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9 million is going to take some time to sell. You are going to appeal to a very small market of buyers who can and would want to spend that.
I would suggest marketing internationally. There are web sites that will do it for free and you can even search for other Realtors who have web sites and see if they will let you put it on their sites sort of as a reciprocal link. This should cost you little or no money.
I hope the listing contract is for a substantial amount of time. You will need the extra time to sell that kind of house and not be eliminated from the process should the contract run out.
I haven't checked in a while, but there was one here for 23M but from what I understand, it had a 3 year listing contract.
Yep. I regularly talk to brokers from places known and unknown....lol..... Basically all over the world.
Many markets already provide everything you mentioned
Quote:
Originally Posted by stevep
The thing about protecting the buyer because he can't handle the information is actually kind of silly. If the buyer has access to this information and then wants to see the property he'd call you (the listing broker) and then either you or someone in your office can show the property and if he wants to write an offer he could deal with you or someone in your office for representation. Also, this mls information doesn't give out seller's name, phone number, gatecodes etc.
Providing this info in one place/system would not hurt your business or "business model". With your current mls system, your basically making it harder for a buyer to find your property. Your actually advertising to sell something (a house), but then you don't want to show people the advertisement or details without making them work for it.
Just out of curiosity....How long does it take to sell a million dollar home?
Well, I sold my home and it was not even listed, in exactly 3 days for well over 2.5M. And the commission was north of 160K and I did not negotiate on that as I got my full asking price. In the following year properties in my town sold in about 180 days with average price being 1.8M. I hope that answers your question, probably not the answer you were looking for. Don't you wish you were a realtor in my town?
I have been looking for land and a house for 2-3 months and have a few suggestions/comments not really related to commission percentagages (though I agree with the posters who feel that with the bubble in housing prices recently, the percentage should be evaluated) but do relate to amt of work you put into sales.
My suggestions are really more on meeting a potential customers needs without tying up your time. Examples:
I personally hate wasting an agent's time and would prefer to look on my own first. Some agents won't give you directions to a place-they want to drive you there themselves. I like listings with directions.
Some agents take you to different properties even when you have requested a look at others.
Some continue to send emails even if you've told them you can access MLS listings.
One even went to county environmental guys to convince me the wetland protection issues were not a rpoblem after I'd told her I didn't want property because of the restrictions (I was correct-there were more restricitons than the seller or agent were aware of). She worked hard, but on things I didn't want her to do.
It would also be nice if there was a process to select/interview an agent in an unfamiliar area.
I have been looking for land and a house for 2-3 months and have a few suggestions/comments not really related to commission percentagages (though I agree with the posters who feel that with the bubble in housing prices recently, the percentage should be evaluated) but do relate to amt of work you put into sales.
My suggestions are really more on meeting a potential customers needs without tying up your time. Examples:
I personally hate wasting an agent's time and would prefer to look on my own first. Some agents won't give you directions to a place-they want to drive you there themselves. I like listings with directions.
Some agents take you to different properties even when you have requested a look at others.
Some continue to send emails even if you've told them you can access MLS listings.
One even went to county environmental guys to convince me the wetland protection issues were not a rpoblem after I'd told her I didn't want property because of the restrictions (I was correct-there were more restricitons than the seller or agent were aware of). She worked hard, but on things I didn't want her to do.
It would also be nice if there was a process to select/interview an agent in an unfamiliar area.
If we should make less in a hot market, should we make more in a cold market?
Providing this info in one place/system would not hurt your business or "business model". With your current mls system, your basically making it harder for a buyer to find your property. Your actually advertising to sell something (a house), but then you don't want to show people the advertisement or details without making them work for it.
While that logic is correct, the problem with it is that it misses an important fact; the MLS was not designed as an advertising medium for the general public. It was created so that cooperating real estate brokers could share information and make a blanket offer of cooperation on those properties they had listed for sale to other brokers who had agreed to operate under an agreed upon set of rules. Many MLS organizations have now decided to make that information public, because they believe that this might make their properties sell faster. At the same time, they don't want to take away the right of the listing brokerage to market the property as they see fit. The advent of IDX has complicated the issue further, as it allows brokers to effectively use listings that are not theirs to advertise. Of course, when most people say they saw a home on the mls, they probably saw it on the IDX site of some broker, or worse, a third party who simply uses the data to capture buyer information that they then try to sell back to real estate agents as "leads", without providing anything of any value to either the consumer or the broker. It seems that we (meaning real estate agents) have lost the ability to control where when & how our properties are advertised, but the entities mostly responsible for that occurring aren't providing the data that the consumers actually want.
A fine mess. I say let the real estate agents have control of our data again, and you'll find that properties get advertised properly.
Last edited by Bill Keegan; 01-17-2008 at 05:36 PM..
Reason: typo
Bill, I agree that the mls wasn't originally designed for the general public, but many ideas/technologies/inventions/sofware programs were originally intended for one purpose and then changed over time to keep up with new business trends, etc.
Today's buyer is very different than a buyer 10 years ago, but realtors still feel like they need to protect their mls system from these buyers. The value of a realtor isn't searching for homes on mls and then printing them out to show to a potential buyer. Some buyers might need this, but the majority don't and this is just a waste of time for both the realtor and buyer which slows down the entire process.
Another way to think of it is.. a buyer gives you general criteria info. You search and come up with 10 listings. You show it to the buyer and then show them the homes. After seeing the homes, they change their criteria a bit and you search again, print out another 10 listing and show them the homes. They don't like any of the homes, so you go back again and find 10 more listing, show them the homes... etc. This takes a lot of time. As an alternative, for the buyers who like searching the internet mls themselves, they can spend one or two nights on the mls looking at pictures, virtual tours, prices, neighborhoods, etc, and then really narrow it down to maybe 10 that fit all of their criteria. This method probably eliminates your first couple of home showing trips of homes that really didn't meet their criteria. The buyer finds the home they want quicker and you're not wasting your time showing them homes that they're not really interested in seeing. But again, this only works if buyers have access to one local/regional mls system.
Bill, I agree that the mls wasn't originally designed for the general public, but many ideas/technologies/inventions/sofware programs were originally intended for one purpose and then changed over time to keep up with new business trends, etc.
Today's buyer is very different than a buyer 10 years ago, but realtors still feel like they need to protect their mls system from these buyers. The value of a realtor isn't searching for homes on mls and then printing them out to show to a potential buyer. Some buyers might need this, but the majority don't and this is just a waste of time for both the realtor and buyer which slows down the entire process.
Another way to think of it is.. a buyer gives you general criteria info. You search and come up with 10 listings. You show it to the buyer and then show them the homes. After seeing the homes, they change their criteria a bit and you search again, print out another 10 listing and show them the homes. They don't like any of the homes, so you go back again and find 10 more listing, show them the homes... etc. This takes a lot of time. As an alternative, for the buyers who like searching the internet mls themselves, they can spend one or two nights on the mls looking at pictures, virtual tours, prices, neighborhoods, etc, and then really narrow it down to maybe 10 that fit all of their criteria. This method probably eliminates your first couple of home showing trips of homes that really didn't meet their criteria. The buyer finds the home they want quicker and you're not wasting your time showing them homes that they're not really interested in seeing. But again, this only works if buyers have access to one local/regional mls system.
I know it's not adequate in every market yet, but that is what Realtor.com is for. We can't share the MLS in it's current format for privacy reasons. Sellers contact info, if homes are vacant, alarm codes, etc. Realtor.com needs to be brought up to speed everywhere and we should be good.
Bill, I agree that the mls wasn't originally designed for the general public, but many ideas/technologies/inventions/sofware programs were originally intended for one purpose and then changed over time to keep up with new business trends, etc.
Today's buyer is very different than a buyer 10 years ago, but realtors still feel like they need to protect their mls system from these buyers. The value of a realtor isn't searching for homes on mls and then printing them out to show to a potential buyer. Some buyers might need this, but the majority don't and this is just a waste of time for both the realtor and buyer which slows down the entire process.
Another way to think of it is.. a buyer gives you general criteria info. You search and come up with 10 listings. You show it to the buyer and then show them the homes. After seeing the homes, they change their criteria a bit and you search again, print out another 10 listing and show them the homes. They don't like any of the homes, so you go back again and find 10 more listing, show them the homes... etc. This takes a lot of time. As an alternative, for the buyers who like searching the internet mls themselves, they can spend one or two nights on the mls looking at pictures, virtual tours, prices, neighborhoods, etc, and then really narrow it down to maybe 10 that fit all of their criteria. This method probably eliminates your first couple of home showing trips of homes that really didn't meet their criteria. The buyer finds the home they want quicker and you're not wasting your time showing them homes that they're not really interested in seeing. But again, this only works if buyers have access to one local/regional mls system.
My wife and I are very busy people. We work long hours far from home and because of this we are hardly ever there. It is almost impossible to take time off for any reason let alone to have our time wasted looking at a house we are not interested in. When we were ready to buy our house we spent 3 months looking at every listing our web searches brought us. We kept track of everything that interested us and through the process we chaged our minds 3-4 times. As we did more and more research we were able to tweak things to the point that we went from over 200 possibilities down to 5. These 5 were all priced similarly, had all the features we wanted in the neighborhoods we wanted.
We had financing in place and partially approved before we saw the first property. We contacted the sellers agents to schedule walkthrus. We contacted the inspectors and researched permits on the 2 that were under construction at the time. When we finally got to the point of choosing ONE and making an offer and having a contract written up we found out that the sellers agent was due to receive over 30k in commissions. This was completely unacceptible to us. I was NOT going to pay someone 30k for doing nothing but listing a home on the MLS and writing up a contract. Yes "I" have to pay dont try to sugar coat it buy saying the seller pays...We tried to renegotiate but that went nowhere. We finally walked away from the deal and found another property and agent a few months later that was more than willing to work with us.
I know that I am not alone in the way we researched and found our house. More and more people are doing this. The old way of doing things is quickly changing. People are becomming more and more savvy. If the industry doesnt wake up and find better cheaper ways to keep up there will be more and more FSBO and people like us to make your livelyhood harder and harder. Do you deserve an host wage for honest work, absolutely. I even believe you as professionals deserve more than that. I know "I" do in my line of work. But that much money for little to no work paid by a private individual, no way.
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Many markets already provide everything you mentioned
