawyer. Besides, have you ever tried to explain the Pythagorean Theorem to any of your family pets? Sure, they will listen but it's pretty obvious from the look on their faces that they are really quite content not knowing what they already don't know. What they do know is how to get fed and watered at regular intervals and I'm pretty sure that's a form of delegation, even if at the lowest of intellectual levels.

Anyway, that would be me. I'm real good at stalking down and retrieving property in Chicago and will even mix it up with the opposing licensed tomcats in the alley if necessary. But my suggestion to you when I show back up with the goods is, if you havent already surmized...call my Guru then get a Lawyer.

Geno Petro

A Yankee's Guide to Chicago

Chris Hendricks, an Active Rain blogger friend of mine from Cali, is coming to Chicago to watch his beloved Giants take a few swings at our hapless Northsiders. I just looked up the word 'hapless' in my synonym dictionary to be certain I was using the correct adjective and sure enough, directly below the definitions: unlucky, unfortunate and woebegone...was a copy of the 2007 Chicago Cubs schedule. To me this posed yet another question: If 'hap-less' means unlucky, unfortunate, and woebegone...what does 'hap' mean? I looked it up too. And yes, it's a word as well. Definition: one's luck or lot. Funny, eighteen years of Liberal Arts education and I never heard of it. And, if the Cubs weren't already a half dozen games below .500, we wouldn't even be having this discussion.

Anyway, Chris and his wife are coming to Chicago and requested an insider's list of 'non-touristy' things to do while in town. I was thinking as a joke I might arrange a tour of the stockyards (or what's left of them) followed by a trip to the basement of the Sears Tower (think about it...nobody pushes the Down button in that elevator) then maybe a quick dip in the Chicago River after dinner at Charlie Trotter's (average dinner for two---$600. With wine, an easy grand, out the door---but a swim in the only river in the Midwest that flows in opposite directions---priceless,). Like I mentioned, Chris is a blogger friend of mine. I've never really met him in person. Please don't call Dateline.

All kidding to the side for now, I do think that a weekend trip in Chicago using only Public Transportation, specifically the Elevated Train system (EL), would be an awesome way to see our city. So to Chris and his lovely (I'm assuming) wife, here is what I propose:

Friday Afternoon: Fly into O'Hare field, collect your baggage from the lower level of whichever terminal your gate is located and follow the overhead signs to Ground Transportation and CTA (Chicago Transit Authority). Wait for the train to arrive at the platform and take the Blue Line east to downtown. While it may at first seem you are waiting for eternity, it's still a much quicker passage into the city than navigating the expressway with a kamikaze (I'm being polite) taxi driver during rush hour. (BTW, it is always rush hour from the airport to the city.) You will enjoy an interesting, if not scenic view of the urban topography that lies at the feet of our extended city limits. (The airport is actually about 17 miles northwest of the Chicago Loop and was annexed into the city limits by some back room gerrymandering decades ago.) Upon arrival, it's a short walk or cab ride to any downtown hotel.

Saturday Afternoon: Take the Red Line north to the Addison Stop. This is Wrigley Field, home of our hopefully soon to be 'happed' Chicago Cubbies. Come a few hours early to stroll through the surrounding neighborhoods. You may want to skip the likes of the Cubby Bear, Hi-Tops and other such tourist attractions and instead, walk a few blocks east before the first pitch. Boystown is always a fun place to stop for a drink or coffee. Just follow the rainbow flags along Halsted Street. I can't really describe it but you'll know it when you see it. Halsted Street between Addison and Belmont, you can't miss it.

Saturday Evening: If you haven't had too many $7 beers and you managed to arrive safely back to your hotel (Caution: the Red Line ride back after a Cubs game can in itself, be a David Mamet play) consider jumping on the Blue Line west to Bucktown for dinner. This is one of my favorite Chicago neighborhoods and this Metromix link will tell you what's happening there on a daily basis or simply walk the sidewalks and pick a place that feels right for you. You'll love it there. The train stops at the intersection of North/Damen/Milwaukee Avenues.

Sunday Brunch: Take the Brown Line northwest to Lincoln Square. This Northside neighborhood has a German heritage with plenty of local cafes, bistros and restaurants. Get off at the Western Avenue stop and wander eastward. The town square is beautiful.

Also, if you are coming from a northern or southern destination along Lake Michigan the Red Line can drop you within a few blocks of Millennium Park, a must see for everyone including Chicago natives. If you are staying downtown, it is walking distance east from most of the finer hotels and a few of the rattier ones, too. The Crown Fountain, Kappor Sculpture, Lurie Gardens, and Pritzker Pavilion, located in the Park, are all 'must sees' if you are visiting Chicago. The Art Institute is adjacent to the complex so pat one of the guardian Lions on the snout as you walk in to view a Picasso.

I must now admit that I am also a visitor of sorts in this amazing city. Born on the East Coast, I arrived here in the mid-1990's against my corporate will. For the first year or so I wouldn't take off my hat or galoshes in protest of the longitudinal relocation package that landed me here-- even in July. Finally I opened my eyes and learned to embrace the beauty of a 6 week Summer. The dozen or so times I myself have ridden on the EL in Chicago, it's been to the locations I mention above. (Personally, I own two cars and would drive to the mailbox if it wasn't just in my lobby.) Anyway, it's only a thought. Try the CTA if you'd like to give your Chicago visit an added twist of adventure.

As for my friend Chris and his wonderful (I'm pretty sure) wife--I hope this gives them a few ideas. Maybe try one rapid transit excursion this trip--perhaps the Red Line to the game and back or the Blue Line to Bucktown, to be sure. I happen to have house guests in town the same weekend the Hendricks are here so we may very well still never meet in person. My two young nieces from Doylestown, Pennslyvania will be anxious to see what big city surpises my wife and I have in store for them. First stop, Sears Tower...bottom floor....just for laughs.


Geno Petro

SUNDAY OPEN HOUSE 2 UNTIL 5 PM

2746 N. Wolcott Ave, 1 North


{CLICK BELOW FOR MY SUNDAY OPEN HOUSE VIRTUAL TOUR}


...Come to 2746 N. Wolcott Avenue from 2 until 5PM on August 19th. Be among the first dozen guests and receive a bottle of wine, compliments of the house! This is our personal residence and truly, the showpiece of the neighborhood.










Click Here for a 'Virtual' Sneak Peek!


Geno Petro

Hey Jude...Dude.

{A few days ago}

While standing in the Starbucks line with one of my younger clients the other morning I noticed Paul McCartney's latest attempt to puncture the demograhically unforgiving shield of the twenty-something buyer we all seem to be expanding toward with near Einsteinian adequation. Word on the web and beyond is that the ex-Beatle averaged less than a million paid downloads for each of his last three singles (Dude!) and is now banking on the 'check-out line of choice' for Realtors and housewives of all ages, to boost his shrinking musical market share in the U.S. I stood silently looking at the CD display ironically titled, "Memory Almost Full," waiting for my beverage. I tried hard to remember if I even own a CD player anymore. I don't think I do. Great excuse for not forking over the other half of the twenty-spot I just handed the Barista.

To put it in persepective, Hey Jude--a record I did buy with my paper route money--sold 4 million records in as many months back in '67 when the same time adjusted dollar bought you an actual piece of circular vinyl in a mini record jacket with Peter Max artwork, liner notes, and an extra 'B-Side' for all the yet-to-be morphed Trivia Pursuiters in unknowing early gestation. Even compared to a contemporary talent as benign as... say, Hannah Montana of current Disney Channel fame, the old rocker from Liverpool is at best these days, just barely "like...so whatever." (translation: not very popular.)

And while my own twenty-something client was fairly certain she'd heard of the man, she wasn't really sure of anything he'd recorded. "Oh wait...I know. Satisfaction...right?" I should add that she also refers to me as Mr. Petro which pretty much makes me feel like the junior high school Science teacher I never wanted to be. And upon exiting the coffee shop, one last glance over at the air brushed album cover only reinforced the fact that while I'm at least a decade younger, I may actually look older than Sir Paul. Hey, at least my beautiful wife still has both of her own legs and a much sweeter disposition, from what they've been telling me on the on E! Channel.

{40 years ago}

And since I now find myself rapidly digressing down the Abbey Road of my youth I should probably take a moment to mention that the last song of every dance I recall attending during those junior high soirees of the late 1960s was in fact, Hey Jude. It was during these same awkward middle years that I, along with a few of my closest inner-sanctum buddies, would hover close to the Boys Locker Room entrance in the gym only to stand and watch as the marginally cooler upperclassmen and really pretty, older girls (tenth grade) swayed insufferably for the full 7 minute 7 second 'long version' of the ballad. And by the time my buds and I were old enough to get our own pretty girls, Hey Jude had been replaced by Miss American Pie and a dance was the last destination we had in mind as we flew through those remaining high school nights in our Fords and Chevys, with no foreseeable end in sight. And according to my client, herself a 1998 high school graduate, Smells Like Teen Spirit was the long playing finale at her spring formal...from what she understood. Apparently, her and her date never made it to their big event either.

{Back to the future}

We took our Ventis back to my car and quickly navigated through the Northside Chicago traffic before turning onto Lake Shore Drive, headed north to meet her fiance at the Uptown property. We had collectively--on our own and together, in all combinations of accompaniment--already looked at 30 similar places. There was no reason to imagine (hope) that this one would be any better or worse than the others. The light wasn't 'right' at one, 'too bright' at another, 'on the alley,' 'off the alley,' "What...no alley?" 'too close,' 'too far'....and the thing is, I totally get it. Everything is just 'so whatever' these days, from music to condos and everything in between, that I decided to quit fighting it and instead... just get it.

You see, I can't just slap my product at the end of a check out line like Paul McC and expect some unsuspecting young housewife, fiancee or whomever to impulse buy a condo too close or too far from an alley, with or without too much light., based on my past reputation and successes, no matter how much I air brush the promotional photos on my website. My typical internet clients have many, many options so the fact they are even in my car is remarkable in itself. So what, if we have to look at 30 properties together. They've no doubt looked at hundreds on line before we even made a connection. So like I already said, I get it.

I turned up the radio and we listened to NPR in silence as we drove along the lake. They were airing story about the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Go figure.

"Have you been following that conflict over there?" she asked me, trying to make general conversation I guess, obviously sick of talking about Real Estate and all it has to offer to society. I was lost in thought about how bad Paul McCartney sucks these days.

"Yeah. My entire life." I said. "I've been hearing about it over there, in one way or another, ever since I can remember." And this is true. Be it 1967 or fast forward to 2007, that is the one situation on this Earth that has remained constant, the way I see it. The two best Beatles have already died and nothing has changed for the better in the Middle East. Not even close.

I veered onto the ramp for our exit as her cell phone rang. Her fiance was running about 20 minutes late, she announced. He's always 20 minutes late. Historically, I've never been a late person and such last minute delays used to really tick me off. But lately, I've started to become a bit tardy as well. I mean, who really cares when it's all tallied up at the end of the proverbial day? I circled the block as it started to drizzle.

"There's a Starbucks at the corner," I said. "We can wait for him there."

"Cool," she said.

We stood in the Uptown Starbucks and found ourselves in a similar line staring at the same "Memory Almost Full" display as earlier. The same CD was playing through the speakers. Not very good, I thought again. Pretty lousy, in fact. I felt a little embarrassed for my generation. At least a more youthful icon like Kurt Cobain died before he had to trap consumers at a coffee house and he was actually from Seatlle. As the Barista topped off our half-emptied beverages my client turned to me and spoke,

"I think that Prince is around 50, isn't he?"

{Just the way it is}

I think it was her way of trying to identify with me more as a person than a Realtor now that we touched on such non Real Estate issues such as the Israeli/Palestinian conflict and music from the last 40 forty years. A little of that perhaps, mixed in with trying to find a way to fill the next 15 minutes with small talk until her partner showed up to nix yet another condo. Too 'uptownish,' was my best bet on this occasion, or maybe...'too close to the lake' (I haven't heard that one yet this year) but I chose to keep it to myself. (I stop biting my tongue however, after the 4oth showing-- or the second 'back out' or 'deal kill,' whichever comes first.)

But as I paid for the second and final round of the morning and caught my own middle-aged reflection in the scone and muffin glass at the counter, I couldn't help but think that just maybe I happened upon a connection to a generation that virtually no one--with the possible exception of me and Prince-- born before 1960 might understand. Truth is, a couple hundred grand is a lot of money to those of this generation and whether they plan on spending it on a condo, graduate school, or simply walking the Earth like Cain in Kung Fu, they are going to definitely do it in their own time and in their own way. And in my opinion, at least their music doesn't suck for the sake of being commercial. It's just generally bad on it's own terms.


image by mosaiccartsource

Geno Petro

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O.M.G! Your BFFs will die when they see your supermodel Duplex in West Lincoln Park/Lakeview. Jenn-air, Bosch, and Granite Kitchen. Marble Baths with Grohe body sprays in two Baths. 20 foot Living Room atrium with curio Fireplace. Two levels of custom paint in designer colors. Deck, so many closets, and 2 secured Parking Spaces make this condo a 'Best in Show.'

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2746 N. Wolcott Ave Chicago IL 60614

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Geno Petro