Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire - The Group of Seven

The Group of Seven

Well, I walked right into that one didn’t I? Now I have to tell you about the adventures of the engineer that brought him to his real estate affair. This is not really a deal that I was involved in, but it is worthwhile telling.

It seems that there were seven fellows, all professionals who wanted to have an upper class lifestyle. So they banded together and rented a place on Wellington Crescent in the older section of stately houses. Well, you’ve all heard the stories about young engineers. It seems that their parties were a little too energetic for the neighbors and the complaints against them got them booted out of the neighborhood.  Undaunted, they scoured around the area and darned if they didn’t come up with another address even more stately than the one they had been evicted from.

A place like that didn’t come cheap either. Very few people could afford to rent a place like that on their own but with a consortium it was possible. It had its economic benefits for the owner too. Almost everyone was happy and if one person left, another would take his place. Each person had his own bedroom or suite of rooms and the common area was by arrangement.

That’s how it was the night he invited us to his place after the annual Hunt Club Ball at the Canoe Club. He wanted to show us what life was like in the “upper class” I guess. So a few of us went over to see this lifestyle. I was the only one who knew he had bought the place in our neighborhood.

We gathered together at the front door, that being a giant verandah that swept across the front of the house in magnificent Tindal stone construction, and entered at the engineer’s invitation. Well! We had never seen anything like this except perhaps on television. It was indeed a grand entrance sweeping around in a semi circle and leading to two sets of stairs that led to the main floor reception area and what I assumed to be a ballroom or large public area. I looked around to see every one of our company’s mouths agape (as was mine I’m sure) at the sight that beheld them.

The engineer took us on a tour through the dining hall, the sitting room, the massive kitchen to the servants stairway, now unused, and back to the sitting room where we parked ourselves to comment on the evening and the elegant home of the engineer. He told the rest of the group that this elegant lifestyle was now marked off his to do list and he would be joining us in more subdued surroundings in the park area. He was looking forward to it.

Time passed and the engineer moved into his new digs, making a considerable number of changes to suit his lifestyle. He built a barn to house his two horses and generally settled in to life near the park.

Well this is about the end of the story of the engineer who settled in nicely and continued as an active member of the Hunt Club. He also came to my place fairly often to visit and we became good friends. I just wanted to relate the story to show how many things we as real estate agents do well to absorb and learn from.