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Our mission as
RESAA is to
prevent the nationwide trend of violent acts against real estate
professionals from becoming a local reality by raising awareness about the
need for personal safety strategies and teaching self-defense
techniques.
We are dedicated to your
ensuring your success by empowering you with self-confidence.
Crimes Against Real Estate Agents in the News
Stories
like the ones below depict only a few of the crimes committed
against Real Estate Professionals nationwide!
Click on title for a link to the
story.
MORE >>
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Real Estate Professionals are at Risk!
Statistics you've hear on such crimes can sometimes be contradictory, but information from
the National Institute of Safety & Health indicates that 227 agents were murdered between
1990 and 2001 and 196 were victims of non-fatal violent crimes between
1993 and 2001.
21 Realtors
were murdered nationwide in the year 2000 alone, according to
a survey by the Washington Association of Realtors!
Maybe it’s
easy to shrug that off and say, “It was a one time occurrence,” or, “That
was in a different town, I’m safe where I work.”
But before you do, I
would encourage you to please keep reading ...
CAUTION! These are alarming
events but we use them to illustrate the importance of taking the proper
precautions for safety in your profession.
Yet another Agent; In another
town - The story you might not have heard was
that of a 40 year old a real estate agent in Dallas, Texas and
mother of a 3 year old child,
Sarah Walker, who was brutally murdered - stabbed 27 times -
during an open house in July 2006. She was robbed of her jewelry and Rolex
watch. This agent was working at a display home for a new subdivision in a
suburb. She could have easily been another face in the office you work out
of. When police apprehended her killer, it was because another real estate
agent had recognized him from the police drawing. Apparently the killer
had entered the second agent’s open house but became nervous when he saw a
dog. Because of this, it is speculated that he was targeting real estate
agents.
Another
isolated incident? Hardly - On August 23,
2006 a New Castle, PA man showed up at a vacant home for sale, saw the
door was open, called to the agent and then walked in.
The agent was
then robbed at
knife point. The attackers were neighbors who had broken into the home to
smoke crack in an upstairs bedroom.
On August 6th, 2006 it was a Kansas City
agent who was kidnapped and
robbed at gun point. The agent went off to meet a man who had
contacted her about buying a home. After showing the man several
homes, he pulled a gun on her and forced her to drive to several banks to
withdraw money. The robber even called the agent a few days later
demanding more money.
On June 23, 2006 a Napa, CA agent received a call from someone wanting to
see a new construction vacant listing. When the agent arrived she
walked through the home turning on the lights. As soon as she
entered the kitchen, a man in a ski mask entered the front door and
assaulted her.
Four days earlier on June 19, 2006 in Hattiesburg, MS, a gunman posing as
a homebuyer shot a 70 year old Prudential agent four times then killed the
homeowner and her nephew. It was believed he was using the agent to
gain access to the home so he could kill the owner whom he had had a
previous run in with.
Within 11 days in May, 2006
three female real estate agents in the Atlanta
area were tied up, robbed and had their cars stolen. All were
responding to phone calls to see homes.
In March 2006 there were two separate and unrelated incidents in Florida;
One was an
agent who was
attacked with a hammer by a man posing as
a buyer and the other was an agent held up at gun point.
And these are just from the past 6 months!
The list of crimes against real estate agents goes on and on. The
North Carolina Association of REALTORS produced a pamphlet that gives
additional stories of agents killed on listing calls or raped after their
attackers picked their photo out of a real estate magazine. It also
provides these chilling statistics:
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21 real estate
professionals were murdered on the job in the United States in
2000.
Between 1982
and 2000, 206 agents died as a result of violent assaults.
An
average of 126 violent acts per year - rape, assault and robbery -
are committed against real estate professionals.
(National Institute for Occupational Safety &
Health)
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"Safety
First... Sales Second."
No Sale is
Worth Your Life!
We
don't want to panic anyone or recommend that you never leave the office.
The point here is that many don't take enough time to think about
security when doing an open house (or showing homes for that matter)
because they're too busy trying to be sales people. Unfortunately,
male agent or female agent, good neighborhood or bad, you have all
advertised in the newspaper, on the internet and on signs outside the home
what time you will be alone in a strange home that may or may not have
working telephone service, with the front door standing wide open.
Real estate agents are also guilty of advertising EVERYWHERE how
successful they are - which only fuels the illusion to criminals that all
agents are wealthy.
Also, to think that safety has something to do with the neighborhood you
are in is a bad assumption. Most of the stories quoted above talk
about how the criminal picked the agent or picked a random empty house to
commit their crimes - the neighborhoods the crimes actually happened in
were irrelevant. Expensive homes on large lots in the suburbs may
offer the seclusion a criminal might prefer over row
homes in the city where neighbors might be close by.
Finally, many of the stories
mentioned talk about how the agent found nothing unusual about the
criminal prior to the attack - including one where the assailant posed as
a nicely dressed DEA Agent - and even followed the real estate agent back
to her office to discuss financing before going out to look at an empty
house for a second time to, “take room measurements prior to writing a
contract.” That’s when she was robbed.
What proactive measures should I take to better protect myself?
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