Realtor Profile

Name: Howard Richards

Company: Frankly Realty

Address: 124 B1 E. Broad St., Falls Church, VA 22046

Phone: 703/395-8003

Fax: 202/318-9197

E-mail: Howard@virginiasold.com

Web site: www.virginiasold.com

Year started: 2003

How did you get started in real estate? During one off-season, while playing for the Dallas Cowboys, a teammate and I decided take the real estate licensing course and exam to begin our transitions from one profession to another. We both passed the exam, but neither of us ever practiced real estate in Texas because our pro football obligation was too great. After retirement from the NFL, I worked for 13 years at the CIA in various capacities, including overseas, but left when I realized my career was going nowhere fast. Real estate was a natural choice for me because I had been involved from an investment side while in Texas, but the market wasn’t very good. I wanted to expand into residential sales and commercial development in Northern Virginia because the market was so incredibly strong. I also had a very good role model in the industry, Roger Staubach, who has proved that personal success is attainable if you work hard and do things the right way.

How long have you been with the current company? About a year

License: Virginia real estate sales

Associations: National Association of Realtors, Northern Virginia Association of Realtors

Awards: NVAR Multi-Million Dollar Sales Club, 2004

Greatest accomplishment in the past 12 months: Assisting two buyers who did not think they could purchase a home to buy their first property, and partnering with a mortgage consultant and real estate attorney to develop seminars for first-time home buyers and first-time investors.

What is your area of specialty? Northern Virginia

Highest-priced home sold: $810,000

Most memorable house: I represented a buyer last summer. Because we were submitting the first offer, I advised him to bid $5,000 higher than the seller’s asking price. I went to present the contract to the sellers and the listing agent, and after the presentation, the sellers decided that they wanted yet more money for the house than my client’s bid. The listing agent was shocked and exploded at the sellers because their greed truly caught him off guard and embarrassed him in front of me. The sellers were surprised that they had received such a strong offer after only one day on the market, so they made a last-minute decision to try to solicit higher bids for the house at the upcoming open house. After another hour of heated negotiations, we agreed on a price, slightly higher than my client’s original offer. The sellers promptly cancelled the open house and took the house off the market. The house did appraise over the sales price, and my client is very happy today because the houses in his neighborhood have appreciated about $70,000 in less than a year.

Worst experience: During settlement, the listing agent and her clients became irate and acted very unprofessionally when I presented noteworthy issues from the previous day’s walk-through. The agent and sellers were upset because we didn’t conduct the walk-through and bring the issues to their attention earlier. I explained that this was my client’s earliest opportunity to do the walk-through. The issues dealt with electrical and possibly plumbing. I was calm but firm with the selling side and stated that hopefully, the issue was only a minor problem, but if some latent defect were uncovered that the seller and agent had failed to disclose, they would be liable for the damages. As it turned out, there was no plumbing problem and the two electrical problems were minor enough that I handled them for my clients on my own.

Age: 45

Family: Divorced; one daughter

Pets: Two boxers

Education: Bachelor’s degree in communication, University of Missouri, 1988.

Community affiliations/community service: Member, NFL Retired Players Association; Big Brothers

Last book read: “Flipping Properties: Generate Instant Cash Profits in Real Estate,” by William Bronchick and Robert Dahlstrom

Last movie seen: “Ray”

What kind of car do you drive? Toyota 4Runner.

What is your personal dream house? Anything with four walls as long as it’s located on a warm, sandy beach with plenty of scuba diving and no threat of hurricanes.