25 Things You Don’t Know About Me That Maybe You Should
You may not realize it, but when you hire a Realtor to help you buy or sell your home, you’re going to be spending a considerable amount of time with that person; certainly weeks, possibly months.
Before you sign on the dotted line and let some random Realtor into your life it’s a good idea to do some research. My guess is you’d like to know beforehand, whether the Realtor you’re considering is really a Gone-Girl-Tinfoil-Hat-Wearing-Whack-a-Doodle.
To help you find a level of comfort should you decide you’d like to hire me, I came up with a list of 25 things most people don’t know about Dave Meir. Keeping in mind of course I’m a Realtor – so by nature at least a little bit crazy.
- I was born and raised in LaCrosse, Wisconsin – I’m a Packer fan. (Might as well get the important stuff out of the way right now.)
- Over the years my entire immediate family – two sisters and a brother and our parents – migrated to Rochester.
- In junior high school I had aspirations of becoming a doctor and assisted during experimental kidney surgery on a dog. (My Mom was on our church council with the head of surgery at Lutheran Hospital in LaCrosse.)
- Not long after graduating from high school I became a meat cutter in a grocery store. Kinda the same thing as a doctor;-)
- I was fired from my job as a meat market manager for spending too much time building my (first) real estate career.
- I played (at) the piano and cello in my younger years. (And maybe Mom, if you’d have let me wear jeans and not made me carry my cello on a bus full of high school kids – when I was in 5th grade – I might still play the cello and not be permanently emotionally scarred from the experience.;-)
- I went to seven different elementary schools in six years. I lived in the same house all through childhood but the bus route kept changing.
- After graduating from high school I moved to Cordova, Alaska for four months. (Until I got homesick and moved back.)
- My family drove VW bugs when I was a kid. We had a yellow Bug when we were first married.
- Kathy (Kastenschmidt) and I have been married – to each other – since 1978.
- Kathy and I have an amazing son, a wonderful daughter in-law and two amazingly wonderful granddaughters.
- I’ve never, ever, ever met a dog I didn’t like. Ours is named Lucy – a slightly spoiled Bichon Frise.
- In the mid-1980’s I became a Certified Level 1 Wisconsin Property Assessor. My Dad was a city assessor in LaCrosse and on weekends had a side gig assessing the Town of Galesville. I helped him in Galesville for a couple years.
- I continued my real estate appraisal education and in 1990 earned the SRA – Senior Residential Appraiser – designation.
- In 1990 I struck out on my own and started Meir Appraisal Service.
- I started d. holmes meir studios in 1993. Kathy and I ran both the appraisal business and the photography business for a few years until we got too busy with photography.
- The mid-2000’s economic meltdown and digital photography becoming mainstream combined to wreak havoc on d. holmes meir studios. We fizzled and faltered for a couple of years and finally closed the studio.
- Mid-meltdown I created The Portrait Expert, an Internet based photography education website to help the new-now-coming-out-of-the-woodwork (digital) photographers get their businesses off the ground. Membership grew to more than 4000 photographers worldwide.
- Closing my photography studio and my Internet business were without question the two most emotionally draining challenges of my life. I identified myself – and was identified as – a photographer.
- For a time I sold private jet charter and played a part in the sale of two private jets. Since flying isn’t one of my favorite things I decided maybe – the incredibly niche market of private jet charter sales – just wasn’t for me;-)
- I started my second real estate career as a Zoning Administrator for the Township Cooperative Planning Association.
- I have the first draft of a murder mystery in a box, in a cabinet, in my basement – where it’s been for ten years. Mason Rivers – ex-forensic photographer – finds a murdered bridesmaid while photographing a wedding at the Plummer House.
- Besides pretty much anything my wife makes, my favorite food is barbequed ribs on the Big Green Egg.
- My favorite authors are Robert Parker who wrote the Spenser for Hire books and Lee Child who writes the Jack Reacher series.
- I enjoy most any kind of music; Lady Gaga to Garth Brooks to Rammstein. Before I die I need to see Prince in concert.
So there you have it; 25 trivial tidbits about a random stranger you may (or now for sure will not;-) hire to help you buy or sell your home.
If you have questions please don’t hesitate to call, text or email. And if you ask nice, I might even let you try on my tinfoil hat.
