Buffalo Rising Online

People are going to live in the suburbs no matter what but there is no reason why a real estate agent should be bad mouthing the city like that.

I've heard essentially the same story in the past. Maybe this is a time when naming names is worthwhile. It's nice that the company supplied another agent, but if I knew someone who was interested in moving to the City I would certainly like to know which companies and agents to tell them to avoid. But then again, maybe when the anti-City agent saw the nice commission the pro-City agent got after working with Francesca they had second thoughts.

The thing thats you gotta love about Buffalo is that we really are the first city of the Midwest. We speak without pretention and matter of fact.....like people in the midwest do.

Now a smart professional real estate agent asks for the customers criteria and tries to fill it. They do NOT ignore the customers criteria and sell them on their own personal opinions. So at the very least this real estate agent was unprofessional and rather stupid.

Now lets put a shot of realism into the situation! 1) The recent parking ticket blitz by the Buffalo Police in our commercial districts didnt help 2) The announcement of red light cameras targeting commuters didnt help 3) The wonton mismanagement of insufficient inspections, insufficient fines and insufficient property laws to handle unmaintained & abandoned properties, house flippers, etc doesnt help 4) The priority of the police toward parking tickets instead of gangs, truancy or cars speeding down sidestreets doesnt help 5) and I dont know how many times I have to say this to Buffalonians but its worth saying one more time. There are millions of people commuting over the Peace Bridge and conducting business between the US & Canada who want and need to be in close proximity to that bridge....just as people need to be in close proximity to the Airport, the rail yards, the Port of Buffalo, the Thruways and Expressways or downtown.....just as there are people that demand views of Lake Erie or the Niagara River. LOOK AT A MAP....THE FORMER CANAL DISTRICT (2ND THRU 7TH STREET IS RIPE FOR BEING REBUILT) AND THERE IS NO REASON WHY THE AREA BETWEEN SOUTH ELMWOOD AND NIAGARA STREET SHOULD BE ANYTHING LESS THAN THE AREA BETWEEN LINWOOD AND ELMWOOD.

INFACT....OUR NIAGARA STREET SHOULD LOOK MORE LIKE LAKESHORE DRIVE IN CHICAGO LINED WITH A WALL OF CORPORATE OFFICES AND RESIDENTIAL APARTMENT BUILDINGS WITH WATERFRONT VIEWS THAN ITS PRESENT 1970S BRONX. (AND IM NOT TALKING ABOUT MARINA TOWERS AND OTHER MUNICIPAL HOUSING)

NIAGARA STREET SHOULD BE MORE LIKE AN OLMSTEAD PARKWAY....THAN ITS PRESENT FORM

NIAGARA STREET AND ITS LAKEFRONT AND WATERFONT VIEWS IS A TESTAMENT TO EXACTLY HOW BRAIN DEAD OUR LOCAL DEVELOPERS ARE TO THE POTENTIAL INTERNATIONAL CORRIDOR.

As I said...the city doesnt help, the police do not help, and the developers do not help....and as a result the west village, the westside, black rock and riverside....needlessly struggle...when they SHOULD be lined with corporate offices......

I think that this realtor had no ulterior motives. He/she probably has little knowledge of the city, probably bases his / her impressions of the city on prejudices which are held by a majority of the people in WNY (much of which is collected from local evening news casts). Many of the suburban residents that I know actually believe that they have a very high probability of being murdered if the step foot in the city. This agent may have been too scared to show houses in the city.

It is a shame that realtors say such things but people do their own research now. All the information about neighborhoods and houses is online.

A funny aside, when I moved to Connecticut my company hired an agent to help me find an apartment. We had four places to see and the first two places were quite nice, but as we pulled up to the third place I could see something was wrong; a firetruck was at the curb and a bunch of firemen were rolling up hoses. They had obviously just finished putting out a small fire in the very apartment we were there to see. Puzzled, the agent walked up to the apartment and I followed. We took a look inside, managing to walk on dry areas of the now flooded first room. I thought we were going to leave and move onto the next appointment but the realtor turns to me and says, "With a little paint this place could really work." Even the fireman who overheard couldn't believe it.

Irrelevant, bluto. Nowhere does it say that this particular customer has children. She specifically told her agent that she needs to be near the Peace Bridge, not that she wants a certain kind of school. Don't knock Buffalo school teachers until you've walked a mile in their classrooms.

A few years ago I met a re-lo who told me that he was interested in Mayfair Lane, which has some of the most desirable residences in the city. His real estate agent insisted that it was a dangerous neighborhood. Mayfair Lane, for crying out loud!

Kelly's right. Agents just want to boost their commissions, and the easiest way to do that is to scare everyone into pricier houses in the 'burbs.

Honestly. Buffalo is like Beruit; it is no place for a braciole like this and her kid!

Um, Bluto - you might want to look at the number of students who are coming from poverty/families who don't value education in the system before putting in all at the feet of the teachers (and, apparently, their salaries, benefits, and retirement plans). All I can equate it to is being a personal trainer and your clients not working out on their own- but the trainer gets blamed for them being out of shape, or a dentist who gets blamed because the patient has cavities from eating too much junk.

I can't imagine what it must be like to be a teacher in this city and then have to listen to (and read) crap about the pay and benefits - all the while seeing Buffalo Bills players earning millions to basically lose football games. Now THERE'S a waste of your taxpayer money.

Impacting the negative attitudes of some realtors has long been a challenge in Bfo.

More troubling is the city government's own refusal to enforce residency on top city officials despite that being a promised reform in the new City Charter implemented under Masiello. It is widely known that City Comptroller SanFilippo' top-aide Tony Farina has long lived in Niagara County.

Farina used three fake city addresses early in Anthony Nanula's tenure as Comptroller after Nanula implemented the new position for Farina as "public relations officer" (who actually serves as taxpayer-funded campaign manager). Nanula was required by Charter to "certify" residency of his appointees. Instead, Nanula co-signed the refinanced mortgage on Farina's house on Brentwood in North Tonawanda.

SanFilippo continued the charade, then covered-up legendary non-residency by workers at the City's nororious housing authority (BMHA) where as many as 100 workers have been alleged to live outside the city.

It was well known that BMHA #2 Thomas A Williams moved to Clarence immediately after his appointment by Masiello, as Wms installed a phone in his mother-in-law's house on devastated West Avenue, from which Wms served as "zone 22 chair" for the Democratic Party.

SEE: http://www.buffaloreview.com/desktopmodules/fullpagestoryviewer.aspx?story_id=305

SanFilippo is now running for re-election, as his "resident campaign manager" Farina runs his campaign.

I predict SanFilippo's mocking city residency law won't even be mentioned in the campaign.

Dick Kern

The reason the realtor would encourage its client to move to the suburbs is purely an economic reason: 1. The reason housing in the city is undervalued vis a vis to its suburban counterpart is because homebuyers (the type who could afford to live in the suburbs) make the rational financial decision that they should pay less in order to afford private schooling for their child. 2. Realtors make a commission on the house sale price.

Therefore:

Realtors encourage people to move to the suburbs because people who move to the suburbs will pay more because they can put all their money into the home and not worry about education costs, leaving the realtor with a higher commission.

My mistake, bluto.

I still stand by my other argument, namely that the client didn't ask the agent for school recommendations, she asked the agent for something near the Peace Bridge. So the agent was using fear to manipulate the client into a pricier house in the suburbs.

So, has anyone had the opposite experience? Asking for suburban showings but having the agent try and manipulate you into buying in the city?

I think the realtors are just saying this stuff because it's easier to sell expensive houses in the city compared to suburban homes. So of course they'll say the suburbs are where it's at. I don't think anything any realtor ever says is based on anything other than what will make them more money. Once I was looking for a place in Boston and the realtor told me that "there is no crime in Boston". If it became difficult to sell expensive houses in the city, suddenly these people would sound like the most idealistic Lexington coop-shopping members of the BRO staff. No there's no crime in the area. Population of the city expected to double in 20 years. Public schools continually send kids off to Harvard, Yale,...

First you should do your own homework. Comparables, school info, community info, taxes, maps, and more are all readily available on the internet, so that when an agent gives you an opinion, you can intelligently debate the merits of that opinion.

Second, there are good and bad parts of the city, where crime, home values, amenities, and other critical information would be different depending on where you want to be. These are called "neighborhoods" and they are very diverse from block to block.

Third, you can blame anyone you want for the city's poor grades as it relates to the public school system, but the fact is LAST is LAST. Any realtor who is talking to a buyer with children is going to have to address schools. It is critical criteria for most parents, and Buffalo fails as a place to raise children because of it, unless you have the luxury of being able to pay for a private education.

As a Realtor and resident of the West Village, I find this story to be pretty sad. I attended a conference 2 years ago and during one of the workshops the instructor half joked that "the public ranks Realtors right up there with used car salesmen in terms of ethics". Obviously, many of the comments here (they will say anything to sell a house and it's all about the commission) support that theory.

If this agent were smart, she would simply listen to what the client was looking for as a first step. Then, if she was unfamiliar or uncomfortable with the area that the client wanted, her best move would have been to refer the client to a qualified agent who specializes in the neighborhood she desired and asked for a referral fee. Very simple and done all over the US, but rarely here. The client gets an expert in the neighborhood she desires, and the agent collects a referral fee without having to venture into an area she is not comfortable in. Everyone wins.

This is not about pretending that some very real problems do not exist in our great city but rather following good business practice. I agree with Bob B's comment, "This wasn't some conspiracy or scam; it was an ill informed fearful agent afraid of the city of Buffalo".

I've printed ths story and will bring it up in my office sales meeting and I encourage any other Realtors reading this story to do the same.