We were selling our house. The buyers wanted to play hardball negotiation. We had agreed on a price, but they wanted us to throw in lots of extras, furniture, the clay pots on our front porch, rugs. We were OK with all of it, until it came to the fish tank. Our then three-year-old daughter had a giant fish tank that she and her father had spent a year stocking and caring for. It was the centerpiece item in our basement playroom, and the buyers wanted it. It was probably worth about $500. They insisted that we leave it. We caved, they got the tank, and we had to break the news to a three-year-old that she was going to have to leave her fish behind. Did they win? Not exactly. They got the tank, but they created ill will amongst our neighbors before they even moved in. Because here’s the part they failed to consider: While they were playing hardball, we were updating our neighbors about the entire process. The night of the big fish tank fiasco, we were at a neighborhood party.  The entire neighborhood weighed in on whether or not we should let them have it. The general consensus was to let it go. One neighbor summed up the sentiment of the evening saying, “I know it would be a pain to move, but what kind of people try to take away a little girl’s fish?” Which is how they’re known as, “The couple who stole Elizabeth’s fish.”  The neighbors were predisposed to dislike them before they had even met them. They made a classic mistake; they thought they were conducting an impersonal negotiation. But for the buyers (us), and our team http://www.mcleodandmore.com/2014/03/26/the-big-mistake-people-make-when-they-negotiate-2/