Biden admin going after realtors!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When I bought a house 10 years ago, I had a reality. I found it myself on redfin, showed up at the open house by myself, and had a second showing with a backup agent my realtor sent in his place. The paperwork my realtor completed was repeatedly incorrect - luckily my attorney husband was able to catch/fix it. My realtor was more than happy to show up at the closing, though. Got his check!

yea, similar experience.

I found the house, and sent the link to my realtor. During negotiations, she didn't bother to call me and tell me what the counter was, and if we wanted to bump up our offer. I had to call her six hours later to ask her what was going on with the negotiations. So, I told her to bump it up, and then they accepted.

I did all the leg work on that house. The realtor for the second house we bought earned her paycheck, though.

We had another house we were trying to sell, and the guy was a complete waste. We had zero interest in 2 years. Finally got a new guy, and we started seeing some requests.

DH didn't want to find a new agent to sell the house because the same guy helped him buy the house. I was like.. "no, we need to find a new realtor". Don't stick with people who aren't doing the work for you.

Same happened to me. I’m addition I learned my realtor worked with the sellers realtor to up the price beyond what the home was valued at. I had a bottom line price and it turned out both realtors were colluding. I exited the market.

Recalling the "reputation" arguments:

Like any other profession, a real estate agent's long term prosperity is tied to their professional reputation. Therefore, doing a good job for their clients is an important part of what the agent needs to do. Therefore, an agent will want to take the factors you outlined above into account on their client's behalf. Are there bad agents/bad apples out there? Of course.
previous poster

The above is why reputation alone is insufficient, and transparent price competition matters. Schemes like the buyer broker commission protect bad agents/bad apples; they have no reputation incentive. The good agents/ good apples are incentivized by reputation, but are further incentivized by unconstrained price competition.

Thus eliminating NAR schemes like the buyer broker commission is a win-win for consumers.

For bad agents, this is a lose-lose. For good agents, time will tell. If the fair market outcome is a loss for some good agents, find a new income source.


This reputation of yours is bought very cheaply online these days. You can pay Yelp, google services a set price to Make sure all your reviews are 5 stars. LOL

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In a more transparent state I sold my house with following deal.
I find buyer, show house, no realtor work for that realtor gets 1 percent
Realtor gets buyer on own she gets 3.5 percent
Realtor resorts to dual agency commission is 5 percent but split I she only gets 2.5 percent.

In that state lawyers do closing so realtors mainly connect buyers and sellers

sounds like VA. I have done the other way around - bought houses in VA and realtor gave me credit back from his commission for everything above 1%. Very common these days.

[Anonymous]

This all reminds me of the fight years ago from the DC taxi drivers trying to defend the old zone system.
They said they needed the high fees because they couldn't count on passengers for a steady income. And then they tried to claim the zones actually helped passengers.
When were you last in a DC cab?

[Anonymous]

Agent here. Last night I received seven offers on a moderately priced house in Virginia. Of the seven buyer agents, each was contributing from 1 to 1.5% to the buyer's for closing costs. The buyer who got the house was not giving the buyer any part of his commission. His clients did everything right to get the house from pre-inspection to solid financials and good local lender.

The buyer paid less than the maximum escalated price on two other offers. They both had home inspections, and the seller did not think it was worth the trouble for about a little more money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agent here. Last night I received seven offers on a moderately priced house in Virginia. Of the seven buyer agents, each was contributing from 1 to 1.5% to the buyer's for closing costs. The buyer who got the house was not giving the buyer any part of his commission. His clients did everything right to get the house from pre-inspection to solid financials and good local lender.

The buyer paid less than the maximum escalated price on two other offers. They both had home inspections, and the seller did not think it was worth the trouble for about a little more money.

Huh?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agent here. Last night I received seven offers on a moderately priced house in Virginia. Of the seven buyer agents, each was contributing from 1 to 1.5% to the buyer's for closing costs. The buyer who got the house was not giving the buyer any part of his commission. His clients did everything right to get the house from pre-inspection to solid financials and good local lender.

The buyer paid less than the maximum escalated price on two other offers. They both had home inspections, and the seller did not think it was worth the trouble for about a little more money.

Stop trying to protect astronomical realtor fees. The buyer won because they waived the inspection contingency. The other buyers are almost certainly aware that this is an option but weren't foolish enough to do this. Your implication that the realtor who receives full fees is somehow better is ridiculous. More like he closed the deal without regard for the buyer's best interest.

[Anonymous]

These kind of posts annoy me. If the realtors lobby still think that they can protect 5-6% commission slashing to 1-2% then good luck with that. Most overpriced and under educated profession.

[Anonymous]

They need to do away with mandatory dual listing if you really want commissions cut.

In NY/NJ a really good realtor lists home and finds buyer if they charge 3.5 percent make more than in DMV with a six since they don’t have to give away 1/2 their commission

[Anonymous]

I don’t really get the problem. Traditional agent and mls is only one product that competes with FSBO, Trulia, Redfin, Flat fee agencies… etc. It’s a very good product and that’s why people choose it. It’s competing in the open market.

[Anonymous]

Nobody is stopping people from selling on Facebook marketplace, FSBO etc…

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:These kind of posts annoy me. If the realtors lobby still think that they can protect 5-6% commission slashing to 1-2% then good luck with that. Most overpriced and under educated profession.

Nope the most overpriced is colleges. They need to be slashed. The gouging they have done indebting young people is criminal .

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I don’t really get the problem. Traditional agent and mls is only one product that competes with FSBO, Trulia, Redfin, Flat fee agencies… etc. It’s a very good product and that’s why people choose it. It’s competing in the open market.

Many agents representing buyers refuse to take their clients to homes listed by FSBO, Redfin, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I don’t really get the problem. Traditional agent and mls is only one product that competes with FSBO, Trulia, Redfin, Flat fee agencies… etc. It’s a very good product and that’s why people choose it. It’s competing in the open market.

Many agents representing buyers refuse to take their clients to homes listed by FSBO, Redfin, etc.

And why would a stupid ass buyer want an agent to take them to an FSB0?

I sold two places FSBO and ones with agent I told they either have to pay agent fee direct or bid higher to cover me paying an agent fee.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:These kind of posts annoy me. If the realtors lobby still think that they can protect 5-6% commission slashing to 1-2% then good luck with that. Most overpriced and under educated profession.

Agreed, literally need to have no qualifications to get a realtors license, do negligeable amount of work, and yet expect to get paid 2.5-3 percent of the sale price of a home. The idea that someone without a college degree (or at least a degree from a decent ie top 100 college) who does a few hours of work in aggregate for a deal expects that they deserve or can expect to get paid as much as they do is irritating, to say the least. With the advent of technology, people find their own homes, so that part is now done, so I really fail to see the value of a realtor nowadays.

All this being said, I do wonder whether this ruling may have unintended consequences for people (specifically on the buying side).

[Anonymous]

We bought and sold 3 houses so far and the realtors have been pretty much useless. I knew what neighborhoods we wanted, found the houses on redfin, and ordered our own inspection. We sold by owner and paid for our own appraisal, which was $500. I can see the value in having an agent when one sells in a buyer's market, but, overall, it all comes down to price. In Virginia, the contract is also standardized, so it's not brain surgery.