Trapped on the Roof

On Wednesday, I showed this lovely modern home at 213 North Washington on St. Armands Key to some clients of mine from England. The home has 3 bedrooms, 3.5 baths, 3,412 square feet with 2 floors of living area, a bottom non conforming ground floor and a 4th floor rooftop terrace.


We meet the listing agent, Hannerle Moore of SKY Sotheby's, at the home so she can give us a tour. She gives us a tour of the private lush swimming pool area. Then we proceed to see the non conforming ground floor, 2nd floors with 3 bedrooms and then the 3rd floor which is the main living area and kitchen. They designed the house that way so you can get high enough to view the lovely waters of Sarasota bay.


My clients and I then decide to take the elevator to the 4th floor to check out the view from the rooftop terrace. The elevator is not equipped to carry 4 people so Hannerle decides to stay on the 3rd floor. So my clients and I take the elevator to the top. It is the type of elevator that requires you to shut the metal cage door in order for it to move. We get to the top and go out on the roof top deck to look at the gorgeous views of downtown, Sarasota bay and the Ringling bridge. The views are gorgeous. When we left the elevator I did not think to shut that cage door because I figured we would only be up there for a couple of minutes.


We take a couple of minutes to enjoy the view and then decide to go back down to the 3rd level. Well, somehow, the outside door to the elevator got locked. My client thinks he may have locked it but was not sure. I call Hannerle on the telephone who is on the 3rd floor to tell her that the outside door is locked and to call the elevator to the 3rd floor so she can come up and unlock the outside door. Unfortunately, she cannot do that because the metal cage door on the elevator is not shut so she cant retrieve it.


Hear I am with a couple from England stuck on the 4th floor of this modern home on St. Armands Circle with no stairs and a very long way down so there no chance of jumping. Fortunately, it was a gorgeous day. So, I try to jimmy the door lock with my house key and that did not work. I yanked on the door as hard as I could and that did not work. I called Hannerle on the 3rd floor and told her to throw up a key or flat head screw driver. She said, "I can't throw something up that high." She calls the owner who was close by to come back to the home to see if he can figure out what to do. We wait up there for about 15 minutes and one of the owners friends shows up. He tries to mess with the elevator to see if he can get it to come down. That did not work. While we were up there I was making jokes about how they were going to have to sign a purchase agreement in order to get off the roof and that is how we sell real estate in the United States. Fortunately, these buyer are very nice and have a great sense of humor.

Finally, after they exhausted of their ideas of getting us down I told them to throw up a flat head screw driver. The owners friend goes to the very back of the back yard and launches one of those large, heavy screw drivers up to the roof, over me and was about to go over the entire house and land on one of the cars in the drive way. My client who looks pretty athletic jumps in the air deflects the screw driver and it lands on the deck. I take the screw driver and jimmy the door open to access the elevator.


We got down safely and had a wonderful laugh about it. I had a good story for my friends in the office and my clients have a good story for their friends back in England.