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My point is that you don't have to get an agent to sell your house. You can do it yourself.
You sure can. But what is your time worth?
Do you work? Can you show the place at 11am? Like a realtor can?
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The pay comes from the buyer, that's what the contract says. He's the one with he money. But this is semantics.
No, the "pay" comes from the seller.
Semantics aside, what does the following mean?:
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Assuming both seller and buyer can meet between what they pay and receive then they split commission in half.
Huh?
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Also I assume the buyer knows how to negotiate. If one needs someone else to hold his hand then OK.
You do assume, and you assume a lot. How many properties have you sold and bought?
There is much more that comes after "negotiating" a selling price as a buyer, and the realtor does the "back and forth" for. I've sold and bought my fair share and every deal has it's own quirks. There is no such thing as a "textbook" sale.
I've sold 4 properties as FSBO's (there is no "I" in FSBO). That was back when I had the time. After the fourth I swore I would never FSBO again and I haven't. Just not worth it. The second property I FSBO'd I lived in and that was ridiculous. Looky-loo's felt they could hang out a lot longer than they should have and tell me what hospital I should deliver my kid at (I was preggo at the time). They didn't like being told that their low-ball was insulting, when they "got back" with an offer. I got full price for all 4 of my FSBOs, but that was pure luck and due to the market inching up every week.
After my 4th FSBO, all of of the properties I have since sold have been through a REA. I took one off the market after 3 months of low-balls, and two months later my agent called me (still off-market) with a buyer. Some guy bought it and offered more than I hoped to get.
How did that happen? My agent "knows" people and keeps on top of things. Without him I'd probably still own it and have it listed with the DOM around 5027 days.
The cost of me keeping it listed and running over to let people in to see it on my own? No thanks, my time is worth more than that. My REA earned every penny, and sometimes it IS all about who your realtor KNOWS/networks with - that you do not and never will.
Please. I bought and sold many houses. I can tell you that the agent never negotiated any fair price for me. If I did not do my own research I would be taken for a song. Agents want the sale and do not care at all if the buyer pays more or a sellers get less. Fairness is not in their dictionary. Sale is.
If there is something that agents are useless and dangerous is price negotiations.
Nothing personal, but if you don't know the basic fact that it's the seller that pays the commission, then I highly doubt you've ever sold a house.
You do realize that what you described is exactly why a an agent is necessary: to bring about a meeting of the minds and consummate the deal: Yes, we have fiduciary duties to our clients, both buyers and sellers, to get top dollar for them but we're also charged with getting the deal done. I've had deals almost fall apart at the last minute over really minuscule amounts of money, like a couple of hundred dollars on a transaction that was over $900K. You're much like Alan Greenspan, believing that the market is rational and efficient, except you forget you're not dealing with widgets, but rather people, who are almost always emotional and irrational, especially when large sums of money are involved. Agents help bring sanity and clarity to the process, at least the good ones do.
I am sure there are some realtors out there who work very hard for their clients and worth the $$ they charge their clients. However, I also think they are few and far in-between.
For example- just go to realtor.com or any other sites which let you search MLS database. Depending on the area and price of the house, I would say 80% to 90% of the listing are incomplete, incorrect, have very poor pictures. There is absolutely no excuse for this in this day and age. I understand that MLS is a not one but multiple database and the data fields do not match from one MLS database to another, but it is 2014 now, National Association of Realtors should have fixed it by now. Now, lets say, National Association of Realtors failed to do their job (for whatever reason), but should a seller's agent not have figured out how to enter data in database so that it appears correctly in realtor.com (which seems to be the main portal)? I would say 50 to 70% listings do not have a description at all. 30% of listings have wrong schools listed. 10 to 20% houses are not shown correctly on the map. And don't even get me started on the pictures.
Finally, should the listings not have a layout of the house with rough non-legally binding size of various rooms. I would say 90% of listings do not have this info.
If the realtors get produce a good and accurate listing of a house, it will a win-win for everyone. Seller will not have to do too many unnecessary showings. Buyers can easily eliminate listings which do not work for them (e.g. family room to small). And Realtors themselves will save gas and time by reducing the number of showings. Win-win for everyone.
I am sure there are some realtors out there who work very hard for their clients and worth the $$ they charge their clients. However, I also think they are few and far in-between.
For example- just go to realtor.com or any other sites which let you search MLS database. Depending on the area and price of the house, I would say 80% to 90% of the listing are incomplete, incorrect, have very poor pictures. There is absolutely no excuse for this in this day and age. I understand that MLS is a not one but multiple database and the data fields do not match from one MLS database to another, but it is 2014 now, National Association of Realtors should have fixed it by now. Now, lets say, National Association of Realtors failed to do their job (for whatever reason), but should a seller's agent not have figured out how to enter data in database so that it appears correctly in realtor.com (which seems to be the main portal)? I would say 50 to 70% listings do not have a description at all. 30% of listings have wrong schools listed. 10 to 20% houses are not shown correctly on the map. And don't even get me started on the pictures.
Finally, should the listings not have a layout of the house with rough non-legally binding size of various rooms. I would say 90% of listings do not have this info.
If the realtors get produce a good and accurate listing of a house, it will a win-win for everyone. Seller will not have to do too many unnecessary showings. Buyers can easily eliminate listings which do not work for them (e.g. family room to small). And Realtors themselves will save gas and time by reducing the number of showings. Win-win for everyone.
Just my $0.02.
Excellent input and all very true. Bad photos, no floor plans, no square footage, descriptions written in English as a 5th language, it's all too common.
I am sure there are some realtors out there who work very hard for their clients and worth the $$ they charge their clients. However, I also think they are few and far in-between.
For example- just go to realtor.com or any other sites which let you search MLS database. Depending on the area and price of the house, I would say 80% to 90% of the listing are incomplete, incorrect, have very poor pictures. There is absolutely no excuse for this in this day and age. I understand that MLS is a not one but multiple database and the data fields do not match from one MLS database to another, but it is 2014 now, National Association of Realtors should have fixed it by now. Now, lets say, National Association of Realtors failed to do their job (for whatever reason), but should a seller's agent not have figured out how to enter data in database so that it appears correctly in realtor.com (which seems to be the main portal)? I would say 50 to 70% listings do not have a description at all. 30% of listings have wrong schools listed. 10 to 20% houses are not shown correctly on the map. And don't even get me started on the pictures.
Finally, should the listings not have a layout of the house with rough non-legally binding size of various rooms. I would say 90% of listings do not have this info.
If the realtors get produce a good and accurate listing of a house, it will a win-win for everyone. Seller will not have to do too many unnecessary showings. Buyers can easily eliminate listings which do not work for them (e.g. family room to small). And Realtors themselves will save gas and time by reducing the number of showings. Win-win for everyone.
Just my $0.02.
Agreed. Spot on. (Not sure about the percentages, but the amount is definitely way too much for this day and age.)
When there's no pictures, or no pictures of a particular part of the house, you can bet there's a very good reason for that.
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