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Okay, so I just bought my first home ever here in Memphis, TN. My realtor is a local realtor that has been in the business 8 to 9 years, had very good reviews and came highly recommended from people within the local RE business. I interviewed her, the interview went well and I selected her to represent me.
My house search didn't take particularly long. The 3rd house that my agent and I looked at is the first house that I made an offer on and is the house that I ended up purchasing. My agent and I toured the house on the afternoon of June 23rd, submitted an offer on the house later on that night (almost a must, as houses in the good neighborhoods here sell almost immediately) and had the offer accepted the next day. We picked a closing date of August 3rd, as that was a Thursday (I was told not to close on a Friday in case there were issues) and it would give me slightly more time to move. Also, it would make my first payment due in October.
As far as inspection goes, I requested a home inspection which was scheduled to be performed on July 3rd (my agent and I were both present for that inspection) and a sewer line inspection that was scheduled to be performed on July 6th (I didn't attend for this one and I don't think my agent was there). Both the home inspection and sewer line inspection companies were picked by my agent and scheduled by my agent.
This is sort of when things went awry from a communication standpoint. The house inspection occurred without a hitch, as I was present for the inspection, paid for the inspection online that night and received my report promptly. The sewer line inspection was whole other story and was my first issue with my realtor, as I couldn't ever seem to get the sewer line inspection report or an invoice for the work from my realtor.
The other issue that I had was related to the roof; the roof of this house was either repaired or replaced in March of this year (I am not sure which, as I wasn't able to get clarification on the extent of the work) and it occurred to me that it likely had a warranty on it and, if so, then I needed to get the warranty info on the roof. To this date I have been unsuccessful in getting my realtor to find out this information and provide it to me.
So, I had two issues with her during the transaction: the sewer line inspection and the roof warranty and I personally believe that both of these issues are related to communication issues largely on her part. Since this was my first time buying a house, I don't know what the norm is as far as issues that might occur in the process or what the norm is as far as communication with and from my realtor and what I should really expect there, so I wanted to get some opinions from some of you, since you would obviously have a lot more experience and know what the typical experience is.
To give you more detail related to my two issues, here is a timeline of communication related to these two issues:
July 6th - the sewer line inspection was scheduled to occur on this date. I sent my realtor a text on the afternoon of the 6th asking if the inspection had been completed; the realtor responded back that she wasn't sure, as she ha a family emergency an was out of town. She told me that she had another agent covering for her while she was gone and she would keep me posted.
July 8th - I met with my realtor to review the home inspection report and to go over the list of recommendations from the report and come up with a list of repairs that we would request from the seller. I mentioned again that we needed to get the sewer line inspection, as that is something that I would ask to be fixed if issues were found during the inspection and that we would need to include that in our repair list to the seller.
July 10th - I heard via text from my realtor that the sewer line inspection reportedly looked clear and that the company would be sending her the inspection report later on in the afternoon. Based on this information, we went ahead and sent our repair list to the seller's agent with no requests for plumbing repairs.
July 12th - via email I again asked my realtor if she had received a copy of the sewer line inspection report and asked if I was supposed to receive a copy of the inspection report and I also told her that I had never received an invoice from the company for the inspection.
July 18th - My realtor did not respond to my July 12th email about the sewer line inspection report & invoice, so I sent her a followup email on July 18th again asking her if she had ever received a copy of the sewer line inspection report and/or an invoice from the company for the work. She sent a followup email later that afternoon and stated that she had never received an invoice from the company but had called them earlier that day to request the invoice. She didn't provide any response in her email to my question about whether the inspection report had been received. She did forward the "Thank You" email notification that she received from the inspection company to me and told me that she would keep working on it.
July 25th - via email I requested that my realtor check to see if there is a warranty on the roof, as since we knew work had been done on the roof in March then there likely was a warranty for that work. My realtor emailed me that same day and told me that she would find out what company did the work and let me know if there was a warranty (what company did the work, the warranty status, etc.)
July 29th - via email I again requested the sewer line inspection report from my realtor, as well as the invoice from the inspection company and told her that I would not be able to pay for the inspection if the company could not provide me with the report. I had not received any update from my realtor on this issue since our July 18th exchange and my realtor provided no email response to this request.
Afternoon of August 1st - My realtor sends me a text explaining that she would be leaving the next morning for a 10th anniversary trip to Mexico with her husband (this was a surprise trip that he had sprung on her) and that a fellow realtor friend of hers would be handling my closing on the morning of August 3rd. I was able to complete the walkthrough of my house on the night of August 1st with my own realtor, as I stated that I preferred to review repairs with my own realtor rather than the realtor that would be covering for my realtor. My realtor was okay with this and complied with my request to complete the walkthrough with me. At the walkthrough my realtor on August 1st, I again brought up the need to find out about a warranty on the roof and asked her to look into it for me. It was also at the walkthrough that my realtor finally gave me an update on the sewer line inspection and basically told me that they couldn't find the report (which is what I already expected) and wouldn't be billing me for the inspection (pretty much expected, as I wasn't going to pay if they couldn't provide me with the report). I will admit that I was annoyed that it took my realtor so long to get any real response from the inspection company and, in general, I was unhappy because it was almost a month after the inspection was supposed to have occurred and, as a result, it was way too late to get another inspection done and request any repairs that might have been found in the inspection.
August 3rd - this was closing date and my realtor's friend was at the closing and everything went well. No issues on this date.
August 7th - I receive a text from realtor congratulating me and asking how closing had gone "today" (keep in mind that closing was 4 days earlier). I responded to her via text that closing went smoothly but again reiterated that we really needed to find out whether or not there was a warranty on the roof of my house. She never sent a response.
August 7th - I did send another followup text to her as sort of a joke on the night of August 7th; it was basically a picture of the dirty fridge that the seller had left. It was pretty filthy but I knew it would be, as I expect that most sellers probably don't make an effort to clean up much when they leave appliances behind. She did respond to this text two days later (August 9th) and asked me if I wanted her to send someone over to help me clean it. I responded back to her text that same day (August 9th) and told her that it wouldn't be necessary, as I had already cleaned it that same night (ie August 7th).
August 16th at noon - via email to my realtor I again asked if she had ever reached out to the seller's agent to see if there was a warranty on the roof of my house. As of this posting, I have yet to receive a response.
Okay, so that is it. I will admit that I was pretty annoyed by the two primary issues that I had with her through this process: the lack of followup on the sewer line inspection report and the lack of followup on the question of the roof warranty. I will admit that I also was annoyed that I found out at the last minute that she wouldn't be present at closing, though I recognize that this wasn't entirely her fault as it was a surprise trip from her husband. As a first-time buyer, I had never been through the closing process before so I was pretty nervous about doing it without my own realtor present. Thankfully, the closing process went well, so I didn't really miss my realtor not being there. I also will admit that I am a bit annoyed that other than 1 semi-congratulatory text 4 days after closing, I really haven't heard much of anything from her or had her ask how things were going with the moving process. I know that isn't required but I have heard that most realtors at least try to keep touch with their clients.
So, am I overreacting to how things went or do I have a right to be annoyed at some of what happened? Is this typical of how realtors handle communication or is this a non-typical situation? I just wanted to get some opinions, as I don't think this is really normal but I don't want to overreact either. I have yet to provide any review of her at the usual places (like on Zillow) because I am afraid that a truly honest review would really hurt her reputation and her business.
1. Was the sewer inspection actually done?
2. Was a roof inspection actually done?
3. Find out who her boss (the managing broker) is and contact him/her.
1. Was the sewer inspection actually done?
2. Was a roof inspection actually done?
3. Find out who her boss (the managing broker) is and contact him/her.
And, no, your experience is not typical.
Dave,
thanks for the response.
1. I think the sewer inspection was probably done but since the company couldn't even provide a report proving that it even occurred and what they found, they agreed not to charge me.
2. The roof was looked at as part of the home inspection. The inspector noted that a few shingles were turned up just a bit. This was part of what eventually led me to ask whether or not the roof had a warranty, since the seller listed that the roof had work done on it in March of this year. Unfortunately, despite asking my realtor all of the times in my post above to find out who did the work and about a warranty, she's failed to ever do so.
3. I am not sure who her managing broker/boss at her firm. Technically I think she is considered a broker rather than an Associate Realtor. I know an Associate Realtor has a managing broker but I am not sure if a more senior-level realtor/broker has a manager.
What did the sellers disclosure say about the roof repairs?
I went back into my emails and found the Seller's Disclosure. It listed the Roof Type as "Shingle" and the age (approx.) as "March 2017". As part of the disclosure, the seller's agent included the MLS listing and in the Public Remarks section of the MLS listing she states "New Roof 2017".
So, based on that, it is pretty clear that it was a brand-new roof put on in March of this year. I would assume there would be some type of warranty but I don't know for sure what the standard is in the roofing industry for warranties. I am partly mad at myself for not pushing my realtor harder on this subject but also partly upset with my realtor because when the listing makes it clear that a new roof was put on the house less than 6 months earlier, I would assume one of the first things she would want to check on would be the company that put on the roof, is there a warranty, etc. That didn't happen, unfortunately.
We were first time sellers and had similar communication problems with the realtor we chose to SELL our house. So I would imagine a buyer may face similar issues.
If you go through this again you should not close on the house until you have everything that you need. What if there are sewer problems? You have no recourse. What makes you think the inspection even happened? I would get one asap and hold your agent's broker's feet to the fire if anything turns up.
Call the listing agent and ask if your sellers have any details on the roof replacement. We insisted on warranty info and contractor details and proof of a permit when our sellers handed us a "new" roof.
Frankly I would have refused to close without knowing if the sewer had any issues or what the warranty stated on the roof.
This. But it's too late now. Unless she owns the company, she has a boss. You should be able to look that information up pretty easily. I would go to them.
I've worked with 4 different realtors, and have had similar communication issues with three of them. I sense many of them forget who is working for whom and start thinking a bit too highly of themselves. They view us buyers as merely pawns for them to make as much money as they can as quickly as possible with the smallest amount of work required.
The realtor we used to buy our first home was very slow to respond and in my opinion not very professional in his answers. He would often show up at showings on the phone, and was even texting during our closing. Since then, two others have shown similar disregard, with late and vague responses, one of whom lost a sale because we found another place a few days after we were ready to put an offer on a house she had shown us, yet she didn't respond for 4 days to my email.
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