It’s your chance to weigh in on the individuals and industry figures you love, hate, and love to hate as you make your own naughty and nice list for the holidays.

Everyone knows this is crunch time—when Santa makes his naughty and nice list. 

Well, he’ll have a hell of a time when it comes to the real estate industry. There are so many controversial figures to choose from, many of whom have been particularly problematic over the past year.

Of course, it’s not just about big-name industry leaders. It’s also about those folks who make our transactions a little more annoying, a little more difficult, and an all-around pain in the ass. Day-to-day, they can have a bigger impact on our professional lives than the big bosses.

It’s also that time when we look back at the year just past and think about what we’re yearning for in the new year. Hopefully, it’s time for us to look at our own performance and do some self-evaluation, seeing where we’ve been naughty and nice, as well.

Naughty or Nice?

If you’ve been naughty here and there this year, you may find those things easy to fix. Sometimes it’s as simple as reframing your mindset, working with a mentor or getting some additional training. 

Some of the things on this list may be pet peeves you see in others. Still, other items might be completely out of your control right now, or they may be problems with the industry at large.

In an industry where professionalism is sometimes undervalued, elevate yourself and make sure that you’re operating above the status quo. If you see yourself in over half of these, it’s time to think about whether this is the right industry for you or whether you need to do some in-depth work on yourself. 

  1. People who are still talking about whether the market’s shifting when it has already shifted
  2. The real estate agent hosting an open house with no pen and no sign-in sheet, much less a tablet and app to track attendance
  3. The agent who writes, “This one won’t last long!” in the property description
  4. The agent who never reads the showing remarks in the MLS
  5. SB-F and FTX’s crypto failure
  6. An agent committing fraud to help his clients get the house
  7. Brokerages talking shit to anybody who’ll listen about Compass
  8. Agents serving hard seltzers at their open house
  9. The agent writing an offer while they drink, then posting it on IG
  10. The agent who goes on vacation without leaving anyone else in charge and posts a hundred-part IG Story while their deals are all blowing up
  11. Zillow and Redfin closing their iBuyer platforms
  12. Pantone’s New Color for 2023
  13. That agent who hides the Supra lockbox in the bushes
  14. Virtual staging that makes the fixer look twice its size and fully renovated
  15. The “top agent” who hasn’t actually sold at a luxury level
  16. The agent who puts 200 photos on the MLS
  17. The frustrated poet/novelist who writes the world’s longest and most insane property description
  18. The broker who doesn’t say “thank you” to their agents or know any of them by name besides the top producers
  19. The broker who doesn’t give the time of day to their agents unless they join in for every drunken Happy Hour
  20. The agent who switches brokerages and doesn’t have a conversation with their broker before leaving (or looking in the mirror to see where the real problem is)
  21. The first-time homebuyer’s dad
  22. The agent whose “marketing plan” consists entirely of 12 iPhone photos
  23. The agent who takes listing photos with the toilet seat up
  24. The agent who adds a listing photo that shows them reflected in the mirror while they take the photo
  25. The agent who adds close-up listing photos of random corners, door frames, and toilet tanks
  26. Agents who are still using flier boxes on their For Sale signs instead of a QR code, let’s save some trees already
  27. Agents who spend their weekends scanning every coming soon listing and Open House and For Sale signs in their market, looking for any possible error so they can report competing agents for sign violations
  28. Agents who publish marketing materials with typos, misspellings, and grammar errors rather than hiring copywriters or copyeditors
  29. The agent who ignores their sphere of influence and past clients until their pipeline is totally empty
  30. Agents with “luxury real estate” in their social media profiles, 18,000 followers, no engagement and an ebook on flipping houses
  31. Agents who work on their downline instead of focusing on their production
  32. Agents who “give out” digital business cards that end up in the black hole of your other 15,000 contacts and that you can never find again
  33. The Chair of the Federal Reserve
  34. Agents who are talking about the 2:1 buydown or 3:2:1 buydown or who are saying, “Buy vs. rent because you’re paying someone else’s mortgage”
  35. The real estate appraiser who comes in below purchase price
  36. Agents who haven’t done their business plan for 2023 at the time of this article 
  37. People who list a house that smells like cat pee
  38. Someone whose favorite phrase is “That’s a write-off.”
  39. The real estate agent who goes radio silent because they don’t know what to tell their client
  40. Sellers who demand to overprice their home and then won’t drop the price because they “don’t need to sell.”
  41. Listing agents who take overpriced listings with no plan to get them sold
  42. That agent who waits until the last day to start their CE and renew their license
  43. The agent who answers their phone while they’re sitting on the toilet
  44. The Airbnb owner who charges a $500 cleaning fee and still makes you wash all the linen, take out the garbage and vacuum the carpet on your way out the door
  45. The 50-year-old agent who is still using a headshot from when they turned 21
  46. The agent who doesn’t disclose problems on any property ever and doesn’t properly advise their clients regarding disclosure
  47. The agent who gets a client’s hopes up with assurances they’re in no position to offer
  48. The full-time agents who bully newbie part-time agents because “if they’re not going full-time, they don’t belong in the business.”
  49. The male agents who assume every female agent is just selling real estate for mad money and not to make a living
  50. The agents and brokers of all types who see each other only as competition, losing sight of all of the ways we could help, support, and cooperate with each other to make the industry better, more respected and more highly regarded

Were you naughty or nice this year? What did you see happening that needs to be called out? Let us know on IG (but no names, please. Let’s keep it classy)!