As the founder and broker of Deerwood Realty, I’ve seen a bunch of odd things in Real Estate here in St. Louis.  One of the more odd things to happen to me is in a story I will present to you below.

I was working on a deal for a rural property south of St. Louis.  The seller’s agent was from Chesterfield, and judging by their transaction history, they weren’t experts in rural property.  On my side, the purchase was one hurdle after another.  There were concerns on ownership, financing, survey, and appraisal.  None of these issues affected the seller.  The only thing that really affected the seller is that they had a backup contract and I suspect it was for more money because the negotiations bordered on stupid.  We asked for a common courtesy at one point and were denied.  That isn’t all that unusual, however.  What really surprised me was this.

The first email from the seller’s agent said, “do you want the pig pen for x dollars?”

I responded, “no thank you”.  My buyers weren’t planning on keeping pigs on the property.

The next email I get is, “do you want the chicken coop?”  Again, my buyers weren’t planning on raising chickens, so I politely said “no thank you.”

A couple of days go by and I get another email.  “What are you going to do with the stray cats?”  I responded that I wasn’t aware of any stray cats and no one would be living at the property to take care of them.

Well, that was apparently the final straw, because the next day I get an email, “It’s a shame, because they are really nice cats.”

Every conversation after that was tinged with anger that my buyers didn’t want their pig pen, chicken coop or stray cats!

As a real estate agent who really does want every deal to work out for the best for each buyer and seller, I’m absolutely flummoxed about what I should have done differently.  It’s like the seller’s agent had painted me as some sort of cat offender when I really don’t have an opinion of stray cats one way or the other.

It seems odd to me that one would take offense in this situation.  For one, you are pushing stray cats on the buyer and rather than look at it that way you get indignant about not taking them.  After all, you’re the one who decided to sell the property, take the cats with you.  It’s a strange argument.

Have any other real estate agents in St. Louis experienced this odd behavior from the seller side?  The strange offense taken when you don’t want the seller’s stuff regardless of whether or not it’s free?   I’d be interested to know in the comment section below.  Should we have just agreed to take the stuff even though it was of no use to the buyer and they really didn’t want to be taking care of cats that aren’t theirs?  I really don’t know the answer.

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