That awkward moment when my referral partner vanished for 6 months then came back with a deal

So I had this partnership with a marketing agency in Austin that just went silent last spring. I figured they found someone else to send leads to, no hard feelings. Then out of nowhere last week they called me up with a commercial buyer looking for warehouse space. I closed the deal yesterday and it was a $12k commission for basically two days of work. Made me realize I should never burn bridges even when it seems dead. Anyone else have a partner ghost them then reappear out of the blue?

3 comments

3 Comments

xena3731mo ago

My old partner ghosted me for 9 months once then texts me at like 11 PM on a Tuesday asking if I still do residential loans. I said yes out of pure spite and it turned into a $5k refi for my cousin's neighbor. Now I call him my "zombie partner" because he keeps rising from the dead right when I least expect it. But hey, that $12k check is a nice reminder to always leave the door cracked open even when it feels stupid.

elizabethn5620h ago

lisa5 makes a solid point about trust, but I'm more curious about something specific here. When you took that refi deal, did you ever actually ask him straight up why he vanished for 9 months? Or was the money too good to risk ruining the vibe? Because I feel like if a partner ghosts you that long, there's usually a reason that'll just pop up again down the road. Maybe he had a personal crisis, maybe he was just lazy, but knowing which one changes everything. Did you ever get a straight answer out of him or did you just let the silence slide because the check cleared?

lisa51mo ago

Okay but is it really that simple though? I mean, I get the whole don't burn bridges thing but sometimes people just disappear with zero communication and that feels pretty disrespectful. @xena373 calls them a zombie partner but I'd be wondering why they went silent in the first place. Maybe they were just using you as a backup plan and only came back when their first option fell through. I'd take the check for sure but I'd also have a pretty honest conversation about what happened before I'd trust them again. For me it's less about leaving the door cracked and more about knowing who you're actually dealing with. Idk maybe I'm too guarded but I've been burned too many times to just shrug it off.