Michael Powell-RE/MAX Real Estate Services

I used Mike Powell as my Real Estate Agent in 2012. He had literally begged me for YEARS to let him be the one to list my home. Once I did, he pawned my listing off on his inexperienced apprentice. I had to say something to him about begging for my listing, before he would even come put his name on my «For Sale» sign.
Mike Powell never did any advertising of my home in the Sunday newspaper, Facebook or the Real Estate Book. His apprentice took some poor quality pictures of my home, and I say they were poor quality because she didn’t let the lightbulbs light up all the way before taking her photos so the walls in my home appeared to be a light green instead of a neutral beige color. She did however upload these pictures and listing of my home into the MLS and that’s the only advertisement my home received.
Being that I was handicapped and was at the time raising my two kids (ages 2 and 12) alone due to my husband working in another state, I set it up with Mike I needed a minimum of 2 hours prior notification of any showings of the house, so I had time to pick up after my girls. Mike went ahead and was generous and put into the system 4 hours min notification, because he was aware of my disability.
However, 3 days after coming home from emergency gall bladder surgery in which I was hospitalized for 4 days with a drain tube from a serious infection, Mike called wanting me to show my house in 30 minutes! I could barely get off the couch due to the incision sites still not being healed, (much less was I supposed to be running around frantically picking up toys after a 2 year old and sure wasn’t to be lifting her into her car seat) and out the door within 20 minutes! Not only that, but the lady never showed up and Mike didn’t have the decency to call me and tell me I could go home. I had to hang out at my mother-in-law’s for hours until I guessed the coast was clear to return home. Then that same afternoon after picking up my middle schooler, Mike calls back and says, «She wants to look at the house again, in 30 minutes.» We weren’t even home yet as we were at the gas station. So that meant I had to rush home and my oldest daughter and I frantically clean and get out of the house again! That’s when Mike then informed me the lady never even bothered to show up that morning. I was so angry that I had a 4 hour min showing notification set and my own agent is calling requesting me to jump through hoops, just 3 days after getting home from the hospital when I can barely move, being handicapped on top of that, and then he pipes up and says, «But you know you need to show your house because you need to sale it.» Here he was laying the guilt trip on me for not wanting to show it in 30 minutes, never mind the pain it put me through.
I did let them see the house, but I talked to my husband that evening and we decided that since my own agent couldn’t respect me enough to give me at least the 2 hours I needed just for being handicapped, much less now that I had to have an emergency surgery on top of that, it was best we take our house off the market until my husband came home.
We have been friends with Mike, so we thought, for many many years, and I still sent him referral after referral every time someone said they were looking to buy a house or needed to sale their house. But when it came time to put our house up for sale again in 2015, my husband and I feared if we went with Mike, the same thing would happen again that happened the first time and we were under a time crunch to get our house sold this time so we went with another Real Estate Agent. This other agent had 4 showings booked for our house before pictures were even loaded into the MLS, on the first day our house hit the MLS listing. We had advertisement on the MLS, the Sunday paper, the Real Estate Book and FB. We had 22 showings the first week, 2 offers on the same day 2 weeks later and accepted one of those offers 2 weeks and 2 days after our listing went up.
When Mike found out we used another agent the second time, he ended his long time friendship with us. That’s the way Mike is, he can’t separate friendship from business. Yes, he knows tons of people, but he doesn’t consider those people his «friends», they are «contacts». With Mike Powell, once he sees that you are of no «financial gain» or not a «financial business contact to benefit him» he will get rid of you.
I have heard from many people in the Real Estate business when I hired him, «Why did you hire him? You know he isn’t very well liked.» But at that time I really didn’t care, because I thought we were friends. Now that I truly see how he operates, and how he treats people, I see why that was said to me so often and why he has been either terminated from jobs or worked at so many places. I do have to say, we are very pleased with the choice we made the second time. We got the results we needed!