Signing Sales Agreement with TollBrothers this week- What to Look out for?

[MayouInSeattle]

Originally Posted by baobeijuju

I bought in Sammamish -Woodhaven, are you familiar with the area or are thinking about purchasing a house in Sammamish?

I had a friend that was looking at their community in Magnolia. I hear they have one planned for Queen Anne in a year or two as well.

Sammamish is a wonderful place to live. You get nice newer houses and it is a straight shot on the 90 into the city. I have a friend that lives there and she loves it.

[Qabyss]

There is very little incentive, outside of having an existing relationship with a broker, to use an outside agent when purchasing from a new home community. The reality is, that builders have a lot of addenda that nearly all outside agents are not familiar with. In new construction, you are often looking at options and specs and features on homes that are not even built yet and forms and procedures unique to each new community and builder. Not only does Washington State Law require your site agent to look out for your best interests, the builder is very selective in who is allowed on their sales team, and ensures that these brokers take good care of you (buyer satisfaction is very important in selling out a new community, as you can imagine). These site agents are the best of the best, agents would kill for such an opportunity.

Site agents, although hanging their license with the listing brokerage office, make very little money if they do not obtain sales representing buyers. They ARE your agent, both by design of WA law, and the desire of the builder. (Some builders do use agent employees to sell their homes, and that works a little bit differently).

Even when you bring in an outside agent, the paperwork for a new community is so foreign to most of them, that the site agents end up doing all of the work that your broker is being paid to do. It is unfortunate that folks get paid for the work that someone else is doing, especially if the buyer found the new home without their agent's assistance.

My experience in these matters comes from more than 70 years of combined brokerage experience at the boutique brokerage that my family owns, both as listing brokers for more than twenty large new communities, and as buyer's brokers for hundreds of new home purchases.

The only folks who champion using an outside agent are outside agents who want your money, for doing less work.