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FYI our "sellers" paid 6% when we bought a decade ago. There is a full service firm in Raleigh that does everything for 3.9% now. Already fees are dropping, and fast.
As for Vicki's note, keep in mind she negotiated for the buyers. The seller lost out on those FSDOs. I can echo a similar story when we bought our house. Our agent pushed back on their ridiculous demands and made the process happen.
If you have a super simple home, with no issues, that gets multiple offers without contingencies not being represented might work.
A RE course in the Raleigh area is as low as $200. Can be as high as $500. You'd learn the in's and out's of the process and would probably be a worthwhile amount to spend if thinking of selling your home yourself. IMO.
I would have sworn somewhere in this topic, rdumike proclaimed he was not anti-agent.
I will tell you all that in the Triangle, we have sold about 38,000 homes in the last 12 months. There are 8,000 or more agents in the MLS - some are appraisers, etc and don't sell, but the vast majority do. Simple math tells me the "average" agent - that 95% figure - sells 5 homes a year. 5 homes at the current $280K average price is $1,400,000 in volume. That's $33,600 gross compensation before any expenses. Not many professionals would work for a piece of $33K.
The 5% that do make a good living for themselves and their families - they're successful. Successful does not always equal "a pleasure to deal with", "keeps their customers' interest foremost" or even "not snarky". Some people respond to snark with snark. Some people are able to grin and bear it.
While your arguments are valid for taxi as Uber's investors pay for the customers' trip (who does not want someone else to pay for your trip ) and travel web sites have been able to disinter-mediate travel agents, on the Real estate industry, the insiders are defending their business pretty well with well crafted local real estate laws and well proprietary database. Do not take this comment as pro or cons real estate agent. This is my view of the current real estate industry in most US states.
I agree with you about this trend of disintermediation in some industries, I am still waiting to see who will be able to break the real estate industry.
My opinion is that a more open real estate industry will benefit the customers as customers will be able to pick the right estate agent for their needs. As you mentioned a good real estate agent will always earn his fees for the service rendered. So far, there is no way for a buyer or seller to find the right estate agent. All the databases are not publicly available. To future comment/feedback, information given by a real estate agent to a prospective buyer or seller about how good she/he is is loaded with conflict or interest. Only third party independent information can be used to evaluate such claims or information from third party that has only interest in the prospect.
Interesting concept. If there was third party unbiased information available that allowed me to easily separate the good agents from the deadbeats, I would actually consider hiring an agent. It's too difficult to discern agents who actually perform vs those who like to talk it up and tell me how they will save my thousands with their expert negotiation skills while cutting down the idea of FSBO, labeling all FSBO sellers as incompetent.
You could go by recommendations from friends or family but I've found that most people have no idea what a "good" agent and base their recommendation off of how their agent was friendly and took care of all the paperwork.
I know many RE agents that are part time and do it on their own time. Either for themselves buying/seling investment property or helping people at my place of employment find homes. I would bet only 50% of agents are practicing full time. Just my in-house estimate.
Interesting concept. If there was third party unbiased information available that allowed me to easily separate the good agents from the deadbeats, I would actually consider hiring an agent. It's too difficult to discern agents who actually perform vs those who like to talk it up and tell me how they will save my thousands with their expert negotiation skills while cutting down the idea of FSBO, labeling all FSBO sellers as incompetent.
You could go by recommendations from friends or family but I've found that most people have no idea what a "good" agent and base their recommendation off of how their agent was friendly and took care of all the paperwork.
C-D is a good resource.
When we found our agent my #1 criteria was a Re/Max agent, because Re/Max (at the time) didn't blackball the flat rate listings which were just starting to gain popularity at the time.
We chose the agent based on correspondence requested when we were away from the area. My wife wanted some info on the area and the only agent to take the time to package up a nice packet of info was the one we choose. It ended up being an excellent choice as she was on her ball and a pro. She was also older.
I agree with you that it feels like everyone has their hand in the pot on a home transaction. The HUD forms are ridiculous and the "fees" just keep going. It's a huge profit center not only for everyone involved in the transaction but the entire US economy as a whole. Housing was the #1 driver of economic growth from 2003-2008, I wouldn't be surprised if it's been that way for the last few years as well. Janet Yellen has stated she views housing at the driver of employment.
FYI our "sellers" paid 6% when we bought a decade ago. There is a full service firm in Raleigh that does everything for 3.9% now. Already fees are dropping, and fast.
As for Vicki's note, keep in mind she negotiated for the buyers. The seller lost out on those FSDOs. I can echo a similar story when we bought our house. Our agent pushed back on their ridiculous demands and made the process happen.
If you have a super simple home, with no issues, that gets multiple offers without contingencies not being represented might work.
A RE course in the Raleigh area is as low as $200. Can be as high as $500. You'd learn the in's and out's of the process and would probably be a worthwhile amount to spend if thinking of selling your home yourself. IMO.
you're not going to learn very much about the execution of residential real estate sales by spending 75 classroom hours and passing 2 tests to be eligible for your NC Real Estate license. Heck, skip the tests and flunk the class - you're not getting any marketing or negotiation knowledge in the licensure class.
No one is forced to hire an agent to sell or buy a home. The ability to successfully navigate the process is based on either a) prior experience with multiple transactions or b) two parties that work really well together (they either know each other, or they're both somehow very reasonable folks) or c) good fortune.
I would have sworn somewhere in this topic, rdumike proclaimed he was not anti-agent.
I will tell you all that in the Triangle, we have sold about 38,000 homes in the last 12 months. There are 8,000 or more agents in the MLS - some are appraisers, etc and don't sell, but the vast majority do. Simple math tells me the "average" agent - that 95% figure - sells 5 homes a year. 5 homes at the current $280K average price is $1,400,000 in volume. That's $33,600 gross compensation before any expenses. Not many professionals would work for a piece of $33K.
The 5% that do make a good living for themselves and their families - they're successful. Successful does not always equal "a pleasure to deal with", "keeps their customers' interest foremost" or even "not snarky". Some people respond to snark with snark. Some people are able to grin and bear it.
I stand by my statement. I'm not anti-agent but I will defend myself against any agent who lashes out at me off topic for wanting to sell my house FSBO and label me as incompetent without knowing my background or level of experience.
Regarding snarky comments, you are right. It's my nature to respond to snark with snark.
I know many RE agents that are part time and do it on their own time. Either for themselves buying/seling investment property or helping people at my place of employment find homes. I would bet only 50% of agents are practicing full time. Just my in-house estimate.
Do you believe that an agent who works part-time does an equal job for their client as someone who works full-time.
Do you think the folks at your company are getting the best representation they could by using the part-time agent?
I think clearly that any agent who attempts to tell you personally that you shouldn't FSBO is clearly banging their head against a brick wall unnecessarily. I would guess that the comments that are "anti-FSBO" are not aimed at you, but rather to provide anecdotal evidence to all the other posters. As such, a discussion of the pros and cons of FSBO'ing your home are within the topic, as you put in the first post.
I think clearly that any agent who attempts to tell you personally that you shouldn't FSBO is clearly banging their head against a brick wall unnecessarily. I would guess that the comments that are "anti-FSBO" are not aimed at you, but rather to provide anecdotal evidence to all the other posters. As such, a discussion of the pros and cons of FSBO'ing your home are within the topic, as you put in the first post.
I hear the same blah blah blah from every agent that I encounter.
"You should have representation, I can negotiate better than you, everything can and will go wrong with your transaction, I'm the #1/ best / top rated sales person in Wake county and you need me because I can get thousands more for your house or save you thousands when buying."
While some of this may be true, this phrase has been repeated so many times, almost verbatim, it sounds too much like propaganda being spread to promote a dying industry.
Defensive agents, you should probably just give up arguing your value to me as are beating your head against a brick wall unnecessarily. If you dish it out to me, I will give it right back.
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) and travel web sites have been able to disinter-mediate travel agents, on the Real estate industry, the insiders are defending their business pretty well with well crafted local real estate laws and well proprietary database. Do not take this comment as pro or cons real estate agent. This is my view of the current real estate industry in most US states.
