I grew up in Culpeper, Virginia, just north of Charlottesville … before it became a bedroom community for Northern Virginia. My dad was and is a commercial real estate broker there; I remember when I was a kid Dad would joke with me – and say, “they know who I am …” and every single time, they did. He built his reputation and business on knowing people and being good to them.

Charlottesville is much the same way – we’ve grown since I was a kid, but we’re a very small town, made smaller by social media and our collective desire to communicate and interact.

We’ve always lived by small town rules; building a real estate business has always been about small town rules. This new world allows for small town rules to integrate and interact with social media rules – and the overlap between the two is tremendous.

– Reputation matters.

– The Golden Rule, while not often explicitly acknowledged, is practiced more often than not.

– Giving back counts.

– Seeing people is easy; knowing people takes work.

Nothing groundbreaking here, but a reminder to be nice.