Real estate market goes full retard

There's a townhouse for sale on Neeve Street in Guelph, a ten minute walk from the GO station.

It's on offer for a little under $700k. 

Neeve Street was one of the early addresses my folks had after they got off the boat. That was way before the GO station. It's in what they used to call "the Ward."

That was the heavily immigrant, mostly Italian part of town. That's the part of town where we landed.

Fifteen years after he got off that boat, my father had re-invented himself as a real-estate broker. I took a stab at following in his footsteps, but working for Dad wasn't going to happen.

But I do recall having a look at that townhouse on Neeve... when it was on offer for $19k.

Credentialism

Credentialism is the feeding trough of the upwardly mobile.

The Farm Manager, in her capacity as a Educational Assistant in her day job, today took a one day course that rendered her a "Behaviour Management Systems Practitioner."

What the fuck does that mean?

In practical terms, nothing.

But she gets a certificate she can hang on the wall.

When one of my mentors in the world of commercial real estate, Vic Tucciarone, got his real estate license back in the '50's, it involved a five dollar fee paid at the Government of Ontario offices, and that was that.

No courses, no nothing.

Today an aspiring realtor has to take multiple courses that take many months and cost many thousands of dollars.

Does anybody really think this has given us "better" real estate agents?

I had a college prof, Al Jeffries, who warned us about this credentialism racket. Keep your resume to one page, he told us over and over again. Anything above that reeks of credentialism.

Then somebody dug up a copy of his resume.

It ran to fourteen pages.

The takeaway?

Credentialism pays!

I remember sitting in my dear uncle Werner's office at the University of Waterloo and admiring the many certificates/degrees/diplomas festooning the walls.

Tucked in amongst them was a Province of Alberta fishing licence circa 1962.

At least he had a sense of humour...