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Been following this for awhile and I have got to ask and will probably get slammed but....WHY in the world would it take 2 yrs to find a house? And I have to say I would not tie up an agents time and expect them to be "jumpin" at every call after that much time, I would expect them to be with a serious buyer instead of chauffeuring me around to look. The other question is how can anyone look at a 100 houses and not find one?
I have had one buyer that took a year, and another buyer that is on about 1 1/2 years. Some people are just really picky and want to wait for what they want.
My picky buyers have always known they are picky and so we talked about that upfront and discussed how I could meet their needs but at the same time I need to be able to run my business. I have never shown a buyer 100 homes. I personally would cut them lose long before then. I think 55 is the most I ever showed anyone (the buyer that took one year).
Why in the world would it take two years to find a house? Because maybe I want to buy a house in a specific neighborhood, on a specific street, with specific sun exposure for my garden, with a specific layout, number of rooms/baths, with a specific lot size, and for a specific price. Some neighborhoods are small. It can take quite a while to find this! I am extremely picky, I know this, so does my agent.
I would like to add that I don't need to have ALL of these things. But most of them, yes. And the street and lot are a must.
Last edited by saltzman143; 05-07-2009 at 09:32 AM..
To make an anology with the insurance industry. It sounds like this agent and most average agents aren't very good problem solvers and just do what their clients ask. They show them different houses and let them PICK one just the way a mediocre health insurance agent will show their client a spread sheet of different health insurance plans and let them "Pick" one.
Instead what they SHOULD be doing if they were GOOD agents is showing the client why one is a better value over another and how the plans will work in different scenarios( ie. how co-pay plans are over priced and will cost them MORE money the sicker they get (and the more and more Rx co-pays they have to lay out every month) vs a plan with no co-pays and a high deductible which is actually much lower than what Rx co-pays would add up to --- if someone needed to be on 10 of the most expensive Rxs let's say ---and guide them towards the better value plan (or at least point out the risks and short comings of the others). At least that is what I do.
You aren't being a very helpful or consultative professional if all you do is let your client "pick" something.
I agree with this but you can't talk people into something they don't want even if it is a better value.
Example, I had a client that was upsizing. They had 1200sq feet and were looking at 2200 sq feet or so. They loved a 3,000 sq foot house. Their income was solid, but not a lot of room for budgeting. I talked with them about how much more their heating bills would be (threw out some numbers) and strongly encouraged them not to underestimate that impact on their budget.
Got a call from them about 3 months into living in their 3,000 sq foot home about why their heating bills were so much more than their 1200 sq foot house. They thought there was something wrong with the house. Sometimes you try, but people don't hear you...
You sound pretty analytical. Some people just don't work that way.
We have been browsing the market to buy a home for a couple years now and have been receiving help from an agent. However, lately she has been slacking. I often find properties on the internet on my own which I then ask her to provide details about. Her MLS sends me a list of properties from time to time. However, unlike the past, she no longer points out the ones that may be particularly interesting for us. If we are thinking of making an offer on a property, she doesn't divulge all the raw data and past history unless I ask specific questions. In the beginning of our search, I did not even know this is all public data and readily available to anyone for viewing. If a house is listed for 500K, and the previous sale, less than a year ago, was for 350K, I don't hear her giving that information to me.
Given that she is super prompt in replying to queries, I still find myself loosing interest in working with her because she now also has very limited time allocated for us on the weekends to go on property tours. I do understand that it has taken us longer than expected to find a house that we like. I would like to dump her, but my conscience won't allow me to do that because I would hate to see the time that she has spent after us go wasted.
Need unbiased views on this matter.
While granted I'm now in the Republic of Panama where international real estate sales is much different than when I was a Realtor in the States, as it does take most buyers longer to 1) determine if they want to move to a foreign country and 2) decide on the area of the country they want to buy - I've read through several of the responses to this post and just wanted to throw my 2 cents in (& since you are requesting 'unbiased views' on this, I'm going to be very straightforward in my response)
If you have been utilizing a buyer agent in the States for 2 years and she was spending a lot of time with you, yet after such a long period of time of showing you property you still have not decided on a home, most likely (as another poster pointed out), she is not taking you as a serious buyer - and no offense, but quite honestly neither would I. When I practiced in the States, yes, sometimes it took me several months to help my clients find the perfect home for them (especially when it was a major relocation then it could take as long as 6 months of scouring their area of interest to find the home - & a lot of previews and late work nights). To this Realtor's credit, she is still being very prompt in responding to your inquiries even after 2 years.
But considering market conditions in most areas of the States and the fact that a 'strong buyer's market' doesn't even come close to describing the market conditions in a lot of areas there, the Realtor does have other clients that she needs to devote time to and generate a sale in order to receive compensation for all of her hard effort and time expended. Realtors have bills to pay too, just like you do. Unlike other professions, Realtors do not receive compensation unless there is a closed transaction.
Though one thing I do agree with in your post is that if you actually have found a house where you want to put an offer in, then she should be advising you on the sale history of the home (sounds like in the aforementioned instance the house was essentially being flipped). In normal market conditions that wouldn't mean squat, but in the current market I would be advising my buyer to come in much lower than the current list price and then let's rock and roll.
It is NOT a strong buyer's market in the desirable areas close to amenities (whether it is jobs, retail, transit, good schools, views, etc.). There is low inventory (because a lot of sellers are holding on to their houses to see if prices go back up) and a lot of buyers. In those areas it is still a seller's market. In those areas it will take longer to buy because there are much fewer options and bidding wars.
If all your agent has been doing is showing you houses you ask to see, I wouldn't be very impressed. It certainly doesn't seem that most buyers' agents do much research. They just expect the buyer to do it all and then make an offer after looking at 5 houses and then collect their commissions for thousands of dollars.
I have an agent now who wasted a lot of time with me .........
I don't think any buyer working with an agent who in the end really works for the seller should divulge that info. The part of the "Property Virgin's" show on HGTV where the virgins/ first time home buyers tell the agent all about their budget and financing they qualify for is a BAD STRATEGY for a buyer if they want to get the best deal they can. Instead they should give the agent an idea such as a range ---but certainly don't divulge all your cards.
Clients get the agent they deserve and vice-versa.
You sound like you are property savy but your people picker is broke.
Assuming you are working with a full service, as opposed to a rebate agency, there is no reason why you or anyone should end up with a clerk with house keys.
Continuing to work with agents who do not meet your needs, you affirm the clerk with house keys. Is it reasonable to say most buyers' agents do not do much research when you have chosen to work with and affirm the ones who do not, instead of advocating for yourself and hiring one who meshes with your needs?
Buyers agency in many states means the buyer's agent has a fiduciary responsibility to the buyer. They are not a sub agent to the listing agent or the seller and are paid outof the transaction. This may or may not be the law in your state.
Agent and client is a partnership in pursuit of a common goal. If you withhold pertinate information, it creates the potential for a self fulfilling prophecy. The more information a buyer withholds, the less likely any agent is going to meet the buyer's expectations and thus the more disappointed the buyer will be with the outcome.
Why in the world would it take two years to find a house? Because maybe I want to buy a house in a specific neighborhood, on a specific street, with specific sun exposure for my garden, with a specific layout, number of rooms/baths, with a specific lot size, and for a specific price. Some neighborhoods are small. It can take quite a while to find this! I am extremely picky, I know this, so does my agent.
I would like to add that I don't need to have ALL of these things. But most of them, yes. And the street and lot are a must.
Quote:
Originally Posted by saltzman143
It is NOT a strong buyer's market in the desirable areas close to amenities (whether it is jobs, retail, transit, good schools, views, etc.). There is low inventory (because a lot of sellers are holding on to their houses to see if prices go back up) and a lot of buyers. In those areas it is still a seller's market. In those areas it will take longer to buy because there are much fewer options and bidding wars.
You make very good points. All the more reason why I would like to know how much "facetime" the OP had with this realtor over the years. You have a wonderful reason to be picky - but in your case, you obviously won't have a lot of showings to go to, simply because as you said, low inventory and specific needs. You have a plan, which the realtor knew of. What was the situation of the OP?
Been following this for awhile and I have got to ask and will probably get slammed but....WHY in the world would it take 2 yrs to find a house? And I have to say I would not tie up an agents time and expect them to be "jumpin" at every call after that much time, I would expect them to be with a serious buyer instead of chauffeuring me around to look. The other question is how can anyone look at a 100 houses and not find one?
I looked for three years! LOL! When I say I looked for three years, that doesn't mean I looked every day or I had an agent take me out every day. I was "in the market," meaning that if THE right thing came up, I'd buy. It didn't. I had very specific criteria, the legwork of which I did myself before I even contacted an agent. I knew what area I wanted to be in, and even narrowed it down to three buildings. It was in the narrowing process that I looked a lot. At that time the market was declining. I was very cautious. This was going to be a 1mm plus purchase and not one I was going to make without being 100% certain.
So yeah, when you're spending that kind of money, it can take years and hundreds of houses. At least for me.
In the end, the agent got lucky. The agent I had used in the narrowing down process pretty much blew me off. Six months later, I bought my place after the agent I went with showed me 7 in two days. You win some and you lose some. I do not feel the least bit of guilt. He chose to blow me off. He miscalculated me. He lost. But there are no hard feelings on my part.
The semantics of who pays the commissions doesn't make any difference. The commissions comes out of the proceeds of the sale unless the buyer has a true buyer's agent and is paying the agent separately. In the usual situation you have two agents that want a sale and some of whom are willing to say whatEVER they have to say (whether they should or not or whether it is even in their clients best interest to do so) to get a sale so they can get their commissions. I don't even think they really work for the seller. My listing agent for one property I had really mucked things up for me telling the buyer and their agent all sorts of things he had no business saying (that were actually all spelled out in the condo documents). So I ended up having to go hire an attorney (which I should have had him pay for) to undo the mess by pointing out that everything that was being offered was in the documents. I REALLY felt ripped off at that closing as the seller. That is why when it came time to sell the place I lived in I did it myself. People don't realize how the communication about the property and even the negotiations can get messed up the more people the message has to go through----and you as the seller and buyer are paying thousands of dollars for this.
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