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Julie Moriarty
06-21-2015, 11:58 AM
This is my first time selling a house. I bought the lot in 1986 and built a house on it and have lived here ever since. We listed the house about a week ago.

From what I've seen so far, this is what I've learned

- Realtors take rejection poorly. When I called one to tell him we were going with another realtor, he acted very offended and almost demanded to know why he didn't get the listing. Another who didn't get the listing wrote a very negative opinion about the house on the company website.

- Realtors learn their product (the homes for sale) through the buyers. They don't attend the realtor open houses to learn about the homes prior to showing. The first time they see the house is when showing it to a buyer when they are as clueless about the home as the buyer.

- Realtors learn about the customers by showing them one house after another until a buyer shows interest in a house. They wait for the buyer to contact them about a house the buyer saw on the Internet and make arrangements to show it.

I know my experience is very limited but based on what I've seen so far in selling our house and looking for another to buy, those three things above pretty much sum it up.

Is this typical?

Al Launier
06-21-2015, 12:18 PM
I'm in my fifth home, all new, and through various types of realtors, each having different "motivations".



Your first example is a reflection of a desperate, unprofessional realtor. How would he/she expect personal referrals to open up new real estate possibilities. I had a similar experience & was glad I decided not to use the realtor as his goal was purley selfish.
I feel it's a good idea to have (3) independent, yet multiple listing realtors evaluate & price your home. Then consider the sale price they suggest & go with the one you have the most confidence with.
Realtors not only learn the home from the owner, but from their own sales experience, plus comparables in the area that should be reviewed in detail with the seller. If comparables are not used, beware!
Also beware of low-ball pricing by the realtor to give them a quick sale with minimum cost & effort on their part. Turnarond time is important, but not just to gain them their commission.
Realtor commissions are negotiable! Don't be bashful about discussing this!
The owner should have a reasonable expectation of the selling price before contacting the realtor as based on other similar sales in the area & judged from his/her own experience. Many factors are considered & important for establishing a reasonable selling price.
Realtors should screen potential buyers for their personal preferences, financial qualifications, & not waste the buyers times running them through homes that don't fit their desires, or discover late in the game that they aren't qualified to buy the home.

My .02.

Wade Lippman
06-21-2015, 12:20 PM
We bought our house after a realtor called us about it. He also called about a couple earlier houses.
A bunch of realtors came our realtor's open house when we sold the old house.
The realtor we didn't use was fine about it.
So, no, I can't agree with your generalizations.

OTOH when we bought a cottage 15 years ago, a realtor called me and screamed that she had shown me the same cottage several years earlier; why didn't I buy it from her.
Obviously she didn't take rejection well. Her rant didn't even make sense.

Doug Ladendorf
06-21-2015, 12:39 PM
I guess we have been lucky, but there certainly are bad realtors out there. When buying our house we went with a realtor highly recommended to us. She was experienced, professional, knew her local market very well and listened to our requirements and wishes. She was patient with us looking at many houses until the right one popped up.

When selling a vacation cabin the market had softened. After a year with one realtor we switched to another who had come to us again highly recommended. She also knew the local market well and showed great patience after some time helped us get it sold and out.

Ryan Mooney
06-21-2015, 12:40 PM
I've had mixed results as well, some realtors are fantastic and 100% worth the commission. Others should be run out of town on a rail tarred and feathered. I don't reckon that its a "realtor" problem so much as a "general people" problem but the overlap approaches 1 :D.

The first two houses I bought the realtors were simply awesome! The first one I was poor and out of college and he took me around more than was really worth his time for the price range I was shopping in and helped find a house that fit what I needed. The second one was working with us remotely and we had a very limited time to look at houses on the house hunting trip, he got all of our specs and wants via email and had a nice range of houses in that price range and specs all lined up so we were able to look at them all over a weekend and picked out a really nice house out. He also did a lot of the paperwork johnny on the spot across an ocean and helped us get the previous owner on the ball on moving out, showing up at inconvenient times to transfer keys/etc... (the POs husband had gotten a job relo and she didn't really want to move - they also had 2 semi trucks worth of stuff; how that all fit in that house I'll never know). Both of those realtors deserve some sort of "good realtor" badge of honor.

I sold the last house FSBO and bought this one FSBO as well. When I was shopping for the current house the realtor we were trying to work with pulled a lot of unethical games, like only showing houses that were under her agency (so they'd get both sides of the commission - "oh that house _juust_ went off market" - still on market 3 weeks later. uh huh I ain't THAT stupid) and other things that are at least unethical if not downright illegal. Luckily we ran into a nice couple doing the house FSBO and just bought it from them directly over a homebrew in their living room. The sale on the last house was border line a disaster as the buyer had zero idea what they were doing and also had to do a bunch of weird financing to buy the place ("can I get the keys now?", "has the money cleared escrow? No? well no then." followed by a long explanation to him about how escrow worked and how I "didn't actually have his money in my bank account yet"). Actually having a realtor to babysit the situation there might well have been worth the commission.

Grant Wilkinson
06-21-2015, 12:51 PM
I've only sold one house, but your second point certainly was not my experience. The day after my house was listed, the listing agent had all the agents in his office at my house first thing in the morning. They did this routinely. They all walked through the house, asked me questions and generally educated themselves on my house. The house sold in 2 days. The sign was not yet on the lawn and the pics weren't up on the website.

glenn bradley
06-21-2015, 12:51 PM
There are some good ones out there. I've bought a half dozen homes and one of the Realtors did their job. The rest were just paper pushers that I had to drag through the process. Very disappointing ratio.

Art Mann
06-21-2015, 12:54 PM
I have a good friend who is a realtor and I'm quite certain that not all realtors are the same. He helped me shop rental property. He knew very little about the houses he showed me because most of them weren't his listings. He found them as listings from other realtors in the multiple listing service. Around here, that is very common. We inspected the houses together and often he told me not to buy the house or offer a very low price for various reasons. That is not typical. The listing agency is being hired to work as the seller's agent whether he tells his customer or not.

In general, I agree with Mr. Launier's comments.

Bill McNiel
06-21-2015, 1:53 PM
Julie,
I think you posr would have been better titled "What I've learned about MY realtor". Generalalities are always dangerous.

Mike Henderson
06-21-2015, 2:00 PM
In theory, the realtor has a fiduciary responsibility to their client, who is usually the seller. In reality, the realtor is only out for themselves. They get a commission on a sale and nothing if it doesn't sell. So they will push you to reduce your price because 5% of a sale at any price is better than no sale. And if you knock $10,000 off the price, you lost $10,000 but they lose $500. And losing $500 off a sale is better than no sale. They will also push sellers to make expensive changes to their house prior to sale even though the seller will not recover the cost by an increase in the selling price.

Do not EVER treat your agent like a friend. Never tell your agent anything that you wouldn't tell the buyer because it will often get repeated. For example, suppose you tell your agent that you would take $10,000 less for the house. You can almost be sure that the offer that comes in will be $10,000 (or more) less than what you're asking.

People are not frequent customers of an agent - maybe once every 10 to 20 years so the agent is not concerned about doing business with you again.

Agents are human and the commission structure incents them toward certain activities. If you understand the pressures on an agent you can ask yourself how you might (realistically) respond to those pressures - and that's how your agent will respond.

And now the other side: Agents have difficult jobs dealing with people who are stressed about buying or selling perhaps the largest asset they own or will buy. They buyer can't make up his/her mind, or they make an offer and then change their mind. And once they do make the offer, they're not very good at getting their documents in and following up. And they can't qualify for a loan. Then, (after the sale) they try to chisel the agent down on the commission, and threaten to walk away unless the commission is cut to 2%. And they get to spend long, boring days sitting in an open house. It's not a glamorous job.

Mike

Moses Yoder
06-21-2015, 2:34 PM
Around here it is common to auction off property. We are selling my mom's house In August, the auctioneer is an old family friend. We checked around before committing to him and found out he really was doing us a big favor with his commission and experience. He will also auction off all of my parent's personal possessions to us kids. THere is not really a lot of stuff and 8 kids so no public auction. I guess it just depends on who you know.

Ken Fitzgerald
06-21-2015, 2:52 PM
Realtors are like every other profession. They each have different personalities. When we bought our first home, the first realtor with whom we got involved, just wasn't a personality match for my wife and I, so we found another one. The first guy was a little upset but what could he do?

I don't remember specifically our realtor for the 2nd house we bought when we moved to suburban Chicago. I know we looked at a lot of houses in the Joliet, IL area and bought one.

Our 3rd realtor I do remember. He came in from a vacation to show us homes for a week while his family of a wife, and 2 children remained camping on an Idaho river for the week over the 4th of July holiday. We bought a home and when the seller, removed part of what should have remained at the home, the realtor offered to pay for a replacement. We saw him often at various functions around the valley over the years. His daughter eventually worked for several years at the local FedEx office and I would see her 3-10 times a week as I picked up and returned parts, test equipment and paperwork.
He was honest to the point of hurting sales but he got our sale as a result.

As pointed out, generally realtors represent the seller. Don't be surprised if a realtor hard sells you on a listing listed by their agency. Historically, if company A lists a home for sale and a realtor from company B sells the home, they 2 companies split the fee. If a realtor sells you a home their company listed, the fees remain within the company.

Julie Moriarty
06-21-2015, 3:22 PM
Julie,
I think you posr would have been better titled "What I've learned about MY realtor". Generalalities are always dangerous.

My observations weren't intended to be generalities. As I said, my experience in this arena is very limited. My realtor, the one we listed the house with, has been great, but she got the listing. Two that didn't were sour grapes. On the buying end, we've dealt with two brokers. Certainly not an exhaustive analysis. That's why I asked if my experience so far is typical.

The only thing that really bothered me was the sour grapes reaction. Ok, you didn't get the listing. But trashing the house? Now everyone who goes through that agency's website will see the realtor's comment and move on to something else. That's not only petty, it's damaging. And I have no recourse.

Mel Miller
06-21-2015, 3:40 PM
He will also auction off all of my parent's personal possessions to us kids. THere is not really a lot of stuff and 8 kids so no public auction.
Auctioneers take huge commissions on small item sales. Do you mean to tell us nobody in your family can agreeably handle the simple task of selling these things to the rest of the family?

Lee Schierer
06-21-2015, 6:02 PM
What ever you do, never call the realtor that is named on the sign in front of a piece of property if you are interested in buying it. Contact a different realtor from a different company as the one with the name on the sign represents the seller and not you. Only the realtor you hire can represent your interests.

Mike Hollingsworth
06-21-2015, 6:09 PM
Unless you are a seasoned negotiator, I would never take this part on yourself. Too many pitfalls in such transactions and emotions run high.
5% sounds high, but a seasoned realtor will earn it back for you. Brothers in law who will do it for 4% are not worth it.

Myk Rian
06-22-2015, 6:44 AM
Unless you are a seasoned negotiator, I would never take this part on yourself. Too many pitfalls in such transactions and emotions run high.
5% sounds high, but a seasoned realtor will earn it back for you.
Like my Daughter and SIL. The realtor they had kept telling another bidding realtor what their bid was. Cost them another 20% over listing price.

Dan Hintz
06-22-2015, 7:43 AM
Our last realtor was absolutely awesome and definitely earned his 3%. Patience of a saint, that one. Once he understood what we were looking for, the spots he offered us really honed in on the mark. Yes, we found a lot of homes on our own, and in the end we selected a home we found, but that's okay. He held our hands, when needed, and saved us quite a bit with various options we never knew about (mortgage insurance transfers) or bringing in guys he works with a lot that have reasonable rates.

But I've talked to the bad ones... just long enough to know when to run away.

Jim Matthews
06-22-2015, 7:53 AM
People are not frequent customers of an agent - maybe once every 10 to 20 years so the agent is not concerned about doing business with you again. It's not a glamorous job. Mike

This should be a sticky. I made mention of this, when we purchased our home in 2008.
The agent mainly steered us to remote, overpriced properties that were oversized.

My older son found our house, looking at the Sunday paper.

The agent resisted looking at the house, because it wasn't his listing
and would be forced to split the commission.

My Wife wanted to smooth over the agent's reluctance,
and I made it clear that if he didn't pursue the house,
he would lose us as clients, entirely.

I've never seen a man get so red.

People who work for you should do as you ask,
the first time.

It's an opaque process that adds cost to the price,
without adding value to the client.

With a good lawyer and a motivated seller,
buyers will soon render middlemen like Realtors obsolete.

Curt Harms
06-22-2015, 8:16 AM
I have a good friend who is a realtor and I'm quite certain that not all realtors are the same. He helped me shop rental property. He knew very little about the houses he showed me because most of them weren't his listings. He found them as listings from other realtors in the multiple listing service. Around here, that is very common. We inspected the houses together and often he told me not to buy the house or offer a very low price for various reasons. That is not typical. The listing agency is being hired to work as the seller's agent whether he tells his customer or not.

In general, I agree with Mr. Launier's comments.

As I understand it (SWMBO was a Real Estate Broker for years), any agent is supposed to have the seller's (the one paying the commission)best interest at heart. The exception is a buyer's agent. (http://www.realtor.com/advice/buyer-agents-work-free/)

Dick Strauss
06-22-2015, 9:53 AM
Curt,
I agree that they are supposed to but those that I have dealt with did not.

Mike Henderson is mostly right on the money!

Realtors don't really want to put in extra effort to sell our houses for $160k when it will sell very quickly at $150k. Let's say a house is definitely worth $155k and maybe $160k. The realtor would rather list it for $150k and sell it quickly than put in the extra effort to get you $5-10k more. Their sellers commission might total 3% (of the 6% total commission) but 1-1.5% often goes to the real estate agency/company (Century21, etc) and not the selling agent. So let's say they actually earn 1.5% for themselves of the $150k vs $160k sales price. This translates to $2,250 ($150k price) vs $2,400 ($160k price).

I don't think many of us would want to spend several more weeks or months trying to to sell the home for $160k (for the extra $150 in commission) when you know it will sell the first day at $150k (below market) unless your client insisted on it. This is why it is important to be educated about asking prices of homes as a seller to maximize your sales price and not just blindly trust your agents opinions. Most agents want to sell quickly at a lower price rather than maximize your return on investment.

Soapbox is now smashed!

Shawn Pachlhofer
06-22-2015, 10:19 AM
good realtors are worth their weight in gold.

bad/lazy realtors aren't worth a plug nickel.

unfortunately, there's more of the latter, and not enough of the former.

Charles Wiggins
06-22-2015, 1:11 PM
We've purchased two homes and sold our first, which involved two different realtors, so we've worked with four different realtors.

For our first purchase we used a fellow with The Buyer's Agent. They help people buy homes, and that's all they do. They don't sell, so they don't have listings, so you're not going to get into the "dual agent" situation where the firm, and maybe even your agent has a vested interest in selling a particular home.

Our buyer's agent was great. We sat down and worked out a profile together, and he would email listings to us almost every day. We would go through and decide which ones we would "drive by" to see if we were still interested after we saw the place and the neighborhood, etc. If something looked good we'd set up an appointment for a viewing, and he would always have pulled tax records and anything else he could get his hands on. He had worked as a builder so he was able to spot potential problems we would have missed. He would feed us as much information as possible then let us make all the decisions. The day we negotiated the purchase I bet we spoke on the phone 45 different times because he ran every single thing by us as they came up.

We had a very similar experience with the realtor who helped us find our current home. She wasn't quite as prepared all the time, and she did not have the construction background, but she was still pretty knowledgeable and would try to get any info she could to help when we got serious about a place. It is a smaller market, so the listings came every few days, but she would often include remarks about how suitable for our needs she felt one place or another would be, and she was usually dead on.

Our first attempt at selling was not so good. The realtor barely looked at the house and came up with a "seat of the pants" asking price, then sent another guy to photograph it. After three months and no bites he says, "all we can do now is cut the price." We parted ways and hired the guy our first buyer's agent said he'd hire if he needed to sell a house fast.

The new realtor came in and walked the house with us. He measured and did preliminary photos himself. The preliminary photos were to show the real photographer certain things he wanted to feature in the listing. When he left we had a list of quick repairs and spruce-ups to do. It still took a while to sell the house, but we started getting traffic the week after the new listing went up.

Val Kosmider
06-22-2015, 2:24 PM
Happy Reading: Why So Many Realtors are Complete Morons:

http://www.city-data.com/forum/real-estate/2384228-why-so-many-realtors-complete-morons.html

Moses Yoder
06-22-2015, 6:03 PM
Auctioneers take huge commissions on small item sales. Do you mean to tell us nobody in your family can agreeably handle the simple task of selling these things to the rest of the family?

Nobody in the world can do this auction for less than he is charging us without actually giving us money for the privilege of doing it. His wife is also clerking for us which means all of the children can simply pay attention to the bidding and not have to work that day. This is not really a fair comparison to other realtor/auctioneers, I mention it simply because it does happen. Some people are independently wealthy because they used to own their own RV factory and simply don't need any more money. Other people are greedy.

Shawn Pixley
06-22-2015, 7:19 PM
As others have said, there are good ones and bad ones. I have seen some incredibly unprofessional behavior. Still, there are good ones out there. I think you need to be very selective about choosing those who represent you. You really can't choose those that represent the other party. My criteria:

Ethics, fit, knowledge about the house type you are interested in /selling, area, work ethic, and network.

Frederick Skelly
06-22-2015, 8:16 PM
I feel your pain. I've seen and worked with some bad ones, lazy ones and unethical ones. And I've fired realtors for laziness and ineptitude. But a good one is worth every bit of their commission.

Regarding the man who flamed your house without reason.... Spend $36 and buy a membership to Angie's List. Then write an honest, unemotional review of the realtor, stating ONLY the facts. That's what Angies List for what is for - providing consumer reviews of businesses based on your personal experiences. You will be doing someone else a favor by writing such a review. (I have no affiliation with Angie's List.)

Fred

Mike Null
06-22-2015, 8:57 PM
I've bought and sold several houses. The realtor is the buyers representative. If you list with one be sure it is the one who will offer you the most in terms of advertising, internet listings, meetings, open houses etc. The larger companies are usually the best at this.

It is fair to compare realtors to car salesmen. Both are money motivated. But a good realtor acting as your buying agent can save you an enormous amount of time and get you very close to your specs.

+1 to whoever said don't offer them confidential info.

Mel Fulks
06-22-2015, 9:09 PM
Some years back this state made it law that if you picked an agent he must represent YOU. Depends on the state. The realtor we used even went so far as playing us phone messages from other agents saying things like "can you get your people up $10,000?"

Jason Roehl
06-23-2015, 7:06 AM
Some years back this state made it law that if you picked an agent he must represent YOU. Depends on the state. The realtor we used even went so far as playing us phone messages from other agents saying things like "can you get your people up $10,000?"

It's a nice law, but the reality is still that they're working on commission, so the quicker there's a sale, the sooner they get their money. Knowing your price range ahead of time means they know the approximate maximum they can make off you, so each additional house they show you costs them more time, and lowers their profit margin. If you know you're going to make about $2000, would you want to show someone 100 houses or 10?

That said, I see a lot of incompetence. Of the people around me who have purchased or sold homes in recent years, most of them have had some kind of paperwork problem that pushed back the closing date. It's like it's the title company's and realtor's first time doing a transaction every time. I remember when I bought my first house (I was 21, zero experience), we had a closing at 10 AM. We were told at 9AM that we would need certified funds for our down payment (I thought I could write a check). Had to scramble to make that happen.

Curt Harms
06-23-2015, 8:51 AM
With a good lawyer and a motivated seller,
buyers will soon render middlemen like Realtors obsolete.

SWMBO feels that web sites like Zillow and Realtor.com are going to change the Real Estate business. What those sites don't offer though are local knowledge like "you know that cute little creek in back? It doesn't stay little when we have heavy rains" or "this municipality is pretty amenable to zoning variances so you can build a shop, that municipality is not". Published data doesn't always tell the whole story. Is that worth 5%-6%? It depends, I guess.

Harry Hagan
06-23-2015, 9:31 AM
If you leave a sound-activated recording device in your home while realtors/potential-buyers visit, you’ll find out real fast who you’re dealing with.

Not to say that I’ve ever done that! :)

Julie Moriarty
06-23-2015, 10:03 AM
I feel your pain. I've seen and worked with some bad ones, lazy ones and unethical ones. And I've fired realtors for laziness and ineptitude. But a good one is worth every bit of their commission.

Regarding the man who flamed your house without reason.... Spend $36 and buy a membership to Angie's List. Then write an honest, unemotional review of the realtor, stating ONLY the facts. That's what Angies List for what is for - providing consumer reviews of businesses based on your personal experiences. You will be doing someone else a favor by writing such a review. (I have no affiliation with Angie's List.)

Fred

I saw one other review he wrote on another house and he only mentioned negatives on that one too. In pictures, the house looked perfect. I've seen reviews from other realtors with that company and usually they are kind, even when there's plenty of reasons not to be. Maybe he's a glass-is-half-empty guy. Or maybe he really wanted to be a home inspector but no one would hire him. :rolleyes:

Anyway, we're still averaging one showing a day and we've had one offer, after a little more than a week. Three of those showings came from the same agency as Mr. Negative. The couple who made the offer is coming back today to take a second look before responding to our counter. So Mr. Negative's comments may soon become a distant memory.

Chris Padilla
06-23-2015, 2:40 PM
I've bought only one home in my life. We found our real estate agent through a seminar he held at work. He was wonderful and continues to be so. He keeps in touch with all his clients (once a client, for life a client) by holding all kinds of seminars, movie nights (he rents a theater out), bocce ball tournaments, and such.

I have a buddy who recently sold his house and he got the sour grapes from one agent when he decided to go with another.

Jim Becker
06-24-2015, 4:43 PM
I've worked with two truly excellent Realtors. (capital R) They came very, very, very highly recommended by others...I didn't just pick one from the listings. The first sold my old home even before the sign went up...I was still painting when the prospective buyer went through and made an offer the next morning. Total listing time: a day and a half. The Realtor I worked with (as a buyer broker) for our subsequent purchase was equally full of quality, even standing up to a listing agent from her own firm when something wasn't right.

So like in any profession, there are really good folks and really not-so-good folks. Careful research and referrals can very much help with finding a good real estate agent to work with. And always remember, if you are buying and unless you have a "buyer broker" contract, the agent, no matter how nice, always ultimately represents the seller and that can very much color things.

Neal Clayton
06-24-2015, 11:56 PM
Ugh, it's like babysitting toddlers.

The one I have listing my house now doesn't get along with a friend and former employee. The friend/former employee worked for me in the restoration of that house (built in 1908) off and on for 4 years.

He doesn't have DSL on his side of town so when he needs to look up something online he goes over, checks the mail, makes sure no one has kicked the doors in, and uses my computer. I of course don't mind, since he's doing me a favor as well. He doesn't like the realtor(s) because they got condescending with him a couple of times, as if he's "the help." That's not the case, he and I are friends despite him being a former employee.

Of course this has nothing to do with the realtor, she has his number and was told to put him on the list as a contact, so that if anyone comes to show the house they call him as well to make sure he isn't there.

The realtor has taken it upon herself to try and drive a wedge as if she is somehow slighted by people other than me criticizing her. Her first strike was coming over when I was out of town to find a chair turned upside down because one of the rubber feet on it had torn away. There was a bare screw in the chair foot. Like an idiot she flipped the chair over and scratched the meticulously restored/refinished 107 year old heart pine floor. So the former employee upon seeing that told her off, as he should have. He had to go over and fix the scratch because I was out of town. She took that personally, apparently.

The other day I get the call from her, in a whiney mood because she had to go over and put a socket cover on and sweep the kitchen floor after I patched a plaster crack in the ceiling, telling me that "your friend is sleeping here and that's a problem, he doesn't need to be around."

Excuse me? Firstly, he doesn't sleep there, I slept there, I told her I was gonna be in town last week. Secondly, he and I are friends, you as a realtor have a contract that's good for 90 days after which your presence is no longer needed. And if you as a realtor wanna complain about having to make a bed and sweep the floor once in a blue moon for your ~40k in commission, then I'm sure someone else would like the job.

Julie Moriarty
06-25-2015, 12:50 PM
My SO reminded me what the guy who pressed us so hard about why he didn't get the listing said when interviewing him, "We could probably sell this house right out of our office, even before it hit the MLS!" Today marks two weeks and we've had 13 showings but not one person from his office has been here. I know, it's sales. Say whatever you need to make the sale.

Julie Moriarty
07-21-2015, 8:37 AM
Something else I've learned...

"Your" realtor cares more about making the sale than anything else.

We got an offer on the house at the beginning of the month and are in final negotiations. "My" realtor has since called twice to encourage me to do whatever the buyers ask. The buyers called in some nit-picky inspector that they apparently feel is omnipotent. The buyers work for local universities and probably know next to nothing about houses. I spent my entire career in construction. I also know how easy it is to become a home inspector. It's a joke.

I agreed to fix some items but have taken the position anything our local building inspector passed will remain as is. They know far more than some home inspector who probably took a week of online courses to become certified. Well, you would have thought I was the most stubborn person in the world. "My" realtor pressed me over and over insisting the items on the home inspection report need to be fixed and I need to pay for that, regardless of if they satisfy municipal building codes and/or are in good working order. My attorney, on the other hand, was surprised I agreed to the items I did saying I'm going above and beyond what most home sellers would do.

What do they call 500 realtors at the bottom of the ocean? :rolleyes:

Greg Cuetara
07-21-2015, 9:36 AM
Julie as least you sold your house. Mine has been on the market for over a year now and I have only had 10 showings. Tough market where I am right now.

Here is my gem of a realtor story: I was selling a condo in Denver about 10 years ago. I did not have the key to the front door knob. I only used the dead bolt and it didn't bother me at all. So when I put my house on the market I taped over the knob and put a sign clearly stating to not lock the knob and only lock the dead bolt. Well TWO realtors tore off the duct tape and made a mess to 'make sure they lock up.' I had to get a key guy in there to unlock my own door. I ended up tearing out the lock in the knob and leaving it. I was also told to just do what the buyer wants because that is how it works. I refused and the realtor ended up paying out of her commission to fix a few things around the condo just to get the sale. People have high expectations for houses and don't want to pay for it. It must be hard when they finally realize that home ownership includes a great deal of maintenance and general chores. A house just doesn't take care of itself and you can't pay for someone to come do everything...well I guess you can but I don't have the money tree in my backyard.

Good luck closing.
Greg

Julie Moriarty
07-22-2015, 8:45 AM
I was also told to just do what the buyer wants because that is how it works. I refused and the realtor ended up paying out of her commission to fix a few things around the condo just to get the sale.

OMG! The realtor took money out of her precious commission and didn't have a heart attack? I can imagine the drama I'd hear if I suggested such a thing.

Dick Latshaw
07-22-2015, 9:28 AM
Something else I've learned...

"Your" realtor cares more about making the sale than anything else.



Ummmm.... Isn't that the reason you hired the realtor in the first place? Do you really want one that is not interested in selling your house?

Mike Henderson
07-22-2015, 10:20 AM
Ummmm.... Isn't that the reason you hired the realtor in the first place? Do you really want one that is not interested in selling your house?
The problem - which Julie experienced - is that the realtor is ONLY interested in closing the sale, no matter what the cost to you. The realtor will press you to make repairs that are unreasonable (at your expense), to drop the price by significant amounts - anything that will close the sale. Because they only get paid when the sale closes.

If the Realtor can get you to drop your price by $10,000, you take a $10,000 haircut but it only cost the realtor a small percentage of that. And if the sale doesn't close, they get nothing.

They will pressure you to fix EVERYTHING on the inspection report - at your cost - so that the buyer will not have any reason to back out of the sale. And that costs them nothing. When I sold my house, the buyer sent me the inspection list and said "fix everything". I sent a reply back saying, "If you want the house, buy it as is. I'm not fixing anything." They eventually compromised on a few things that I was able to do myself.

No, the Realtor does not represent you, they represent themselves. They know that you won't be selling another house anytime soon so they don't worry about repeat business from you.

Mike

[So what do I want from a realtor? One whose interest is aligned with mine, which is to get the maximum net from the sale.]

[And don't get me started on home inspectors. I think one thing they teach them is that the list of "defects" has to be a certain length, no matter what the condition of the house. Some of the things the "inspector" listed as defects on my house were ridiculous. I'm convinced that if I fixed every ridiculous thing he listed and he came back and did another inspection, he would produce another list of the same length.
Inspectors know that the buyer wants a list that they can negotiate from and they won't get any business from buyers' side agents if they say the house is in good condition.]

Brian Elfert
07-22-2015, 2:51 PM
I sold a house I had built in 2001 in 2014. The inspector the buyers found TWO things wrong. One was the stove didn't work. Simple 10 second fix because the child lock was on. Second was a very minor leak in the septic pump discharge plumbing. I replaced the pipes and the buyer was fine with that. Inspectors don't always find a big list of issues.

My realtor was pretty good. He didn't have an issue with a listing price a little higher than other realtors suggested. I wanted to lower the price and he actually talked me out of lowering it. He sells so many houses that I think he can afford to wait a little longer on sales. He doesn't have to have the sale to put food on the table next month. I didn't really like he required a six month agreement.

I used the same realtor to buy my next house. He had me sign an agreement that he would get his commission if I bought ANY house within six months no matter if he was part of the deal or not. I didn't realize how limiting that agreement was and would have told him to take a hike if I realized how bad the agreement was for me. If I bought a piece of land and made all my own arrangements to have a house built I still owed him 2.75% on the price of the house even though he would do absolutely nothing. I ended up not building a house because of the extra $5,000 that would come out of my pocket. I bought a foreclosure for $150,000 and spent $110,000 on repairs. I'm shocked I wasn't required to pay his 2.75% on the $110,000.

Julie Moriarty
07-23-2015, 7:25 AM
Mike, that's pretty much exactly what I've seen, both from the realtor and the home inspector. My attorney has been doing his best not to criticize either but he's slipped a few times and I get the feeling what he has seen so far he doesn't condone, and I'm being polite. He said a few things I won't repeat here but he's obviously displeased with some of what I'll call antics, though when I defined one such antic as unethical he could barely contain his agreement.

My take on the home inspectors is they are like divorce lawyers. Two parties can start off amicable but after hiring their own lawyers they end up hating each other. I don't think the buyers have a clue about the validity of the inspection report. But the fact it's 15 pages long might give them the impression they got their money's worth. They don't know the background of the inspectors or how they became certified and licensed by the state. From everything I've seen, it looks like generating revenue is the primary objective. The online "certifiers" sell you on the lie you can learn all you need to know about identifying real problems by taking a few hours of their online courses and pass a simple test. Then they sell you on the value of becoming a member of their group and paying monthly dues. The state charges you a fee for the license and the realtors probably ask for a cut if they recommend you. All you have to do is create a big report and everybody makes money.

Being an electrician, I couldn't help challenging the electrical part of the report. Some of the items made it obvious the inspectors have no expertise in electrical construction. I doubt they could repair half of the items they listed. I know the municipal building inspector. He's from my local. We worked together many times over the years. I took out a permit for some remodel work we were doing a couple of years ago. When he came to inspect I invited him in for coffee. I took him through the house and asked for his input. I knew I would be selling in a year or two and I wanted to make sure everything was up to date. He pointed out a few small things and I took care of them. They were up to code when installed but the code had changed. I did this because I didn't want to pass on problems to the new owners.

When I saw a 15 page report of "problems", I had thoughts about taking it to our building inspector and razzing him (in jest, of course) about missing all these things. I'm sure he'd roll his eyes at the report if he didn't burst out laughing first. But I doubt there's one person involved in the sale of our house who would know if the report was truly valid or not. So they are vulnerable because they think hiring inspectors who are certified and licensed guarantees they will be getting highly experienced professionals.

Ok, rant over.

As long as the appraisal goes through, we will soon have the opportunity to switch to the other side of the table and become buyers. What kind of fun will be in store for us there?

Chris Hachet
01-18-2016, 7:31 AM
This should be a sticky. I made mention of this, when we purchased our home in 2008.
The agent mainly steered us to remote, overpriced properties that were oversized.

My older son found our house, looking at the Sunday paper.

The agent resisted looking at the house, because it wasn't his listing
and would be forced to split the commission.

My Wife wanted to smooth over the agent's reluctance,
and I made it clear that if he didn't pursue the house,
he would lose us as clients, entirely.

I've never seen a man get so red.

People who work for you should do as you ask,
the first time.

It's an opaque process that adds cost to the price,
without adding value to the client.

With a good lawyer and a motivated seller,
buyers will soon render middlemen like Realtors obsolete.

Our experience was very much the oposite, but I am beginning to think I am the exception.

Randy Rose
01-19-2016, 2:15 PM
I've bought a half dozen homes and one of the Realtors did their job. The rest were just paper pushers that I had to drag through the process. Very disappointing ratio.

Same here.

Possibly the least credible "profession" that I have encountered.