A group of Bay State Realtors recently got a wake-up call about the diversity of the clients they will be working with in the future, as one real estate expert charged them with the task of adapting to the different cultures that make up the home-buying population.

Fred Southwell, a professional trainer with DeWolfe New England, addressed multicultural issues at the annual Massachusetts Association of Realtors convention in Falmouth last week.

Southwell said Realtors, as well as most people, have stereotypes about different ethnic groups of people that may adversely affect they way they conduct their business.

“If we really evaluate ourselves, we can’t help but see that we carry these stereotypes with us,” he said. “Even if we don’t realize, we have stereotypes of individuals.

“And it’s important to come to grips with the fact that we have the tendency to carry these stereotypes,” he added.

To illustrate the point that everyone harbors stereotypical views, he had the group of Realtors come up with descriptive words for a number of occupations. To exemplify the point that stereotypes hit close to home, he had each agent come up with descriptions of Realtors as well. While some words like “dedicated” and “organized” were used, there were several descriptions including “pushy,” “controlling,” “middle-aged woman,” and “wears flashy jewelry.”

Realtors will have to increasingly deal with people from cultures that they may not be familiar with because immigration figures for the United States are on the rise, and the immigrants will soon be looking to own homes, Southwell said.

“We have to look at what’s going on across the [United States],” he said, explaining that millions of immigrants have come in through the country’s gateway cities during the last decade. “Immigration is on the rise, and cultural interaction is on the rise.”

People typically think of the 1890s as the time in American history with the greatest immigration, Southwell said. However, figures for the 1990s are actually higher than they were a century ago, roughly 8.7 million people then versus 8.8 million people now.

In the past, he said, select East Coast and West Coast cities, along with some of the states in the Southwest, were the only markets that had to deal with conflicting cultures because of high immigration in those areas.

“By the time [the immigrants] got to the rest of the country, they were assimilated. That’s not true anymore,” Southwell said.

“What’s the impact of this on us as real estate agents? We’re going to be working with these people,” he continued, explaining that according to recent surveys, the importance of home ownership is higher among all immigrant populations than it is for the American public as a whole. Seventy-five percent of Mexican immigrants place a high priority on home ownership, as do 70 percent of South Americans, 65 percent of Hispanics and 67 percent of blacks. The figure for all Americans was 51 percent.

“It is unbelievable, the impact this is going to have on us as time goes on,” Southwell said. “Within the next six months to a year, everyone is going to be working with someone who is culturally different from them. Learning a second, third or fourth language might not be a bad idea.”

Problems could arise when working with a potential homebuyer with a different cultural background because practices that might be considered “normal” by an American real estate agent might be viewed as offensive by someone who was raised in a different part of the world.

Making direct eye contact with a client, patting someone on the back or shaking hands might not be something that client is used to, possibly prompting them to find another agent with whom they can better relate.

“If I’m unwilling to adjust the way I conduct business as time goes by, someone else is going to get their business, and I’m not going to be doing any business,” Southwell said.

“We all have external values and internal values, and we’re not going to change our own or anyone else’s,” he said. “But we have to recognize early on if we’re working with someone who brings a different set of values to the table and adjust accordingly.”

Understanding clients from a different culture goes beyond just learning different customs to make someone feel more comfortable, Southwell said. “You’re going to have to understand the different family sizes, backgrounds and housing preferences.

“The impact on the construction market will be great,” he continued. “People are going to have to rethink the way houses are built in order to accommodate these new buyers.”

Immigrants typically used to gravitate toward larger cities, he said. But today’s immigrant population with a middle-class income will relocate to suburban areas just as easily, so all residential markets will feel the effect of the immigrant homebuyer population.

‘Asleep at the Switch’
To try to prepare Realtors for the future, the National Association of Realtors recently added a new designation entitled At Home With Diversity, where Realtors must attend 12 hours of diversity training.

Locally, in addition to the diversity workshop at the annual convention, a number of regional associations in the state have hosted similar diversity training sessions in their areas, and the Greater Worcester Board of Realtors is planning an upcoming diversity training course.

Also, Southwell recommended reading a number of books written on the subject.

“I think we need to look at ourselves,” he said. “Sometimes that’s the most difficult thing we do. It’s something we seldom have the opportunity to do.”

While saying that many agents could benefit considerably from diversity training, Southwell said Realtors have been receptive to the idea of adapting once they became aware of the situation.

“I give high marks to the way Realtors have handled this,” he said. “I think they recognize that this makes good business sense.

“Workshops like these are designed to give people a taste of what’s out there, so they recognize what’s going on,” he said. “I think most of us have been asleep at the switch when it comes to immigration and the immigrant population’s ability to purchase housing.”