

It isn’t like this lifetime commitment, like one you would make in a fairy tale.” MV Realty under fireĪs firms look to modernize and revamp the way we buy and sell homes, some companies have turned to cash incentives and right to list agreements to generate new business. “If the home doesn’t sell, then you can renew or go with someone else. “The way business is done today, somebody will sign a listing agreement and it is good for a certain number of months - it might be four, it might be six, it just depends on the market,” Ken Trepeta, the executive director of the Real Estate Services Providers Council, said. But just like “Rumpelstiltskin,” there is a catch: You have to sign an agreement saying the firm has the right to list your home if you choose to sell it in the next 40 years.

Imagine you are a homeowner in need of a little extra cash, say somewhere in the ballpark of $300-$5,000, and you come across a website that claims it can give you the cash you need without a loan. While the tale ends happily with the miller’s daughter (who goes on to marry the king and become queen) keeping her first-born child, she learns that there is always a price to pay. But in return she must give him her first-born child. The miller’s daughter tries in vain to spin the straw into gold, but just as she gives up hope, an imp-like man appears in the room and agrees to help the fair maiden out by spinning the straw for her. The king then summons the miller’s daughter and locks her in a tower room filled with straw and a spinning wheel with the ultimatum that if all the straw is not turned to gold by morning, he will have her killed. If it has been a minute since you have read the 19th century German fable, here is a quick refresh: A miller brags to the king that his daughter can spin straw into gold.

As the saying goes, “there is no such thing as a free lunch.” It’s one of the main takeaways from the classic Brothers Grimm fairy tale, “Rumpelstiltskin.”
