I was mentoring an aspiring real estate investor—door-knocking in a decent west Denver neighborhood.  We were prospecting for leads—home sellers, future buyers, whatever.  We knocked one door and an angry young dude stepped out.

“Good morning,” I said.  “I’m Tom and this is Rich.”  My mentee nodded.

“We’re always on the hunt for potential home sellers.  So we’re wondering, do you know anyone who might be thinking about selling.”

The dude was disgusted.  “No,” he said.  “We don’t even like guys like you in this neighborhood.”

That was all we needed to hear.   I thanked him and we hustled down the steps.

“Guys like you” no doubt was a reference to real estate investors—of any stripe, size, race, creed, or color.  In the minds of many, investors are predatory opportunists, responsible for high home prices and unwelcome gentrification in their neighborhoods.

That house was our last planned stop, so we climbed into my car.  I looked up and there was Angry Dude.  He had followed us down the steps and he was snapping photos of my car and its front license plate.

I don’t have the space here to defend real estate investors.  They occupy all disciplines: buy-and-hold landlords, flippers, wholesalers, and scrape-and-replace developers.  To condemn them as all bad is just plain stupid in my book.

I’m not sure of his intention in recording my auto tag number.   Most likely it was to use in social media rant of some sort.  I decided to make it easy for him.

As we pulled out past him, I lowered my window and handed him a business card.

“Just spell the name correctly,” I said.

I don’t know if he ever posted anything.  If so, I hope he spelled the name correctly.