In December 2010, my partner visited a B&Q store to buy a clothes rail for the wardrobe – all the ones in stock were longer than what she needed. When she requested for the sales assistant to look into shortening the rail for her, he responded that had no idea how it could be done. She recalled seeing her father use a junior hack saw to cut steel when she was a little girl. Therefore, she requested the assistant to direct her to the aisle where she could find a junior hack saw. This is very typical of the experience most shoppers have when interacting with retail employees.

The Guardian wrote an article entitled “Electrical goods store staff ‘lack basic knowledge.’” The article told the story of an undercover investigator from Which?, the consumer organisation, who conducted covert sting operations on retail staff working for a handful of the UK’s largest retailers. The investigators determined many of those employees lacked the basic knowledge of the products they sold. Furthermore, those same employees provided completely inaccurate advice about the product’s functionalities. As it turned out, only 8 out of 154 stores investigated earned an excellent rating – and none of the famous high street names were amongst those eight.

Sales professionals of all ages would rather hit the streets to speak with potential clients than sit in a long seminar on sales technique. Managers and executives place a high premium on results but corporations want sales people to have the information needed to use intuition in a reasonable manner. Your experience with sales training sessions will go smoothly when you understand how your daily work and professional livelihood are influenced.

Before doing a short sale you should do some research and make sure it is the best avenue for you.  If you are facing foreclosure, short sale or deed in lieu, your credit will be impacted for the next couple of years.  Even if you are late 30 days or more on your mortgage one time, your credit score will drop on average about 60 points!  If you already have bad credit due to late mortgage payments, having a short sale or foreclosure report will not be the end of the world. However, you should consider the long term impact it is going to have to your credit profile.  Below are some common things you should be asking a realtor and thinking about before you list your home.

1) Realtor should be experienced in short sales