I was showing a new client into my office the other day when she remarked on how lovely and off-the-beaten-path it was, and then asked how I found it. I related how I had first come into the area to look at an office across the way that was up a steep, long flight of stairs, but I decided against it, "because so many of my clients' down payments are provided by their parents, so I wanted to be sure I had a ground-floor office that their parents can get into!"

That got me to thinking -- my clients' parents had a pretty major impact on my choice of office location, but they often play an even more significant role in their adult children's real estate transactions -- sometimes intentionally, other times totally unwittingly.  more...