I think I’ve always known I would be in real estate, even long before I knew what it was called.
Some of my earliest memories are about neighborhoods, houses, floor plans, etc.
I remember the street my grandparent’s lived on. It was mostly built in the 1940s. There were a lot of Tudor looking houses with dramatic roof pitches. Most had asbestos tile siding. There were a few brick ranches from the 50s/60s. I always wondered why those houses were different.
A kid named Chris lived across the street. His backyard was a hill. I always liked the better view he had over my grandparents house but I did like the flat yard and privacy my grandparent’s had.
We lived in an apartment complex for a while. I really liked the design of the buildings. Our unit faced an open field that was great for playing. I had a friend who lived across the parking lot. His building was sort of built into a hillside. There were lot of steps and turns you had to take to get to his front door. I remember thinking I liked our easier access and view better, but I thought it was cool how getting to his front door was more eventful and intriguing.
Then I lived in a house sitting up on a hill. The house right next door was the mirror image of our house. I remember noticing that we had the only “Ditto” houses on the street and wondered how that happened?
Next was a fairly new house in a neighborhood still under construction. We had a vacant lot behind us. When a house was built, it ruined the backyard for me. It sat higher than our house and that bothered me. It was like the house was casting a shadow on our house. We had some drainage problems too.
All of this and I wasn’t even 10 years old yet.
Now nearly 40 years later, it is still hard for me to believe that I have made a living out of telling people what I think about houses, neighborhoods and floor plans.
It’s been really good!