{"id":1429,"date":"2006-08-17T12:32:09","date_gmt":"2006-08-17T20:32:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/wordpress\/archives\/2006\/08\/the_trial_of_the_walking_doormen.html"},"modified":"2006-08-17T12:32:09","modified_gmt":"2006-08-17T20:32:09","slug":"the_trial_of_th","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/archives\/2006\/08\/the_trial_of_th.html","title":{"rendered":"The Trial Of The &#8220;Walking Doormen&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Brian Carter <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nypress.com\/19\/33\/news&#038;columns\/rentaldem.cfm\">again comes clean in the New York Press about that dirty business<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>The temperature had officially reached 100 degrees. I was walking a heavy-set billboard salesman from a tiny studio on Hudson Street to an even smaller place on the Lower East Side. He already owned a place in Jersey, but said what he really needed was, &#8220;a shack up pad.&#8221; He asked, more than once, if it was legal to fasten a mirror on the ceiling, and if I knew anyone who could do it.<\/p>\n<p>. . .<\/p>\n<p>Before the Internet, agents had the opportunity to earn their commission. We were the gatekeepers to uncommon knowledge. If I told you there were only three apartments in Gramercy Park, you pretty much had to take my word for it. Trust saved everybody a lot of time, and loyalty was equally rewarded. Of course, it was beside the point if I was lying. Then again, why would I? You were my client, and eventually we would find what you were looking for.<\/p>\n<p>The Internet has reduced the agents, in most cases, to little more than walking doormen. A necessary evil in an already absurd endeavor, we are viewed more as an obstacle than an opportunity. I don&#8217;t really have clients any more; I have ten minute meetings in apartments.<\/p>\n<p>We finally made it to the Lower East Side. We were in the apartment less than five minutes when his cell phone rang. It was another broker. It&#8217;s common these days for a client to make appointments with one broker while looking with another. But it&#8217;s hard to call someone a &#8220;client&#8221; when I&#8217;m only showing him two apartments. It&#8217;s even harder to charge him $3000 for doing so.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The Case Against Brokers Part One: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/archives\/2006\/07\/business_had_be.html\">Business Had Been Slow, But One Day This Dame Walks In And Hands Me One Of My Biggest Cases . . .<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The Case Against Brokers Part Two: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/archives\/2006\/08\/dwayne_schneide.html\">Dwayne Schneider As Father Figure<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Brian Carter again comes clean in the New York Press about that dirty business: The temperature had officially reached 100 degrees. I was walking a heavy-set billboard salesman from a tiny studio on Hudson Street to an even smaller place on the Lower East Side. He already owned a place in Jersey, but said what [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1429","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-real_estate"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1429"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1429\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bridgeandtunnelclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}