With age comes a measure of wisdom; forget all the things you would have done with hindsight but utilise those moments as learning, to hopefully not repeat mistakes and to capitalise on new opportunities that arise.

We have accumulated masses of information, which over time becomes invaluable. Add to that, experience of 20 years in banking, 10 years of local police authority administration, 20 years of running businesses dealing directly with the public and over 10 years in the property business and it gels into a deep base of customer awareness, product knowledge and administration processes.

However, common sense has always been instilled in us and that keeps us sane and our feet firmly on the ground. We don’t know everything, there are areas where we rely on other experts and we expect the best from those people to meet the standards we set ourselves.

In our day we have had a client say, “I never thought buying a property could be so much fun”, it can be it doesn’t have to be filled with angst and stress.

Our greatest compliment came from an elderly gentleman, himself a long time business man, who said, “Forget the property, and market you”.

We all need a self esteem boost and we are grateful in that we have been mostly lucky with people we have met. However, we all make occasional mistakes but it is how you deal with and rectify them that will be remembered. Therefore communication is the greatest healer, no matter what, always speak to people, never shrink from the responsibility and they never feel deserted.

In anyone’s vocabulary the words “Estate agent” stink! The pariah effect is often unjust, especially in Spain where we have found companies giving an exemplary service whilst not charging the earth.

When we first came to Spain we made lots of mistakes and received no help from the very people who sold us a property, said a lot, made promises but delivered nothing. We came into the business because we wanted to do things in a better way by giving a service that meant clients actually said that we had done a good job and felt safe in recommending us to others.

Honesty and reliability in everything we did and we feel that we have achieved it to a great extent. When an old client phones to see how you are, we feel rewarded and respected and the latter is hard to earn but we wouldn’t have it any other way.

Loyalty and trust are the other factors which are the mainstay of any business or partnership and being sure that you work as a team to give advice to the best of your ability and now if we don’t know it ourselves, we have people who we trust to give us the right information, which we now gladly pass on to those waiting to start their new adventures.

Jo & Thelma