Second Chance: November 10

The story starts here.

Karin turned off the ringer on her phone so that it would go automatically to voicemail, she put up the out on appointment sign and she closed the blinds on the bay window next to her desk. She filled her carafe with coffee and brought it to her work space. Then, she got serious about developing a proposal for the Piermont Complex.

“What do I have to lose?” she said, out loud. She put to work all the design and creative writing skills that she had learned from developing sales brochures and newsletters for Re/Max. When she was satisfied with what she had, she packaged it up and walked it to the mailbox at the end of her block. She stood there for a few seconds, hesitating.

“Better do it before I change my mind. Alright, here it goes,” she said as she dropped the package into the blue box.

Back at the office, Karin turned her door sign around and turned the phone’s ringer back on. She checked the messages that had come in while she was working on the proposal. There were a couple from prospective tenants. For the time being, it looked like it would be awhile before she had any vacancies, so she held off on returning their calls. The last message was from Troy Bennett. He didn’t say what he needed, but asked that she call him back right away.

“Hey Troy, sorry I missed your call.”

“Hi Karin. I just wanted to thank you for the Realtor you recommended. We talked with her and two others and they all gave us basically the same numbers.” Troy said.

“She’s the best I know. I think she will do a good job for you.”

“Well, that’s part of why I’m calling. All three also said that now is not the best time to sell and that if we weren’t opposed to continuing to rent the places out, it might be worth it to wait a year or two and see what the market does. Your girl, Gayle, said if we left it empty and listed, it might sit for that long before it sells anyway, so why not make some money in the mean time?”

“I think it makes sense,” Karin said. “I really wish I could afford to buy some property right now because sale prices are low and rents are high. But, I know your mom always said this was her thing and that none of you kids wanted to be landlords.”

“That’s true,” Troy said and laughed. “I remember growing up, our dad would always try to get us to work on the apartments and none of us would do it unless we were desperate for money, and even then we were reluctant. And, obviously, after this incident with Mom’s house, we don’t know what we’re doing in picking tenants either.”

“Yeah, it can be a pain fixing up the same place over and over again.”

“Gayle did give us a pretty good number for the lake house though. Even in the condition it’s in, the location is prime. She says she even knows of a guy from Chicago who is in town looking for a vacation home.” The mention of the word Chicago made Karin think of Jay, but millions of people lived in Chicago and hundreds of them vacationed in Dunewood every summer. She was sure it was just a coincidence.

“She said he might not mind the extra work it needs if we price it right.” Troy finished.

“Well, I’m sure that Gayle knows her stuff, so if she thinks she can sell it quickly, she’s probably right.”

“She’s sending me a listing agreement to look over, and I’m planning on signing it. So, I wanted to know how it would work to have you take on the other properties as manager,” Troy said. “Like maybe for a year or two, like Gayle suggested and then we’ll try to sell them.” Karin and Troy talked business for another twenty minutes or so, with Karin explaining the general outline of her standard contract. Troy said he was still interested and she agreed to email him a copy to review. As she hung up the phone, and looked at the clock, she saw it was quarter to six, and she suddenly remembered that Jay was coming to pick her up at six o’clock.

She looked down to see what she was wearing and said, “Well, at least it’s not paint clothes.” She took five minutes to put away her paperwork and lock up her files before heading to the bathroom to try and make herself look presentable.

Find out what happens next here.