« Derek, Handyman Extraordinaire | Main | Governor's Island »
July 14, 2005
Duplicitous Real Estate Agents
I just dropped off the keys to our old apartment. Our landlord was nice, so I was looking forward to seeing her and getting some gossip about the buyers' impending luxury renovation flip, but no. Opening the door and grinning ear to ear was the Corcoran broker. I tried to be friendly. The landlord was there, too, so we chatted, but seeing the old place and the enabler-of-real-estate-madness dampened my mood.
To make it even worse, the broker casually mentioned (smiling nonchalantly all the while) that, oh, the place actually isn't being renovated. In fact, the buyer is probably going to put on a coat of paint and rent it.
I probably should have tried to get more information, but I was a little pissed (I mean, it's not like we're going to move AGAIN to get it back). I'm guessing there's more to the story. It probably sells a little better if you don't have to worry about accommodating an existing tenant, or something. Or the buyer just didn't want a tenant, even though we're "dream tenants" according to our old landlord. (The broker and landlord had said they'd tell buyers that we were good tenants and were interested in staying there.) Whatever. The whole move/uprooting thing has wreaked havoc in our lives, so the possibility that the move could have been avoided made me really mad. I left and walked down the street cursing silently, envisioning various violent episodes with real estate broker windows and baseball bats.
To get over it I called D and asked him to meet me at any place that had alcohol. We went to the newish Bar Minnow (spinoff of the very nice Minnow seafood restaurant around the corner). Cold muscadet and dinner eventually calmed me down. It was our first time there and I really liked the relaxed, bar/seafood shack feel -- it's a good summer place. It smells like seafood inside and there's a good selection of beer on tap (I liked Derek's unpronounceable wheat beer -- something with "heifer"?). Derek's lobster roll was a bit citrusy, and my seafood salad was decent (good calamari, iffy everything else). I think I'll stop by and sit at the bar for some wine and oysters or clams the next time I have a bad work day (or bad real estate experience) and need to unwind.
Posted by csageday at July 14, 2005 12:11 AM
Comments
I had dinner at Bar Minnow on the weekend, by myself, and I was very impressed with how well they treated a solo diner, which is one of my little tests for restaurants. I had a pint of Brooklyn Brown, and an oyster po-boy (which they insisted on calling an oyster po-boy sandwich, which cracked me up). My food was excellent.
I'm sorry about the real estate crap. I, too, would have needed booze and sympathy after that interaction. How maddening! I hate absolutely everything about the situation as you have described over the last few weeks. Eccccch. Onward!
Posted by: Rose at July 14, 2005 02:02 PM