MOUNT VERNON — Life’s twists and turns can sometimes take one in unexpected directions. Such is the case of Jane Howard, who recently retired as a Realtor after 24 years. It was not something she imagined she would do until she actually did it.
Howard is a sixth-generation Mount Vernonite. She grew up around Mount Vernon and had a variety of jobs before she became a Realtor.
“I was born in Mercy Hospital,” she said. “I grew up in Utica. I graduated from Utica High School in 1965.
“It was wonderful growing up in Utica. My great-grandmother was from Lancaster. She had 13 children and opened Watts Restaurant. My grandfather was an apprentice barber at the age of 14; he had his barbershop right next to Watts, and that’s how he met my grandmother.
“I did waitressing,” she recalled. “I was also a bank teller, a bookkeeper, an office receptionist, a cashier at Buckeye Mart, and a housewife for 10 years.”
But it wasn’t until Howard was 36 that she really found her calling.
“I went into real estate when I was 36,” she recalled. “I was newly widowed and I had asked God to find me a job where I could help people and where I could continue to learn and grow. And not be bored.”
She soon got her answer.
“God answered the question,” she said. “And I found an ad in the Mount Vernon News. It said Realtors wanted.”
It was everything Howard wanted in a job. She could meet lots of people and meet the challenge of pairing people with the perfect home. It was this and several other things about being a Realtor that appealed to her.
“My late husband and I had a modest home,” she said. “I thought how nice it would be to help people find a home that they could love, too. And to buy a portable color TV for my bedroom. Which I never did. I married Steve instead. And he had one.”
Becoming a Realtor was just the right thing at the right time for Howard.
“It’s just been an incredible journey,” she said. “It’s been something just beyond my dreams. I never would have met all these people and had relationships with them. I’ve seen the joy of a young couple finding their first home. There’s that moment of thrill that goes through you that yes, this is the right home for them. It’s a wonderful thing to call the buyer and tell them it’s theirs. It’s also a thrill on the other side where you have a seller who really needs to sell for one reason or another. The main goal it to have everybody perfectly happy.”
Getting a real estate license takes a lot of work, which Howard said she found to be quite interesting.
“You have to take classes,” she explained. “And you have to pass tests. Now, it’s much more involved than when I took mine. There’s also continuing education; 30 hours every three years. And that’s a good thing because you have to keep up with the changes in the market trends and the laws keep changing, just like the markets.”
Howard said the classes she had to take were just a part of the process. There is more to the job than laws and data.
“The classes that I took didn’t really prepare me for listing homes or showing homes,” she said. “I learned all that and more on the job. A lot of it was on-the-job training. And the interpersonal part of it.”
Now that 24 years in the real estate business is behind her, Howard has no intention of sitting still.
“Oh, I have plenty of things planned,” she said. “I want to spend more time with my father. He’s 79 years old. And spend time with my husband and friends.”
But that is only the half of it.
“Of course, I have all those books to read,” she said, pointing to several bookcases. “And I am very much looking forward to Thanksgiving this year and doing that in a leisurely fashion.
“Christmas is coming, then there’s gardening. And I am going to get a membership to the new Hiawatha Water Park. It’s a fabulous place. It’s just wonderful.
“So basically, I’m just kicking back and doing the things I never had time to do before,” she said. “I don’t really think I’ve had five straight days off in 24 years. So I thought it was time to do a little bit of other things. But I have no regrets. I’d do it all over again.”
