Find and understand emotional issue and you can keep any deal together. This thought applies no matter if your role is buyer, seller, agent, or inspector. Ultimately, you must seek to understand why people feel as they feel in order to fully comprehend what they really mean in what they are saying.

Not long ago, I inspected a home for an electrical engineer, a very bright and successful individual. The home had a beautiful swimming pool in backyard. Our intrepid engineer had out his digital tape measure and was measuring distance between each electrical receptacle along rear exterior of home. He would measure, then ponder, measure more, and then ponder more.

Finally, he approached real estate agent and me announcing that there was an unsafe condition relating to unequal distance between electrical outlets. He then spouted large quantities of electrical engineer babble and finished with, "I'd be shocked if this were not a code violation". I wanted to respond with "No sir, code is intended to prevent you from being shocked", but decided that "hmmmm" was a better response.

After much debate and some real listening, man's issue had nothing to do with electrical engineering or National Electric Code. In his mind, he had perfect place for his lounge chair, but there was not a receptacle adjacent to that location for him to plug his radio into! He was laying logic, however flawed, on us in order to justify his demand that a new receptacle be added.

Listen to logic, hear emotion!

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Then, insert in a nice and suave manner your point of view and advice. You can tell him something like:

"Your shirt seems to be very comfortable to wear, Paul. Since this is your very first date, I think Sandra (his date) will be much more impressed if you would wear something like outfit that you wore on my birthday. You look smashing when you put on clothes like that."

Afterwards, make another positive statement. You could say something like:

"You would definitely make a big impact on Sandra. She would fall heads over heels over your gorgeous appearance and cheerful personality. Have a great time on your date, Paul."

Do you think Paul would be offended by such pleasant comments? Not a chance. You have wittingly inserted a slightly negative feedback into a plethora of acceptable and ego-boosting remarks.

People love compliments. They believe they got qualities. They want other people to intensify great abilities that they believe to possess. People wanted to hear their greatness purported from someone else's mouth, and they would be very glad if other individuals would know about it.

So if you want to criticize anybody, remember to praise him first. It will leave a positive impression that you're a nice guy. Then say what you have to say, but in a smooth and non-offensive manner. Finalize with another positive reinforcement to establish a foundation of goodwill.