One of my favorite aspects of my career as a real estate agent, is to be able to say Welcome Home. 

The word Welcome is so powerful. According the Mark Twain quote 

“A kindly courtesy does at least save one’s feelings, even if it is not professing to stand for a welcome.”

So a welcome is far beyond a courtesy.  

It makes us think of hospitality. Whose job is it to welcome and be welcoming? Those in hospitality.  It involves making others feel at home. 

It involves a relation between a host and a guest. 

“When I offer hospitality, something amazing happens–so much more than I have anything to do with. An exchange takes place. Our guests bring who they are with them and enlarge our lives in their offerings.”
― Janice Peterson, Becoming Gertrude: How Our Friendships Shape Our Faith

Welcome can mean finding a place to stay, but its also a feeling.  Mary and Joseph, they couldn’t find any places at any inns.

but they still found warmth, generosity, and friendship. 

One of my favorite traditions is that of setting an extra place at the table for the unexpected guest. 

Welcoming someone into the home also involves dinner many times and dinner can be quite magical. 

Madeline L’Engel claims “There is nothing that makes me happier than sitting around the dinner table and talking until the candles burned down.” 

Or Samuel Pepys thought that “Strangle to see how a good dinner and feasting reconciles everybody.”  

How does it feel to be welcomed home?  Well you’d be past the anxiety of financing, the appraisal, the offer, the inspection– to a different place. Of not needing to worry if it will become yours because it has. 

Being a real estate agent is hospitality adjacent, because our goal is to provide a client experience that helps one feel welcome to buy or sell a home. 

The hospitality industry is a heartbeat of our area.  In seeking to understand how to communicate the feeling of welcome, I’m reading The New Gold Standard: 5 Leadership Principles for Creating a Legendary Customer Experience Courtesy of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company. 

and 

Setting the Table: the transforming power of hospitality in business. 

I welcome people to the Roaring Fork Valley and Western Slope with my informative travel guide, Western Slope Adventures. 

I also welcome renters to homes I manage for landlords with LauraConnorPropertyMgmt.com

I welcome home buyers to engage my services as a buyer’s agent to find the best possible home for them in the market of the moment.  A place a buyer can make their home and in turn, extend their hospitality and make others feel welcome.

If you want to go through the process of welcoming yourself home, I can help.  Fill out my buyer questionnaire, and I’ll set you up to be emailed listings you might like, as well as lender options. 

For songs of welcome, I chose the Oak Ridge Boys, Come on In, and this amazing cover of Bob Dylan’s Shelter from the Storm.