It would be easy to say that Gennady (Gary) Papirov of Homes R Us is a great realtor, very…read moreprofessional and did an outstanding job for us, but that just would not be enough.
This is a story about family and friends and deserves to be told. So, please indulge me and read on.
My sister and I grew up in a two-family house with our parents and cousins in South Brooklyn/Park Slope in the 1950's and 1960's. We were and still are a very close family.
Careers happen and my sister moved to Los Angeles in 1978 and I in 1980.
After our mother passed away in 1993, our dad would go back and forth between his house in Brooklyn where he lived with his nieces (our cousins) and Los Angeles with us. He passed away in September of 2021 in Los Angeles at my sister's house.
Years before, he had set up a Living Trust for his house and had two wishes. First, to be buried with our mother and second, to sell the house when he passed so the money could go to us and our cousins. No problem, dad. We got you covered. Right?
Yes, but now we needed a lawyer to execute the trust and represent us in the sale of a house, that had been in our family since 1955, as well as a realtor. None of us knew any lawyers or realtors in any of the five boroughs.
Lucky for us, I had a good friend from grammar school who was a financial planner. He and I had stayed in touch over the years and he lived in Staten Island.
He highly recommended a lawyer, and he and the lawyer highly recommended Gennady (Gary) Papirov of Homes R Us to be our realtor.
Boy, oh boy, talk about hitting the Daily Double. Our dad loved to gamble and definitely would have appreciated the reference.
Our dad was a few months shy of his 93rd birthday when he passed. He had a good life and died peacefully in his sleep. That's the good news.
The not so good news is that because of Covid, he hadn't been back to Brooklyn since his last trip in 2019, and our cousins were extremely sad that they hadn't seen him since that time.
Needless to say, that brought up a lot of mixed feelings around selling the house. Not that any of us were in any disagreement about fulfilling his wishes. It's just that 66 years holds a lot of memories and it was very difficult emotionally for all of us, especially our cousins who lived in the house with him and our mother longer than my sister and me.
Gary Papirov was definitely the right person to be our realtor on so many levels. Yes, he is very professional, smart and honest, but this situation called for so much more.
First of all, Gary lives in Staten Island and that is where Homes R Us is located, and although he also works in Brooklyn, he felt that he needed to work with a realtor in Brooklyn who he had done business with before, Albert Benzaken, and was very familiar with our area, so our cousins could feel comfortable knowing that there was someone in the neighborhood, so to speak, that they could call on if any questions came up.
Truth be told, Gary could have easily taken care of our dad's house on his own with no problem and collected the entire commission for himself, but he knew that our cousins, who were all working out of the house due to Covid, needed emotional support around the scheduling to potential buyers, as well as making them feel that this was not all about the money.
And another thing. There was a possibility that if our cousins could not find new homes of their own in time for the scheduling of the showings, we were going to postpone the sale.
Gary never once pushed the issue. He and Albert just made sure that everyone felt at ease and never pressured.
In the end, everything went well and we can't thank Gary enough for putting together a great team.
When my sister and I flew back to New York in the summer to bury our dad and have a celebration of his life, everything was going well and everyone was very happy with Gary and Albert.
In fact, we all got together one evening with the team and their wives for a wonderful dinner together. We broke break as friends and by the end of the evening we were a big family.
Thanks Gary.