Why Smart Women Podcast
Welcome to the Why Smart Women Podcast, hosted by Annie McCubbin. We explore why women sometimes make the wrong choices and offer insightful guidance for better, informed decisions. Through engaging discussions, interviews, and real-life stories, we empower women to harness their intelligence, question their instincts, and navigate life's complexities with confidence. Join us each week to uncover the secrets of smarter decision-making and celebrate the brilliance of women everywhere.
Why Smart Women Podcast
You’re not buying an apartment. Your biases are buying it for you.
We unpack the psychology that makes property buying so risky and share the biases that almost had us purchasing a unit above a bong shop because of plantation shutters. We lay out simple steps to slow down your thinking, separate what can change from what cannot, and make a cleaner call.
• urgency and fatigue pushing “that’ll do” choices
• halo effect from shiny features masking defects
• anchoring on price guides and fake discounts
• scarcity pressure and authority cues from agents
• sunk cost from time, travel and rapport
• overconfidence about “fixing” structural limits
• confirmation bias and selective evidence
• endowment effect and loss aversion once attached
• optimism bias around income, rates and levies
• practical guardrails and a cooling-off habit
And don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review the podcast and share it with your fellow smart women and allies
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You are listening to the Why Smart Women Podcast, the podcast that helps smart women work out why we repeatedly make the wrong decisions and how to make better ones. From relationships, career choices, finances, to photo jackets and chaos movies. Every moment of every day, we're making decisions. Let's make them good ones. I'm your host, and you're McCub, and I'm the woman of a certain age. I've made my own spirit of really bad decisions. Not my death. And I wish this podcast had been around to save me from myself. This podcast will give you insight into the working of your own brain, which will blow your mind. I acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which I'm recording and you are listening on this day. Always was, always will be, Aboriginal land. Well, hello, smart women, and welcome back. Today I am broadcasting. No, I'm not, I'm podcasting. Broadcasting different to podcasting?
SPEAKER_02:Yes, it is. Yeah, broad broad broadcasting is like you cut you you cast broadly, and then when you're podcasting, you just you broad you you you cast into the someone's pods.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, I see. Yeah. So I'm podcasting today from um DY, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
SPEAKER_02:Do you think people really want to know that?
SPEAKER_00:Yes, they do want to know that. It's very interesting for you to know where I am that I'm in DY.
SPEAKER_02:You spend many seconds every every episode talking about being in DY. I know, but people talking about the nasty weather.
SPEAKER_00:And today it's windy, but we're heading into our uh beautiful summer.
SPEAKER_01:Come on, summer.
SPEAKER_00:Um yeah. Come on, summer. Come on, you can do it, summer. Um, hello to everybody. We have listeners in Jamaica, uh, in Ukraine. I'm sorry about that, and I we do think about you often. Um Japan and many, many in the United States and Canada, Canada and New Zealand. So hello, hello from Australia.
SPEAKER_02:And for those that Annie didn't mention, sorry, it's because she has a bad memory. It's not that that she thinks that your nation is unimportant.
SPEAKER_00:It's true.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:So um I'll tell you what we're going to talk about. And if anybody on this podcast has ever gone and um spent their time looking for a place to buy, then you are going to really appreciate um the cognitive biases that David and I have come across.
SPEAKER_02:This is the special real estate episode.
SPEAKER_00:Real estate real estate episode. So um David and I have been assisting our son um in looking for a new apartment uh to buy. And what this has meant is that on Saturdays we get in the car and and we drive thousands of kilometres uh in the heat and the the terrible weather to assist him in this process. It's not true. We don't drive thousands of kilometres, though Hundreds. Well, it's it you know, it's a good hour from um the northern beaches in Sydney um to the to the more western suburbs of Sydney, but that's what we've been doing, and we have been caught in terrible traffic along the way, Saturday traffic, but such is the devotion of us as parents.
SPEAKER_02:Oh yeah, we're so devoted.
SPEAKER_00:We're very devoted, aren't we?
SPEAKER_02:So devoted. We kicked him out.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, we kicked him out, and now he has to buy something to live in. So we've been going out and helping him in looking at these properties.
SPEAKER_02:That's right. You know, choosing between the houses of uh straw, the the houses of sticks, and the houses of stone.
SPEAKER_00:What are you talking about?
SPEAKER_02:Well, I've I'm the the earliest introduction. Well, the earliest introduction that any of us had had to real estate, I think, was the story of the three little pigs.
SPEAKER_00:You tell that while I go and put my hair back. Go on.
SPEAKER_02:What?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, tell the tell the story.
SPEAKER_02:Everybody knows the story of the three little pigs. Look, I'm doing this under sufferance. Yes, Annie's just left the room to fix her hair. I don't know why that's important. This is an audio podcast. But the first little pig built his house out of straw because he thought it would be easy, um, but it didn't stand up to the wind. Well, or the blowing of a wolf. Um neither did the house of sticks, which was the house of the second pig. Um that was also blown over. I don't know why I'm telling you this story. The third house was made out of bricks and the wolf couldn't blow it over, and so that was probably a good investment and um saved the pigs' lives.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, that's right. Quiet piggy. But but how was that?
SPEAKER_02:Quiet Piggy.
SPEAKER_00:How was that? That was a that was a bad moment.
SPEAKER_02:That was a that that was a nice moment of of status reinforcement where the where the president really wanted to put that young journalist in her. It's really delightful. So one day we'll do an episode on the the cognitive biases that you find in in media um and interviews with politicians. But today we're talking about real estate. And probably there's there there are a few um activities that human beings engage in that are more replete with cognitive biases and heuristics and the possibility that you're going to make a bad decision than real estate. And the other good thing about real estate is because the wheels go so slowly, you've got plenty of time to actually examine your thinking. It's true. You be it caught in traffic or or something don't examine our thinking. Okay. Cognitive bias number one. Urgency.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I just don't, I mean, I I get out there and I s because I don't like it, I don't like being, you know, I want to come home again. So what happens to me is I see something that's sort of vaguely okay, I go, that'll do. That'll do. What? Yeah, I do do a little bit. I'm like, well, that seems fine. There was two on last Saturday where I go, yeah, we'll just get that. Because I I don't want to keep looking.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, right, okay.
SPEAKER_00:So um, so that's one bias is just um, you know, try post-rationalizing. So the feeling I have inside me is I'm sick of this. We've been this is the seventh one I've looked at. Can we just buy one?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Which is very poor thinking on my part.
SPEAKER_02:And and look a little bit of a little bit of context. Um last year, but actually it was about this time last year that Annie and I entered the the the property market for the first time in like about 24 years. We had uh we had a a lovely. I was just gonna say, you know, we had a we had a lovely, rather unique um property um up in Beacon Hill on Sydney's northern beaches.
SPEAKER_00:You can't use you can't use my speech rhythms trying to sound interesting, then my speech rhythms are.
SPEAKER_02:And uh and and so in the in in that in that event we were we were we were the vendor, we were the seller. We were also buying at the same time, and we've been through the process with our son, as Annie was saying. Um and so um yeah, these the cognitive biases and heuristics that arise are really um uh sort of top of mind at the moment. And one of them is the halo effect.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, the halo effect's really interesting.
SPEAKER_02:Because it worked in our favour. It worked very much in our favour.
SPEAKER_00:As vendors.
SPEAKER_02:As vendors. You explain what the halo effect is, and I'll explain how it works for you.
SPEAKER_00:So, you know, so the halo effect is when something is good, like an element of something, or like if you take a human being, if you really like the human being or find the human being attractive, what can often happen is they then have a halo around their head, and that you may infer upon them qualities that you don't that they actually don't have. So I may think the the best one I can think of is Gwynneth Paltrow, who's a very, very good actor.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, she's a great actor.
SPEAKER_00:She's a fantastic actor. So you might look at her and go, She's really pretty, um, she's a really good actor, and then you look at her products that she sells through her um her woo-woo fantasy land, which they call goop.
SPEAKER_02:You know, you know why it's goop.
SPEAKER_00:No.
SPEAKER_02:Gwyneth Paltrow, G, P, first, last letters. What it's uh and then you've made that up.
SPEAKER_00:No, well Goop is also stuff you put on your face.
SPEAKER_02:Exactly, exactly. So it was convenient that the the stuff that you put on your face have the first and last letter.
SPEAKER_00:Anyway, if I can get back to the you don't know that you've made that up about the GP thing, haven't you?
SPEAKER_02:No, I th I would I I haven't made it up. It's it's obvious, it's self-evident.
SPEAKER_00:It's not. Anyway, um because she's very attractive and um apparently only eats apples and I don't know, kale or something.
SPEAKER_02:No, that was her son. She called her son Apple.
SPEAKER_00:Oh yeah. Anyway, she like but barely eats and just I don't know, is constantly giving herself coffee enemies. I don't know what she does, but anyway, she's got this company called Goop, which is a terrible purveyor of pseudoscience, woo-woo, uh, which as we know is dangerous because once you go down that path, you're less likely to believe the science. So she has a halo on her head. Pretty actress develops a pseudoscientific product line which is sort of drowning in glitter and glamour, and people buy it for that.
SPEAKER_02:So it's what has that got to do with real estate?
SPEAKER_00:I'm explaining what the halo effect is. Okay. So so if you talk look about that in a in a real estate sitch, then a single appealing feature like an ocean view or a renovated bathroom or great light, then colours your perception of the entire property, and you start ignoring floors because that one feature, right, the halo of it, feels like the proof of overall quality. And so the impact of that is you can, you know, overlook structural features or noise or body court problems or something. And I did it. I'm telling you, I did this.
SPEAKER_01:You did it.
SPEAKER_00:I did it with the property that we that we looked at above the shop. Remember that one above the shop.
SPEAKER_01:The property above the shop. Do you know what I got hooked on? How big it was? Three bedrooms?
SPEAKER_00:I got hooked well, more than the three bedrooms. I got tragically hooked on the fact that they'd put really nice white plant plantation shutters over the windows.
SPEAKER_02:Oh my god, yes. This was the scongiest, you know, X, you know, brothel or something like that. It was it was above a shop with decaying awnings and um It was really terrible. I mean, the you know, the the the strip of shops underneath it, you know, convenience store, um uh fish and chips, there was a bong shop there.
SPEAKER_00:It wasn't great. Well the whole thing, but the thing is I walked in, I went, oh, and then the real estate agent said to me, Look, it's really beautiful. Look at the kitchen.
SPEAKER_02:Plantation shutters.
SPEAKER_00:Plantation shutters, and then Laughlin had sensibly opened one of the plantation shutters and behind it the windows were all broken.
SPEAKER_02:Yep. Yeah, but but the but the fact that the broken windows were concealed by a plantation shutter.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, um and then and then he cleverly that guy used the anchoring bias.
SPEAKER_02:Ah, the anchoring bias.
SPEAKER_00:The anchoring bias is really, really interesting because if they say, look, um, you know, this is worth um, I don't know, five hundred and thirty thousand.
SPEAKER_01:Yep, yep.
SPEAKER_00:Right. And then you find that so you're anchored to that number, right? You get anchored to it.
SPEAKER_01:Yep.
SPEAKER_00:And then when they say, Oh, actually you can get it for 510,000, you're like, awesome saving of 20 grand, even though the 530 was an imaginary number.
SPEAKER_02:It was arbitrary in the first place. That's right.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, um, and of course, they do it all the do that all the time because what they're doing, they're using the anchoring bias, and the other thing that they do is the scarcity bias, which is oh yeah. Look, we we've had a lot of interest in this. There's very, very few properties that are in this sort of location with this sort of access to public transport, right, that have had this amount of quality renovation. This is a very, very, very rare property. Yes. So if you don't act now, what's gonna happen?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, you're gonna miss out.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:You're gonna miss out.
SPEAKER_00:And scarcity is a classic because it absolutely flips the switch from strategic right, strategic um reasoning to just being impulsive. It must be dreadful for people with ADHD like yourself.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, it's shocking.
SPEAKER_00:Is it shocking?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean I I um as I said, you know, g real estate, I can I can see all of these these these cognitive errors just working away. Yeah. You know, they put their their business clothes on, they look really legitimate, and then I can I can hear my mind saying to me, listen, you've got to we've got to put an offer on this place now. You know, it's it's well above what we want to spend, but but properties like this don't come onto the market. Um, you know, the the the vendor is obviously motivated to sell, you know, we could we could get a real advantage if we just acted quickly. Yeah. If we backed ourselves. Do you know? I wonder whether this has had anything to do with the um Commonwealth Bank's latest advertisement. Um so yeah, the Commonwealth Bank is one of Australia's largest banks, um, and they've just gone into the public arena with this thing Doubt Never Did. That's the slogan, doubt never did. Don't doubt yourself, go for it. Oh go for it, buy for buy the house, buy the car. Doubt never did.
SPEAKER_00:And of course, that that absolutely plugs into one of my all-time Don't doubt yourself. Don't absolutely loathed um inferences, which is everyone should just trust their instincts because your gut will just will, you know, lead you in the right direction.
SPEAKER_02:That is so irresponsible. In my gut, if I'd gone with my gut, yes, you would have bought that dreadful place above the bong shop.
SPEAKER_00:With the above the bong shop with the terrible plantation shutters. Um the other thing is we had to take the dogs with us on the journey because we couldn't leave them in the apartment.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, but I know where you're going with I I know where you're going with this.
SPEAKER_00:And then so you know, I then have to text neighbours and can you take them up for a Wii or whatever? Da. So we took the dogs, yeah. We took the dogs and then that real estate agent said said those dogs are my god, they are the most beautiful dogs. And then complimented the car. Oh my god. Look at your cute little electric, blue electric car, and aren't your dogs adorable? And I was like, I really want to buy something off you. Yes. As soon as I as soon as I like someone, and I tell you the other thing they do is they use my name. What's your name? Yeah, Annie. And as soon as they say, um, yeah, Annie, look, I love your dogs, love your car. Look, this is look, there's obviously there's things that need to be done to this property, Annie. But um I don't know. I know and also you know what else? He knows me. You know what else he said to me? What did he say? He said, You must be so proud of your son for getting into the market. And me, me, I'm like, Jewish mother. Yeah, yeah. I'm really my son, my help, help, my son, the lawyer is drowning. Yeah, so um, yeah, so I'm I and he said all help help my son, the lawyer, is trying to buy a house.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, help help.
SPEAKER_00:And then, you know, I'm like, yeah, I am really proud. And he was like, Yeah, well, you know, when I was 33, I was just married and still living in home with my parents. Your son's doing amazing, and I'm like, Yeah, he is doing amazing. Also, you really like my car and my dogs, and you think my son's amazing. I want to buy something off you, yeah, that's right. And you use my name.
SPEAKER_02:That's right. That sounds like halo effect to me. That sounds like really solid halo effect. But also, also, I reckon that kind of relationship, um, you know, when the real estate agent knows your name, appreciates your dog, admires your car. You've come all this way from the northern beaches, from the northern beaches, then you're in danger of falling prey to the uh sunk cost fallacy. And that is, I've spent all this time, I've got to know this person. I don't want to have to go through the process of getting to know anybody else.
SPEAKER_01:Yes.
SPEAKER_02:I I I don't want to go through the process of having to look at another property. So um, so you you you you you double down on the the agent or the property that um that you've you've you've become attached to because it's sunk cost is absolutely classic, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00:It's the sunk cost, I love it, because it's like you know, the other context where you're like you've been holding on the phone to Telstra for what feels like nine years, right? But you cannot hang up. You cannot hang up because otherwise you've wasted Yeah, you've wasted all that time. All that time on the phone. Whereas in fact, if you just hung up and then called back at another time, that would be totally fine.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, that's right. You know, uh um I'm gonna I'm gonna just do a little dangerous thought experiment here.
SPEAKER_00:Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Um, you know, if if you think about our relationship, Annie, and all the years that we've been married.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, you could leave me.
SPEAKER_02:Well, no, I got some cost fallacy.
SPEAKER_00:We've spent this long.
SPEAKER_02:I've spent this long.
SPEAKER_00:You may as well yeah, but so you may as well stay the course. That's right.
SPEAKER_02:It's gotta get good sometime. You know, the pendulum swings. It's gotta come back.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, at some point, yeah. So that's right. You've spent, you know, it's been well that is actually what happens to people to people in disastrous relationships. It's exactly why people don't divorce.
SPEAKER_02:Yes, but but darling, I I wouldn't describe our relationship as disastrous.
SPEAKER_00:Um There's redeeming qualities, features.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, there are some redeeming qualities and features, and um and you know, I figure I'll be able to sort it out.
SPEAKER_00:Can you fix me?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, well you reckon you can fix me. Like I can fix a property with a lick of paint, you know, just just put a lick of paint on that, you know, put some plantation shutters in, and um and then the place will be magnificent to live in. And that's and that's the overconfidence bias. Well, I think You know, I can make this work, I can make this property work.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, but we've missed that we've missed the big, you know, the big mother of all biases.
SPEAKER_01:What's that?
SPEAKER_00:Which confirmation bias. You know, once you've decided, I mean that's the thing, once you decide it, you know, I've walked in and it's got nice plantation shutters and three bedrooms and and a nicely renovated bathroom, and the guy's used my name and complimented my son and my car and my dogs. Yes. Confirmation bias. I'm like, yeah, I want it. I know any you just unconsciously cherry pick any bit of data that doesn't fit my current desire.
SPEAKER_02:What about the fact that it's a long way away from public transport?
SPEAKER_00:Doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_02:Really? What are you gonna do?
SPEAKER_00:He's not my it's not my problem. He's living there, it's not me. It doesn't matter, you see, in my confirmation biased brain. Once I've decided he should buy this, right?
SPEAKER_02:But what about the fact that the you know the bedrooms don't have any aspect out there?
SPEAKER_00:It doesn't matter. He can put pictures out there.
SPEAKER_02:It's pretty small, you know. How are we gonna how's he gonna fit?
SPEAKER_00:But that's okay because he's he's you know, he's a kid, he doesn't, you know, he's doesn't what does he need? He hasn't got children.
SPEAKER_02:All of which sounds like um, you know, practical, pragmatic, motherly advice. It's not, it's confirmation bias.
SPEAKER_00:It's all confirmation bias, and um, of course, you know, I make an emotional decision and then we just post-rationalise it. It's fraught. It's absolutely fraud. The process is fraught, and we're sort of aware of this stuff, but I just I forget. As soon as I'm there, yeah. My my any notion of me applying my own um critical thinking skills just goes out the window, pretty much. I then have to walk away, get in the car, and start thinking. Yeah, I really have to apply myself, David.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because there is that thing that happens when you uh when you leave the property and then you start fantasizing about yourself living in that uh in that unit, you know.
SPEAKER_00:Or he's he's he how nice it would be for Lockheed to be in there.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there he is, and he only has to go downstairs and he can get his teeth fixed. And he can get his teeth fixed at the dentist, he can buy a bong, he can um you know go get a bottle of uh w of wine, even though he doesn't drink, and he could start. He can have he can apply himself. Enriching cultural experiences with the um everyone was lovely. With the other people wandering around in the street. And um and and they actually call this the endowment bias, that you start to imagine yourself or your son or somebody, you know, living the perfect life in this place, and uh again you do the work of the real estate agent for them, you know. You you you you look at the city.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I think what happens is you you plug into that endowment effect, so even before you've bought it, you can imagine living there, yeah, which then tips your brain into loss aversion. So suddenly I've imagined that or I've imagined Lockie living there, right? So losing it, he'd love it, right? That's right. Life in South Granville. Life in South Granville above the bong shop. Why would you want to why would you want to give that up? And then you get into loss aversion. So the weird thing about loss aversion, it's a very interesting cognitive bias, is that what it does to your brain, it starts to hate the idea of loss more intensely than it values equivalent gain. So you do anything then to avoid, you know, to to to because your aversion to loss is so great. And remember, this is happening unconsciously in the brain, right? Yeah, that's right. So suddenly I'm saying to this, to my son, look, this is you know, because I've decided he should have it because of the plantation shutters and etc. etc. And the guy used my name and liked the car like the dogs. Yes. So then what would happen is you'd start saying, Look, you can stretch your budget, and all of the red flags then get rationalized and you take risks. That's how you get into this terrible state of taking risks you shouldn't take.
SPEAKER_02:The optimism bias, where you say, you know, I'm gonna get a whole lot more lot more work this year, or interest rates are going to come down and I'll be able to afford the payment.
SPEAKER_00:So optimism bias is my greatest, is my greatest flaw. I mean, I've got a lot of flaws. I do no come on, come on. No, really, yeah, I know it's a surprise to you after 30 something years.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I know.
SPEAKER_00:No, no, I don't know. I've got to tell you though, optimism bias. Yes, you know, the way there's just all this, man, let's get some optimism and positivity happening. I'm telling you, I have made so many mistakes because I'm fundamentally I'm highly optimistic. It's in my personality.
SPEAKER_02:Okay, so are you optimistic about the world? Are you uh optimistic about the way that you're going to be able to rise to the occasion?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, just yeah, just yeah, I just assume things will are going to work out.
SPEAKER_02:I sometimes get the feeling that you're not terribly optimistic about me though.
SPEAKER_00:No, yes, I am. Are you? 100%. I always think everything's going to be fine. All right, okay. Oh good. I have a lot of tr uh wildly perhaps misplaced levels of trust in your capacities.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, well, time will tell, won't it?
SPEAKER_00:So, you know, if you think about um optimism bias in relation to um, you know, perhaps making a purchase, you know, oh, because I know what there was. There was this notion that there was going to be the special levies. The special levies. And and it was like they were like, it's not going to matter. There is special levies and there's capital works involved in this, but it's probably only c gonna cost you 30 grand over 10 years.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, just a little bit of waterproofing for the for the for the you know the building.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, so then you go, oh, okay, 30,000 over 10 years sounds fine. And so then you expect the future to bend to your hopes, right? So you're hoping that they're right, because I said to the guy, well, that won't be locked down, because I do manage when I'm actually in there with an estate agent to actually ask questions. I said, Well, we don't actually know that, do we? We don't know that that it's going to be locked at 30, because exactly what we know has happened to people, it started off at 13 and it's ended up at 150,000 extra.
SPEAKER_02:How old are your dogs? Aren't they lovely?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that's fine. 30 sounds great. Okay. Um, so then of course, as we know, um, and you've already mentioned this, that real estate agents turn up, they've always got the same um narrow lapeled suits on, haven't they? Yes, stovepipe, sort of the stovepipe trousers, very, very shiny, expensive shoes.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, do you I mean do you do you find your do you notice the the real estate agents' shoes? Always. I always do.
SPEAKER_00:I always do. What is it? What is it about that?
SPEAKER_02:They're very shiny. They're they're sh so that's like a rule. Is that a heuristic? If if the shoes are good, it's a successful real estate agent. If the shoes are shabby, maybe they're not.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, 100%. So look, you've got agents, builders, doctors, you know, bankers, whatever. Anyone who looks confident feels more credible than they actually are. It's the authority buyers.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah, yeah, got it. The authority buyers. Would you would you would you would you rather deal with a shabby real estate agent, you know, who maybe isn't so slick, is not going to use so many clever, you know, might be a bit down on his luck, you know, might work harder for you. Or would you prefer to deal with a real estate agent with very shiny shoes, a very dry clean suit, you know, clean hair, you know, is on top of it, smooth talking, etcetera, etc.
SPEAKER_00:No, that's a pointless question.
SPEAKER_02:Why?
SPEAKER_00:Well, because you've inferred that just because somebody has turned up and is a bit sort of shabbier and has taken less time with their toilet.
SPEAKER_02:Like the like the Colombo of uh real estate agents.
SPEAKER_00:Then that infers credibility. It makes no difference. How would I know what they're like? Just what I'm going to suddenly go, oh, you're shabby, you're going to tell me the truth.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, hang on a uh uh uh are you are you speaking from the enlightened mind at the moment? I thought we were looking at heuristics. Oh, like oh if you weren't if you weren't applying critical thinking, yeah, do you think you'd be able to run rings around a shabby one? Um and yet the uh the very professional looking one will probably do a job on you. What do you reckon? What would your expectation be?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I I would think that I'd be more inclined if with the the the snick one. Oh really?
SPEAKER_02:You'd rather have the schmick one?
SPEAKER_00:I don't understand the question. I don't know. What mind am I being applying critical thinking?
SPEAKER_02:No, no, not at the moment. This is this is your unguarded self.
SPEAKER_00:Unguarded self. I don't know, I can't tell.
SPEAKER_02:All right. Then it probably wasn't. I just look at Lochlan. Sorry about that.
SPEAKER_00:I just look at Lochlan, who's our boy who has a very interesting relationship to clothing.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, he doesn't value the externals at all.
SPEAKER_00:And yet he's he's um he he works in a very specific area of the law, um, and he's very, very good at it, very caring, very nice, very bright, very smart.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, he's got that lovely combination of being super smart, but he's also super conscientious. Yeah, he is.
SPEAKER_00:He's compassionate and yet he he looks like he looks like his clients. So um he does. Well, that's why they like him. It's just interesting, right? Yeah. So I mean the thing is sorry?
SPEAKER_02:In real estate?
SPEAKER_00:I don't know. It was a really confusing question you asked me before. It what would I rather?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Do I would I think I could run route rings about someone in my unconscious self that was shabbier?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Yeah, would you would you look at them and go, oh, this real estate agent's a bit down on his luck. Probably. I could probably push him hard.
SPEAKER_00:Probably.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah, okay.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, but it's a bias, right? It is a bias. Because some the way someone presents is an absolute irrelevancy to how much you can actually manipulate them to your yeah. So um look, we've I think we've discussed um we've discussed the scarcity bias and the urgency. Urgency bias is massive. You've got to do this now, you've got to get into the market, you've got to buy this today.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, actually, you know, you want you want to put an offer in, you want to you want to take the property out of the market before it goes to auction.
SPEAKER_00:You've got to do that because otherwise you're never gonna get a property like this.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, you're gonna do that. So look, um So how do you tell the difference between the two? How do you how do you how how how do we how do we keep our thinking caps on um when we're in the real estate uh game?
SPEAKER_00:Well, uh what you have to do is watch for any emotionality that is creeping into your brain. So as soon as, you know, as soon as I get in the car, I actually do do this and I go, Oh, that would be really good. I then have to actually um do some serious analysis of my thinking. You have to analyze your thinking, and I think the way to start is the first time you get a strong feeling about something. You know, I really love this, okay. Take yourself away, go and sit in the park, go and sit in the car, do something. Why do you like it? Same with I hate this property. Couple of times, I just hated the property, yet if I'd applied more critical thinking to it, maybe it was more redeemable because the location was better, even if in the interior wasn't great.
SPEAKER_02:Okay, so so you're saying as soon as you recognize whether you are moving towards the property or away from the property, if I was just to put it really, really simply, you know, you move you're moving towards it. Um that you slow it down and you go, okay, what am I moving towards? Correct. Am I moving towards access to public transport? Am I moving towards space? Am I looking moving towards community? Am I look moving towards and then ask, is this relevant? You know, is it is it realistic? Am I evaluating this correctly?
SPEAKER_00:Well, to my brother's point, um What would your brother know that? My brother, who's been in real estate for about 900 years, um, he said yesterday, you can't change the location and you can't change the size, right? Yeah, and that that's that's the reality. You can't change the quality of the building. Anything on the inside that's cosmetic, you can change it. Yeah, but if you're in a crap location, you're going to be in a crap location.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:So, I mean, I think um, you know, don't get caught up in the you know, the new smit kit. And the Renault bathroom. Um, you know, if you pull the blind up and you're looking out at a brick wall when a view matters to you.
SPEAKER_02:Okay, so it's an extra hundred thousand dollars more, we could always tighten our belts and maybe I'll get that job, then you go, uh oh, I noticed that maybe it's the optimism. Optimism bias. You know, or I'm post-rationalizing, or I'm using, you know, confirmation bias. Confirmation bias is just the biggest one.
SPEAKER_00:It's the biggest one. You just unconsciously cherry pick the environment to arrive at the conclusion that your brain wants you to arrive at. It's an absolute killer.
SPEAKER_02:I've got I've I've I've got what I think is is is is probably the smartest thing that you can do in this situation.
SPEAKER_00:What is that?
SPEAKER_02:You keep telling us that the problem with unconscious bias is that they're unconscious, that you don't notice that they're happy. So this is probably a good time to pick up the phone and call Uncle Paul or call your mum or call your brother or something like that.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, call another person.
SPEAKER_02:And notice when you talk to them about the property, are you trying to convince them?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. You know? Or do you just genuinely want feedback?
SPEAKER_02:You know, it it's you know, it's it's it's it's very colourful, you know, it's a nice place to live, etc. etcetera. Are you trying to to c convince yourself or are you just sharing information and gen genuinely looking for a uh another perspective?
SPEAKER_00:That is correct. That is very good. And on that note, I'm going to wrap this up because any second now, our apartment is going to test their emergency warning system. And I don't think that um our listeners.
SPEAKER_01:So you're you're winding up, are you?
SPEAKER_00:I am winding up.
SPEAKER_01:Going once? Going twice, going three times and solved. And we're done.
SPEAKER_00:And we're done. Thank you so much, listeners. I hope that was helpful. Um remember, whenever you're purchasing anything, including a partner, choose wisely and keep your critical thinking hats on. See you later. Bye. Thanks for tuning in to Why Smart Women with me, Annie McCubbin. I hope today's episode has ignited your curiosity and left you feeling inspired by my anti-motivational style. Join me next time as we continue to unravel the fascinating layers of our brains and develop ways to sort out the fact from the fiction and the over 6,000 thoughts we have in the course of every day. Remember, intelligence isn't enough. You can be as smart as paint, but it's not just about what you know, it's about how you think. And in all this talk of whether or not you can trust your gut. If you ever feel unsafe, whether it's in the street, at work, car park, in a bar, or in your own home, please, please respect that gut feeling. Staying safe needs to be our primary objective. We can build better lives, but we have to stay safe to do that. And don't forget to subscribe, rate, and review the podcast and share it with your fellow smart women and allies. Together we're hopefully reshaping the narrative around women and making better decisions. So until next time, stay sharp, stay savvy, and keep your critical thinking hat shiny. This is Annie McCubbin signing off from Why Smart Women. See you later. This episode was produced by Harrison Hess. It was executive produced and written by me or Annie McCubbin.
