we sold at 5 percent; didn't use an agent to buy.

for both i would ask 4 or 4.5
we sold with a 5%

We recently met with an agent to discuss her services for two transactions, as listing agent to sell our house and as buying agent to purchase another house. She told us 5.5% on the listing side, split 2.5% to her and 3% to the buying agent. This is silly to me. She will accept 2.5%, so why wouldn't that be satisfactory for the buying agent? Given online access to listings, most buyers spot houses to check out themselves, right!? Would a buyer's agent really try to avoid showing a house with a 2.5% buyers agent commission if the potential buyers expressed interest? I could see buyers agents having more power to control Potential buyer's access to available properties back in the day, but there is so much transparency now. Is a buyer's agent incentive (higher commision)even in the equation anymore??? Most buyers I know do the legwork in finding properties on their own!

Anonymous wrote:Can you give us the name of your agent who did it for 4%?

I would love to find an agent to sell our house at 4-41/2%

http://www.virginiamls.com/

Can you give us the name of your agent who did it for 4%?

I would love to find an agent to sell our house at 4-41/2%

Anonymous wrote:We are listing our current house and buying another. We are using the same agent for both. Standard commission is 6%. She has offered to reduce to 5 1/2. Has anyone had success in getting their agent to reduce further? Is this commonplace, or should I just be happy with the 1/2 % reduction already offered?

Yes, it's common practice that if you are using the same agent to buy and sell that they charge less, 5% is typical. Her reducing to 5.5% all-in is just silly. Do you even need a buyside agent?

And given agents rebates are proliferating in this environment, her 5.5% proposal looks even sillier. We got both agents to reduce their fees in our recent purchase, so all parties "met in the middle" to get the deal done (>$1m properties are moving slow). Dual agent deals cut rebates as well.

ours did 4. but we only pulled the realtor in for paperwork---didn't drag her around with us to open houses etc.

I think 5 is standard now for both sides of transaction, but you can even get a discount using a realtor for only one side of the transaction, so definitely negotiate.

5 percent is the new 6 percent. But that doesn't mean you can't do even better if you negotiate hard - depends on the realtor.

I've also heard that 5% is the standard now from friends who have bought and sold recently.

Ours did 5% listing for handling both transactions. I think the's more common.

We are listing our current house and buying another. We are using the same agent for both. Standard commission is 6%. She has offered to reduce to 5 1/2. Has anyone had success in getting their agent to reduce further? Is this commonplace, or should I just be happy with the 1/2 % reduction already offered?