Hire the WRONG Real Estate Agents,
and You Could Lose Your Shirt!
REinfo4me.com
Get the right real estate agents working for you and it could save you thousands!
Real estate agents seem to be a "dime a dozen", so how do I find the right one for the job?
Friends and relatives: Probably the best way to find your RealtorŪ.
Ask all your friends, relatives and co-workers if they have used a RealtorŪ recently, and did they do a good job?
Get their names and #'s and add them to your list.
Local Advertising: Check out the local paper.
If you are a seller see which RealtorsŪ are advertising houses, not just promoting themselves.
You will want someone who is concentrating on selling homes, not their expertise.
Banks and insurance agencies: Ask your local banker and your insurance agent for the names of real estate agents they do business with on a regular basis.
These real estate agents are obviously doing business and should go on your list.
Local Associations of RealtorsŪ: Some local boards will tell you the top listing and selling RealtorsŪ in the area.
Check it out, it's worth a try!
Online: You can search online for real estate agents referral sites.
Most sites will connect you to three or more pre-screened real estate agents in your area.
They will also give you the agent's specialty.
The screening process varies and some sites screen more than others.
Real estate agents may have to pay a fee to be listed, and usually have to pay more to get to the top of the search.
A word of WARNING:
There are some real estate agents who will not be happy with the following warning.
I don't care!
This is my site and it is set up for the sole purpose of educating you and not to please agents!
DUAL REPRESENTATION: This is what a listing agent loves.
It means that they get to keep ALL the commission from the sale without having to split the fee with another agent.
Of course, they still have to split the commission with their
brokerage unless they are in a 100% office.
Talking about "splits", the broker usually splits the commission with the agent anywhere from 50%/50% to 5%/95%, depending on the agent's productivity and experience.
In a 100% office, the agent pays a monthly "desk fee" along with other administrative fees and gets to keep all the commission. Dual Representation comes into being when an agent (usually the sellers real estate agent) represents both the buyer and seller. This is what will happen if you make an offer directly through the listing agent.
It is perfectly legal for the agent to represent both parties.
However, it can be a nightmare ethically. On the one hand, the agent typically knows what the seller's bottom line is and then, on the other hand, they have to write an offer for a buyer without disclosing or using this information! In my 20 year career, I have done this once, at the insistance of both the buyer and the seller, but I found it to be too much of a conflict of interest that I resolved never to do it again.
I realized that I could not give 100% of my knowledge and negotiating skills to the buyer as well as being employed by the seller to get the most profit on his sale.
If you feel comfortable, it is legal to do it.
DUAL AGENCY in the legal sense also means a
duality exists when the real estate buyer and the real estate seller are represented by the same brokerage, even though there are two separate "agents".
The reason for this is that the "listing" and the "sale" belong to the broker, not the agents.
The REAL ESTATE TEAM concept: Here I go again, more hate email!
This is just my personal feelings based on experiences I have had in dealing with real estate agent "teams". The team concept is relatively new and came about when top producing agents wanted to handle more clients and earn even more money, but they found themselves stretched too thin.
So, they put together the "team".
The "team" normally consists of several non-producing, or new agents and some unlicensed clerical staff. The "team" leader puts his or her name out there as the best producing agent in the area and claims all the credit for the work done by the "team".
It is, in effect, a "mini brokerage" within the agency.
The way the
concept is presented is that they claim that you will always be able to reach a team member, and usually you can.
However, you are only likely to see the "star" when signing the listing agreement and possibly at closing.
I often found it difficult to reach the "leader" when I had questions about an offer I was writing and needed answers only they could supply. You will find the "team" concept agents spend most of their advertising $$ promoting themselves and the team as being the greatest, instead of using the advertising space to sell the listings.
Agents working as PARTNERS are an entirely different matter. Here you are dealing with the main agents and are not being fobbed off on an underling. Enough said!
No matter where you get your list of
agents from, do not jump in with both feet before you check them out.
Narrow your list to three possibilities.
Interview each one before you make any decisions.
Sellers should ask for three previous clients and CALL them to see if the agent (or Mentor) did a good job for them.
Buyers should also get referrals from past clients and CALL them! Once you have checked them out, decide which RealtorŪ you like best and, GO FOR IT!
Now that's all done with, let's go look at the The Offer Page
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