Just when you think you’ve heard every Realtor’s story about this-lockbox or that-lockbox, something entirely new makes its presence felt.

Lockbox stories are like golf stories.  Heard one, heard them all.

“I was in the fairway rough, okay, and I was going to hit 8-iron but I went with 9-iron, and I really smacked the ball, y’know, and you should have seen the height on this thing…”

Same story, just change the yardage, club, result, and find a different way to phrase “greatest shot ever.”

Those of us that work in the real estate industry have heard every lockbox story there is to tell.

Either you went to the dreaded “wall” at 75 East Liberty Street, where there are 150-200 lockboxes, and your instructions merely said “Lockbox On Wall, Code 1975,” or you found a frozen lockbox in the winter, or you got locked out of the building.

But try this one on for size…

I had a listing earlier this fall for a “luxury” condo, and a cold-caller to whom I had already shown the unit wanted to return with his fiancée and their parents.

Sounds legit, right?

This was a Friday night and the young buyer had a very short window to see the unit with all the adjoining parties, but we found a time to make it work.

I showed up a little early and went into the storage room to get the key from the lockbox, but when I opened it up, there was no key inside.

As I’ve told you before many times, this is unfortunately quite common.  Agents walk off with the key in their back pocket, and once you call three or four agents and all of them say, “It wasn’t me,” the key magically re-appears later that day.

In this case, there was only one agent who had shown the condo since I was at the property last.

I called her, and naturally she said, “I put the key back.”

I know her somewhat well, and we have a rapport.  So I asked her nicely, “Can you please, please think for a moment?  Try and visualize the lockboxes, think back to when you entered the storage room, picture the row of boxes, and remember if you put the key in the black lockbox on the bottom row with the Toronto Realty Blog logo on the front?”

She visualized.  She pictured.  She thought.

And she remembered.

“I put the key in an open lockbox on the top row.  It was black, with no markings on it.  David, I’m so, so sorry…”

At least she admitted it, right?

“I’m at the Eaton Centre right now so I can’t help,” she said, “But I live in the building, and I have a hammer in my drawer in the front hall.  I can ask concierge to open the unit and you can get the hammer and try to smash the box open.”

That wasn’t going to work, and time was of the essence.  The buyer and his harem were waiting upstairs.

I went and gave them the bad news, and they were not happy.  Not understanding, and not willing to accept that something like this should happen in 2019.  Frankly, I don’t blame them.

The concierge wouldn’t open the door without written authorization from the sellers, and while one seller was unreachable, the other was on a plane.

I tucked my tail between my legs, and drove home.

As soon as I pulled into the driveway, my client called me from the airport.

I told him what had happened, and he was able to call concierge and authorize us to get in.

The buyer and his family were already out of the building, heading to dinner, but I pleaded with them to return for the viewing.

They returned, they loved the unit, and they ended up buying it.

There; I glossed over the ending, but that’s not really the story here, today.

What became of the lockbox?

Well, that night, the agent who had locked the key in the wrong lockbox had returned with a friend, and a hammer, and bashed some other agent’s lockbox all to hell.  Try as they did, they weren’t able to open the box.  They merely beat it up.

For those of you wondering, it’s not like we could have called the other agent, in who’s lockbox our key remained trapped, to ask for the code.  That lockbox had no identifiers on it, which unfortunately, is very common.

Here’s the lockbox area for this building:

I’m holding my lockbox there in the bottom of the frame, which has the red-and-white “TRB” logo, but it also has my business card taped to the back.

The lockbox where the agent had mistakenly placed my key is fourth from the right, on the top row.

I’ve taken to including a photo of the lockbox and lockbox location with many of my listings now, to ensure people don’t get lost in the woods trying to find the box, and then starve to death…

Later that Friday night, once my daughter had gone to bed, I returned to the property with my hammer, which was as solid a piece of steel you’ll ever find on this earth.  After the very first swing, I realized just how pointless this was.  I smacked the box again a dozen times or so, but with those boxes hanging there, you don’t get the contact you need.

I left, and went home and drowned my sorrows in Crown Royal.

The condo was sold, so all was not lost.  But the sellers wanted their key and FOB back, and we kept telling them, “Don’t worry, it’s all good,” while they remained concerned about security, and rightfully so.

I asked my colleague Chris, “Why don’t we just go over there with a pair of bolt-cutters and snap the damn thing off?”

A discussion ensued about whether or not a concierge would allow two people to walk through the lobby with goddam bolt-cutters like it’s nobody’s business, but we had nothing to lose.

So here’s a question: would you be concerned if the concierge in your building simply allowed a person into the lobby with 3-feet-long bolt-cutters?

I can tell you, honestly, I had absolutely zero problem getting in, and doing this:

Somebody here in the office just said, “You look four feet tall.”

Then somebody else said, “Why did it take so much effort to cut that box off?”

Then the floodgates opened, and I heard comments about my baggy pants and out-of-date suits, and lack of an “adult haircut.”

The vertical footage isn’t my fault though, I wasn’t the one filming, but I digress…

Now once we had the lockbox off the rack (which the concierge had no issue with us taking out past front desk, along with the bolt-cutters…) it was a matter of how to get the box open.

Smashing the lockbox with the hammer did not work, surprisingly.  The box just kept jumping up off the pavement.

Then I remembered a scene from “Animal Kingdom,” and I’m referring to the TV show about the crime family in Los Angeles, not the show about actual animals.

Remember when the boys stole a massive safe, and they couldn’t get it open?

Jay, who is the brain-child teenager, said that they had to drop the safe from up high, and while I can’t really recall the mechanics behind it (something about the tumblers…), the boys hoisted the safe up with a crane, let ‘er rip, and the safe opened with ease.

So here’s what I did:

Ignoring my maniacal laugh, and the fact that this suit really is way too baggy, the lockbox opened – on about the seventeenth throw.

Who said that you can’t learn from watching shows on TNT?

Happy Friday, folks!