Official Review: The Fishy Side of Real Estate
Posted: 15 Feb 2013, 23:34
[Following is the official OnlineBookClub.org review of "The Fishy Side of Real Estate" by Mitch Vogel.]
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This book follows Miles Vincent, who starts off as a real estate agent for a large company, but decides to start his own real estate business after wrestling with the moral dilemmas of limited agency (where one agent works on behalf of both the buyer and seller of a property). As Mitch starts his new company he tries to get others in the industry to realize that the rules on limited agency need to be changed, but is ignored for the most part because most of the people only care that they are following the rules, no matter how unethical they are.
This novel is based on a true story, which surprised me a little, considering it follows Miles, the good guy, and most books in this style tend to follow the shady businessmen. Miles trying to get others in the real estate industry to admit that limited agency does lead to a conflict of interest makes for an interesting story, because most of them are trying to fool themselves into thinking it doesn't so they can get twice as much money on a deal by essentially not doing their job for the buyer and not feel guilty about it.
I really enjoyed the way this book was written, it took the subject of real estate, which is generally a very dry subject, and turned it into an interesting story. It was on the short side, coming in at only 120 pages long, but I felt it said everything it needed to and it didn't feel like it was skipping over or cutting parts short that would be interesting like some shorter books do.
My only complaint with this book is the fishing stories and references. Although they weren't to bad, they did feel out of place at times and would throw off the flow of the book. I felt they were added in to try and change the pace of the story and discuss something besides the real estate dealings, but I felt it would have been a stronger book without them.
Overall I give this book 4 out of 4 stars. It stays interesting throughout, and is actually an informative book about the practice of limited agency. Although I felt that a lot of the fishing stories didn't belong, they didn't take away enough from the book as a whole to make me dislike it, it was still well written and interesting throughout.
***
Buy "The Fishy Side of Real Estate" on Amazon
Buy "The Fishy Side of Real Estate" on Barnes and Noble
Share This Review
This novel is based on a true story, which surprised me a little, considering it follows Miles, the good guy, and most books in this style tend to follow the shady businessmen. Miles trying to get others in the real estate industry to admit that limited agency does lead to a conflict of interest makes for an interesting story, because most of them are trying to fool themselves into thinking it doesn't so they can get twice as much money on a deal by essentially not doing their job for the buyer and not feel guilty about it.
I really enjoyed the way this book was written, it took the subject of real estate, which is generally a very dry subject, and turned it into an interesting story. It was on the short side, coming in at only 120 pages long, but I felt it said everything it needed to and it didn't feel like it was skipping over or cutting parts short that would be interesting like some shorter books do.
My only complaint with this book is the fishing stories and references. Although they weren't to bad, they did feel out of place at times and would throw off the flow of the book. I felt they were added in to try and change the pace of the story and discuss something besides the real estate dealings, but I felt it would have been a stronger book without them.
Overall I give this book 4 out of 4 stars. It stays interesting throughout, and is actually an informative book about the practice of limited agency. Although I felt that a lot of the fishing stories didn't belong, they didn't take away enough from the book as a whole to make me dislike it, it was still well written and interesting throughout.
***
Buy "The Fishy Side of Real Estate" on Amazon
Buy "The Fishy Side of Real Estate" on Barnes and Noble