70, Today!

This really is a milestone. In about five minutes, I'll be 70 years old, and this month also completes 38 years in Real Estate sales for me. So much has happened...both in my life and in the real estate market since I came to Sunnyvale in 1967.
Some of the biggest changes have been in the technology we use in marketing homes. We went from checking out new homes on the market by driving to the local board of Realtors office and looking at a hand written list every week, then bi-weekly It was followed by "the book" with a single black and white picture of the house. Before electronic keysafes, we all accessed a keybox with identical keys. If an agent lost his or her key, the whole system had to be rekeyed.
Then came computers, printers with rows of holes on each side of the paper, and fax machines. No more driving to deliver each document that was needed for the sale or escrow...but as the ease of delivery has increased, the number of papers has increased proportionally.
Now a cell phone can pull up a series of color pictures of a house in seconds. We can lock out a lost or stolen key, and signatures are becoming electronic. No matter what changes come in the future, one thing will never change.
We will still need caring and professional Realtors to manage the legal and emotional sides of selling a home.
I can't wait to see what the next few years have in store, for the business...and for me!