I spend a lot of time thinking about how to market better. How to make our cities better. How to build better buildings and serve clients at a higher level.
But recently, I’ve been thinking about something else.
Character.
Growing up in the 70s and 80s, things felt different. A large part of the structure of our days was built around how we would build character.
In the morning, teachers talked about it. In the afternoon, coaches reinforced it. And at night, our parents demanded it.
Developing our character wasn’t the exception - it was the expectation.
I recently read a piece citing Gallup data on trust in professions. Nurses, unsurprisingly, have held the highest spot for decades. Doctors, teachers, and military veterans are close behind.
At the other end of the spectrum sit politics, media, and sales industries. Real estate ranks near the bottom.
And that’s not surprising.
Our business, (like some others) can reward the wrong behavior. And much of what the public sees reinforces that narrative. Reality shows, social media, and our industry press often highlight the worst examples, not the best ones.
A few bad actors have shaped public perception in powerful ways.
I came into the industry as a rental agent with a naive assumption - that people were admirable, that character was a given, and that if you did the work, you earned your commission fairly.
But that’s not the way things always work out. I experienced a bad character in my very first month in the business.
I was renting a nice loft in SoHo when my client pulled me aside and offered me a smaller commission in cash to subvert my broker and push the deal through. He said “everyone does it.” I walked away and rented it to someone else.
This was a small moment that left a lasting impression
This business doesn’t give you trust. It tests it.
And yes, while there are people in this business who make a lot of money with very little character, the opposite is more common. (That was the only time I was offered cash in lieu of commission).
So this is where the opportunity is.
We don’t fix perception with better marketing. We fix it with better behavior. How we act when no one is watching. How we respond when it’s inconvenient. We fix it with better communication. How we speak about it as a community. And who we give the mic to.
Because for every bad example, there are 100 examples of people in this business doing it the right way.
Just like when we were kids, the lesson hasn’t changed. We still need to work on developing our character. We just have to change how we speak about it.
Let’s do this!
Shaun