Ralph came out of the projects. He finished high school with some pretty impressive credentials. He had full scholarship offers from several universities. He was no miracle kid but for a guy who lived his whole life in assisted housing blocks with a poor single mom, you had to give him credit for not getting involved with crime or the drug trade or the many great misguided lives that seemed to evolve right outside the front door as he grew up.
 
Instead of using the scholarships, Ralph chose to find a job and make things better for his mom, who had sacrificed so much to get him through school with the right books, the right tutors and most importantly the right life choices.
 
Ralph worked hard but could not make enough to do that in the jobs that he found. After a few years, Ralph decided to work toward his real estate license. People had told him he was affable, easy with people, good with marketing figures and of honest character. He had all the attributes of a good salesperson. After a time Ralph got his license and began his career in real estate sales.
 
Ralph went to work for a good broker in the downtown core, the part of the city he knew best. From the get-go he struggled to find customers. He knew that many real estate agents began their careers through family or family connections to people interested in buying or selling their homes.
 
The trouble was he was so young that he had not made many contacts in his life so far and in Ralph’s background no one knew anyone who was connected to anyone who ever owned a house. Everybody he knew was poor. So Ralph tried hard to prospect from the office. It was not working well for him.
 
One day a woman with two small children came into the office distraught and upset. She was the victim of an abusive husband. She did not know where to go or who to turn to. No one in the office knew what to do with her. Except Ralph.
 
Ralph knew where the women’s shelter was. In fact, he knew the people who worked there by first name. His mom never had to turn there for help but many of his friends spent time at the shelter because their mothers had to. So Ralph took her there and her road to help began.

A few days later another woman came in and asked for Ralph. She was not in an abusive situation but she heard about the woman that Ralph helped and wondered if he might help her find assisted housing. Ralph could not make that happen for her, but he knew where the office was to put in applications. He knew it well. He had spent some long hours there as a kid waiting and waiting with his mother for her turn to speak to one of the various bureaucrats that worked there. He got her there and got her started on the waiting list.
 
The next week a man came by who was down and out and asked if that fellow Ralph he heard about could help get him a place to stay. Ralph gave him subway fare, drew him a map and told him how to get to the men’s hostel.
 
Word spread and soon Ralph became known to those who were in need of help in the downtown area as the person to see for housing. All housing. They called him ‘Realtor Ralph’. Before long there was a write-up in the local paper about him and Ralph began fielding even more calls. “Can you help me find information on co-op housing, Ralph?” He had to research co-ops but he got the answers to the people who needed to know.
 
Ralph’s broker was delighted with the publicity his office was getting so he asked Ralph to teach the office staff and other agents the where and how of housing programs available that they did not know about.
 
It did not take long before Ralph received the inevitable calls, “Hello, I heard how you helped others find housing. I want to sell my house and list it with you” as well as, “I want to buy a house, I heard you were a good honest man, will you be my agent?”
 
Ralph had learned a great deal from the agents in his office but at the end of the day it was the rule his mom raised him by that made him successful. Do unto others…you know the one.
And by the way, Ralph was very successful. He bought a fine house for his mother. One of the best houses he could find. Downtown.
 
Heino Molls is publisher of REM. Email [email protected].

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