ON THE RECORD: With Bob and Ed Watkins, brothers in real estate

Martin Swant | By Martin Swant |
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on October 17, 2010 at 9:01 AM
Bob and Ed Watkins.JPGView full sizeRealtors Ed, left, and Bob Watkins check out the features of a home for sale on Piedmont Drive in Helena, Ala., on Wednesday, Oct. 13, 2010. The two are brothers and have worked in realty for more than 40 years. (The Birmingham News / Michelle Campbell)

Bob Watkins and his brother Ed have been selling houses together in the Birmingham area for 40 years.

Their company, composed of the brothers, a nephew and a niece, has been in the same location at 1957 Hoover Ct. in Hoover for more than three decades. In that time Bob has seen the staff at Watkins Realty grow as large as 25 agents and shrink to the current number of four.

Bob, 79, became a Realtor soon after he finished active duty in the U.S. Army, at the age of 23. The first home he sold fetched $7,500. Ed, 82, sold his first home in 1968 for $6,000.

Today, they say they've never had any major problems working together, though Ed jokes that's because he's an independent contractor.

Bob founded the company in 1967. Over the years, he's sold a variety of properties, but his specialty now is foreclosures, a market the brothers got into about 20 years ago. That was long before it became the trend, he said.

Their nephew, Andy Watkins, says that's probably one of the reasons that Bob's company has survived so long.

"He's like Bear Bryant," said Andy, an agent at the firm. "He's used to adapting."

A few weeks ago, Ed received the Realtor Emeritus Award, given to him by the National Association of Realtors for 40 years in the profession. (Bob also holds the award.)

The brothers sat down in Bob's office to recall how they've seen the profession evolve from the age of rotary phones and typewriters to era of the Internet and GPS.

Q. How bad is the current market compared to previous crashes?

Bob: In my 56 years experience, I've never seen anything like it is today on prices. The prices are changing, you get offers, it's a completely differently way to sell houses from what it used to be because of this recession we're in.

Ed: Lots of people today owe more on the house than they can get for the house. (They're) underwater, way underwater.

Bob: We're selling some investment houses cheaper than you pay for an automobile. Cheaper than an automobile. It's unreal.

Q. Have the qualifications for a license changed from when you started?

Bob: You had to go to training classes. When you first got your license, all you had to do was have the money you needed to pay for one, and send it in every year and get it renewed. But they did have examinations at that time in 1954. You had to take a state test the same way you do today. But once you got your license you were set free, unless you made any violations.

Ed: But now everybody has to qualify every year.

Bob: I'll tell you one thing that has changed. when you qualified buyers in those days, if you filed a man that made $375 dollars a month, you knew you had a client that could buy a house. And if you found a man working for U.S. Steel, he usually made $475 and you could sell him a house for as high as $12,000. Back in those days, we were selling houses from $7,000 to $15,000.

Q. How have the housing markets changed?

Bob: When Jimmy Carter was president in 1980, the housing market nearly crashed. It was because of interest rates. Interest rates were as high as 21 percent. And you also had to pay a discount fee on top of the closing cost just to be able to make a loan. At that time the real estate market really went bad. Birmingham real estate board's Multiple Listing Service lost 1,100 members during that time

Of course after that things began to change -- the government changed, interest rates started down, then we had an influx of people that wanted to sell real estate, and we've had that for a long time up until three years ago when the real estate market started down.

Q. What do you think has surprised you the most over the last 40 years in the realty business?

Bob: The number of different subdivisions that we now that we did not have. The building industry has been phenomenal over the past 40 years. Fifty-six years ago, it was hard to find a new house in any subdivision. What has made this change is the interstates, where you can go from one location to another location very fast -- you didn't have all of that. If you had an office in the western side of town you lived on the western side because you couldn't travel like you can now.

And the style of houses has changed. Back in 1954, a small house was called a cracker box because they were small. Then we got into the ranch-type houses. Then we got into the split-level houses. We got into the split foyer houses. Now everybody wants a two-story house.

Q. When do you plan to quit selling houses?

Bob: I'll tell you something kind of funny: Of all my friends that I started out with -- most of them have either quit or died. I saw one of them the other day and he said "Bob, how long have you been doing this?" I said, "56 years." He said, "Man, when are you going to quit?" I said, "I'm planning on working 25 more years and then I'm going part-time, unless I start to work and I can't find the office, then I'm going home."

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