New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

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Arkrite
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by Arkrite »

Yeah... we found a place that looked really nice, so we told our realtor to put a bid in.
Then discovered that the foundation was made out of wood.
Decided to stick with it, because maybe we could get it for cheap.
Realtor drags her feet, two full days later we find out somebody else has already put in a bid, and now it's a race.
We bid more than we should have after agonizing over the choice for all Friday night.
Immediately lose the bid because the other guys bid more.
Feel bad, move on.
Get called back when the seller gets mad at the buyer over the request for a Real Property Report.
Now I'm super paranoid, why wouldn't you just get the RPR, it's not that expensive?
Talk to our family, a professional carpenter and a guy who's been involved in lots of construction, they have concerns.
Bring concerns to realtor. Realtor waves them off, seems like she just wants the paycheck.
Spend all Sunday night stressing over if we should buy the place or not.
Eventually decided that we shouldn't.
Realtor isn't talking to us now. So at least some good came out of this ;~)
Michuru
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by Michuru »

Arkrite wrote: Wed Jun 19, 2019 2:51 am Yeah... we found a place that looked really nice, so we told our realtor to put a bid in.
Then discovered that the foundation was made out of wood.
Decided to stick with it, because maybe we could get it for cheap.
Realtor drags her feet, two full days later we find out somebody else has already put in a bid, and now it's a race.
We bid more than we should have after agonizing over the choice for all Friday night.
Immediately lose the bid because the other guys bid more.
Feel bad, move on.
Get called back when the seller gets mad at the buyer over the request for a Real Property Report.
Now I'm super paranoid, why wouldn't you just get the RPR, it's not that expensive?
Talk to our family, a professional carpenter and a guy who's been involved in lots of construction, they have concerns.
Bring concerns to realtor. Realtor waves them off, seems like she just wants the paycheck.
Spend all Sunday night stressing over if we should buy the place or not.
Eventually decided that we shouldn't.
Realtor isn't talking to us now. So at least some good came out of this ;~)
I had to deal with a lot of real estate agents at my last job; I determines that they are all scum. There are maybe two I trust. I’m working with the one I didn’t have a whole flirty thing with because reasons.
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Arkrite
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by Arkrite »

They certainly seem to make a lot of money, and from my side they don't seem to do much beyond showing up to see a house occasionally.
Maybe I'm in the wrong business. Maybe I should get into that highway robbery business.
Michuru
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by Michuru »

Arkrite wrote: Wed Jun 19, 2019 3:18 am They certainly seem to make a lot of money, and from my side they don't seem to do much beyond showing up to see a house occasionally.
Maybe I'm in the wrong business. Maybe I should get into that highway robbery business.
In central Illinois, before you can sell a home serviced by a septic system, a licensed septic contractor had to come out within thirty days of the closing to speak to the condition of the septic. The idea was... these things are pricey. A new septic can run around $5k-$16k, and to buy a new house and then have the septic fail and suddenly have to shell that much out would suck. My part was to warn buyers of what they could be facing.

The problem was the realtors. My report had to be submitted before closing. Typically, once given the order to perform an inspection, my move was to call the governing health department and get all information on the septic system. Whoever installed it had to file a permit with them, submit a proposed diagram, and before they covered it, the health department would inspect it and diagram it as it actually was. All of this would tell me what was in the ground and where so that I wouldn’t need to excavate the entire yard. Some counties I had a good rapport with: if I emailed them requesting this info, they would email me back everything within the hour. Others were... not as forthcoming: I had to fill out a Freedom of Information Act form to request the documents, as well as explain why I was requesting them, then submit them to a FOIA officer to review. For some reason, this request could not be emailed—originals only were accepted via mail. This meant it could take days to get the right information.

Several realtors were in the habit of calling me up to tell me that they were closing tomorrow and needed the inspection done today. Also, they needed the report today. That’s filling out a six-page document and typing up all notes and recommendations. Did I see anything that the current homeowner will need to repair? Then I also need to submit an estimate for said repairs.

Despite explaining the issue here as nicely as possible, some real estate agents were just way too pushy. They would call every hour to demand an update. One guy came into my office and told me he would stand there until I physically gave him the report he had only requested an hour ago... right before closing...

The best part was when I would do this and immediately invoice them for said inspection. “I’ll get you paid in a few weeks once we close.”

“Uh, don’t you close tomorrow?”

“No, we close three weeks from now.”

Here’s the thing: there’s a difference between a real estate agent and a Realtor. Realtor is a copyrighted word. It’s a big thing that no every agent can claim to have. It also comes with a code of conduct, and breaking it can result in losing that status. One of the codes? Honesty. Lie and you can have that revoked. I had no qualms about threatening to report them to their ethics board. When they didn’t care, I absolutely did. Only once did I ever see it work—where a guy had his status revoked. He had to toss out all his cards and ads—couldn’t call himself a Realtor anymore. It was glorious.

I have also had a realtor threaten me if I didn’t change my report. His client (who oddly had the same surname he did) was selling a house and the septic was shot. It was not failing: it had failed. You could not flush the toilets. He did not want this in the report as the options were 1) lose the sale; 2) negotiate the price because of the cost on the buyer; 3) escrow funds from the sale for said repairs.

Another came to the house while I was doing the inspection and repeatedly tried to prevent me from doing said inspection. “Can’t you just put down that you didn’t see it?”

I mean, I can, but then the health department will make you repair it, thinking this component wasn’t there.

Almost every real estate agent I worked with was pushy, a liar, a bully, an idiot, or worse. I had one show up at my office (to pay) and she went on a tirade about how her community was going downhill because an Asian person had moved in down the street.

I ended up making a spreadsheet for real estate agents’ contact information—name, company, billing, phone, fax, email... I also had a column where I scores them... Every encounter I rated as positive or negative, and would assign or remove points as needed. Two agents had a positive score...

One of them is difficult to explain... She called about an inspection and asked if she could be present for it. I had no qualms with that, so I set up an appointment to meet her at the house. Turns out she was buying it and wanted to know how to maintain a septic. She had questions galore. I walked her through it all. We ended up spending a few hours there. She showed me the house and all of the plans she had for it. She kept making comments like, “This is why I need a boyfriend like you—someone who knows this kind of stuff!” After so many statements like that, I took it for flirting, but didn’t make a move yet. I didn’t have anything remotely close to resembling self-confidence, soooo... yeah.

The next morning I woke up to a friend request from her on Facebook. I added her and got a tidal wave of notifications that she liked almost every single photo of me. Then came the flirting through email. I took a chance and asked her out for coffee.

She never responded to it. She just went radio silence.

About six months go by and she posts to Facebook that she’s been having fun playing matchmaker and wants to keep doing it. She asks people if they want to be fixed up and I threw my hat in. In my head, if she was interested, she wouldn’t fix me up. My female friends said this was proof that I didn’t understand how women think. She fixed me up with two women—both of which were absolute train wrecks. It was terrible.

A few months later, this realtor was doing this charity thing and looking for people to do stand up. That’s how I got roped into that one. At the show, we ran into each other. She hadn’t seen me in almost a year and I’d dropped about a hundred pounds. There was this awkward, “You look GOOD” accompanied by a dumb grin. My thought process here was that stupid Marilyn Monroe quote women throw around: if she couldn’t handle me at my worst, she didn’t deserve me at my best.

She is pretty active in the community and is instrumental in organizing this annual festival our town holds. Last year I was walking around, almost half the man I used to be... My friend said some woman was checking me out. I turn and see it’s her. She flashes me this flirty grin. I said hi and called her by name. She looked baffled as to how I knew her. I reintroduced myself. “Oh, wow! You really look good! What’s going on? How’s life treating you? Seeing anyone?”

Suffice to say, when I went looking for a realtor, I went with the other one with a positive rating on my spreadsheet.
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Flynnarrel
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by Flynnarrel »

Good Luck with your Realtor, Mich. Happier GMs is something we should all strive for so... don't ask her out for you, do it for Martin and Jack and Otso and all the other imaginary friends we've created.
"Something pithy this way comes."
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Gilliam
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by Gilliam »

I have to agree that woman is one to avoid.
Michuru
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by Michuru »

Gilliam wrote: Wed Jun 19, 2019 6:19 pm I have to agree that woman is one to avoid.
Everyone has a type: I’m attracted to women sane people avoid.

Case in point: my last girlfriend legitimately suffers from Borderline Personality Disorder (aka, what Tatjana has) and... she made me realize how tame I have been playing Tatjana.

While we were together, there was a day when I didn’t text her fast enough (I was at work), so she crashed her car.

Things ended about a year ago and she just keeps coming back crazier and crazier. She messaged me a week ago on Facebook to get my mobile number. She’s on vacation and her mobile was stolen. She just moved out of the house she was renting—selling most of her stuff to move in with her new boyfriend (of four months)—and they drove to Myrtle Beach where he allegedly used her as a punching bag. Now she has no money and no way home and she’s scared and doesn’t know what to do. I suggested that she call her father, the police officer, and tell him her boyfriend is abusive, that she needs a way home from South Carolina, and a place to stay until she gets back on her feet. At the expense of sounding like someone who brushes off abuse accusations, I suspect she’s making things up in an attempt to use my sympathy to get some money.

The last time I saw her was a month ago. She looked fairly messed up. She apologized for forgetting about my birthday and said we should go to a B&B to make it up to me. She suggested we go to a B&B while she was in a relationship with someone else. She’s... special... and I’m pretty sure she’s off her medications at the moment... I feel bad for her, but at the same time? Her presence in my life is insanely toxic, and I have to take care of me.

And inevitably find someone crazier to get involved with.
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Arkrite
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by Arkrite »

Michuru wrote: Wed Jun 19, 2019 6:44 pm And inevitably find someone crazier to get involved with.
Anything I could say here would be pretty hypocritical.
Both me and my wife have some major issues.

On the other hand we both love each other and try to look out for each other. I think that's a good thing ;~)


Also: I agree with the others. Avoid crazy realtor.

Also: Your stories both scare me, but don't surprise me. (about the realtors)



And in my defense, Lex has previously been listening to the MP3 player during episodes, it's just kind of an off hand reference so I'd be shocked if anybody noticed besides me ;~)

And since I didn't explain it well, Lex was worried about stealing songs from a band, singing it and then finding out it was something they were going to write in a few years, but now that he swiped it and played it on the Internets they'll never have their big success.

Though I'm still using it as an excuse to have Lex singing songs he couldn't possibly know due to the year of the game :D
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by EnigmaticOne »

Quick clarification, the part where Violet's dad is the former director of MI18 is still generally unknown to the PCs who weren't involved, yes/no? But her status as the daughter of a Baroness is?
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by Michuru »

EnigmaticOne wrote: Thu Jun 27, 2019 2:33 am Quick clarification, the part where Violet's dad is the former director of MI18 is still generally unknown to the PCs who weren't involved, yes/no? But her status as the daughter of a Baroness is?
Exactly.
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by EnigmaticOne »

Argh, you know, I had Dennis pointing out what Violet said, but that got lost in my edit.
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by Shock »

Damn I messed that up. At least I'm pretty sure it was me misunderstanding. Violet was talking about not wanting to see Black Ice again. She (and I, apparently) wasn't even thinking about Applebottom
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by Michuru »

Shock wrote: Tue Jul 02, 2019 3:17 am Damn I messed that up. At least I'm pretty sure it was me misunderstanding. Violet was talking about not wanting to see Black Ice again. She (and I, apparently) wasn't even thinking about Applebottom
Ah! Okay, I'll make some edits. My bad!
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by EnigmaticOne »

Michuru wrote: Tue Jul 02, 2019 2:09 pm
Shock wrote: Tue Jul 02, 2019 3:17 am Damn I messed that up. At least I'm pretty sure it was me misunderstanding. Violet was talking about not wanting to see Black Ice again. She (and I, apparently) wasn't even thinking about Applebottom
Ah! Okay, I'll make some edits. My bad!
But don't get rid of Puck's asking who will stand up and take down Applebottom! I liked having Dennis' building realization about how we could do it.

Edit: Too late. So I'll just make a tweak to Dennis' post too.
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Re: New Vindicators Academy of Europe (OOC - Full)

Post by Shock »

Sorry for that mix-up. I was going to try to roll with it but thanks for the fix

My mind started wandering last night and I got to wondering, what would happen if Black Ice got sent back to Pandora? I know they stopped using it since the truth about the Elpis came out but it has to still be a theoretical possibility. Would she then run into herself simultaneously arriving from her home dimension? Get stuck in some kind of time loop? Cause a paradox?
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