Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our agent definitely did more work to help us buy a new house than to sell our old house because in last summer's market, houses were basically selling themselves, but to help us maximize the price for value, she:
- Gave us names for her preferred vendors (although we did call other people, but most of her vendors were a good price) and someone on her team coordinated the timing and access
- Paid for staging (two out of three floors), landscaping, and cleaning
- Called the listing agent of a house that went under contract in our neighborhood to find out what price they sold it for, and then recommended that we increase our listing price based on that (we did, by $25K and our house sold for $25K over that).
- Negotiated with the people who put down offers to get rid of all contingencies and get the fastest closing possible (two weeks)
- Coordinated the closing so that we could do everything virtually

Not a single solitary person I know had their agent pay for staging, landscaping or cleaning. Not one. What coordingating is need to do a closing virtually? What a joke. That is no work. I swear there are agents here sock puppetting.

You are quoting me and I'm not an agent. I sold a house in August 2023 and my agent included staging, landscaping, and cleaning in their fee (we also bought with them, and they made a lot of money on the purchase, maybe that's why). The landscaping wasn't anything major like tree removal, but they trimmed our bushes and mulched all the areas that needed to be mulched. I have no idea what goes into coordinating a virtual closing, we just followed the instructions that were sent to us.

I also posted about interviewing agents - we interviewed multiple agents. They all offered different services, but every single one of them paid for staging. I actually don't think I know anyone in this area whose agent didn't include staging. Ours said they would pay for a month, but we only needed the furniture for a week.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our agent definitely did more work to help us buy a new house than to sell our old house because in last summer's market, houses were basically selling themselves, but to help us maximize the price for value, she:
- Gave us names for her preferred vendors (although we did call other people, but most of her vendors were a good price) and someone on her team coordinated the timing and access
- Paid for staging (two out of three floors), landscaping, and cleaning
- Called the listing agent of a house that went under contract in our neighborhood to find out what price they sold it for, and then recommended that we increase our listing price based on that (we did, by $25K and our house sold for $25K over that).
- Negotiated with the people who put down offers to get rid of all contingencies and get the fastest closing possible (two weeks)
- Coordinated the closing so that we could do everything virtually

Not a single solitary person I know had their agent pay for staging, landscaping or cleaning. Not one. What coordingating is need to do a closing virtually? What a joke. That is no work. I swear there are agents here sock puppetting.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mine got us way more for our house than we were expecting. The value in someone good is not in the physical activity they do per hour but for positioning your house well, negotiating on your behalf, getting the right people in to help, and minimizing your risk. It’s a big transaction, and for us is worth the commission vs going with some Redfin agent who wants to slap your home on the MLS and sell it at any price.

Odds are good you'd have gotten the same price with a terrible agent. They don't really negotiate but review the offers and best and final offers with escalation clauses. I'm sure she did a decent job staging if it didn't cost you money but staging is meaningless to me. A good RE transaction lawyer can minimize risk for you by reviewing the contracts.

The simple reality is that RE agents are in a precarious position because much of their old value is now replaced by the internet and the comps data is available to everyone at their fingerprints and all it takes is a few decisive changes to wipe out the profession. There's no reason why a mortgage company can't offer RE transaction services and prepare the offer for you and review the contract for you before you sign to it, all for a few hundred dollars.

There can be a place for a RE agent with a first time buyer to walk them through the process and to help them understand comps, and ditto for some sellers who can't understand why their old kitchens and worn bathrooms mean the house is worth 200k less than the one next door that sold with a fully remodeled kitchen and bathrooms, but for experienced buyers/sellers, RE agents are useless and very much a cartel that needs destroying.

Different strokes. I don’t have the time nor interest in researching and getting good at what my agent knows because she does these transactions over and over. Our house sale and purchase were both large dollar value transactions and it’s worth it to me to have someone handle it who knows what they’re doing. I feel the same about a decorator and hiring out home repairs. It would take me too long to get good at it and my time is better spent on my own job and doing what I enjoy.

You clearly can afford to waste a lot of money on realtors (decorator? got it although I also have similar feelings, I've seen many professionally decorated houses that were shockingly dull and/or badly decorated). I have no experience with the 2M+ market but at 1M it's a very straightforward process and any reasonably intelligent person who's in a position to afford a 1M house can figure this out on their own and save 50-60,000 in commission fees. That's a lot of money. Are you aware that in most counties, including Europe and places like London, agent fees are nowhere close to 5-6% and yet people managed to sell houses!

Use a realtor if you want. We shouldn't have a cartel that forces everyone else to waste silly money on realtors because people like you are too lazy.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our agent definitely did more work to help us buy a new house than to sell our old house because in last summer's market, houses were basically selling themselves, but to help us maximize the price for value, she:
- Gave us names for her preferred vendors (although we did call other people, but most of her vendors were a good price) and someone on her team coordinated the timing and access
- Paid for staging (two out of three floors), landscaping, and cleaning
- Called the listing agent of a house that went under contract in our neighborhood to find out what price they sold it for, and then recommended that we increase our listing price based on that (we did, by $25K and our house sold for $25K over that).
- Negotiated with the people who put down offers to get rid of all contingencies and get the fastest closing possible (two weeks)
- Coordinated the closing so that we could do everything virtually

Not a single solitary person I know had their agent pay for staging, landscaping or cleaning. Not one. What coordingating is need to do a closing virtually? What a joke. That is no work. I swear there are agents here sock puppetting.

Anonymous wrote:Sorry, OP, about your agent. I had a very similar agent. I've used 3 different agents to buy and sell homes in the past and really felt they were a big waste of money. I have sold 2 properties FSBO and did extremely well both times and just the buyer's agent got a commission. It was totally fine. I really did not think it was much more work than using an agent. I think the whole real estate agent business can be scammy.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mine got us way more for our house than we were expecting. The value in someone good is not in the physical activity they do per hour but for positioning your house well, negotiating on your behalf, getting the right people in to help, and minimizing your risk. It’s a big transaction, and for us is worth the commission vs going with some Redfin agent who wants to slap your home on the MLS and sell it at any price.

Odds are good you'd have gotten the same price with a terrible agent. They don't really negotiate but review the offers and best and final offers with escalation clauses. I'm sure she did a decent job staging if it didn't cost you money but staging is meaningless to me. A good RE transaction lawyer can minimize risk for you by reviewing the contracts.

The simple reality is that RE agents are in a precarious position because much of their old value is now replaced by the internet and the comps data is available to everyone at their fingerprints and all it takes is a few decisive changes to wipe out the profession. There's no reason why a mortgage company can't offer RE transaction services and prepare the offer for you and review the contract for you before you sign to it, all for a few hundred dollars.

There can be a place for a RE agent with a first time buyer to walk them through the process and to help them understand comps, and ditto for some sellers who can't understand why their old kitchens and worn bathrooms mean the house is worth 200k less than the one next door that sold with a fully remodeled kitchen and bathrooms, but for experienced buyers/sellers, RE agents are useless and very much a cartel that needs destroying.

Different strokes. I don’t have the time nor interest in researching and getting good at what my agent knows because she does these transactions over and over. Our house sale and purchase were both large dollar value transactions and it’s worth it to me to have someone handle it who knows what they’re doing. I feel the same about a decorator and hiring out home repairs. It would take me too long to get good at it and my time is better spent on my own job and doing what I enjoy.

Anonymous wrote:The model really should be hourly fees plus a real estate lawyer to review the contract and to be on call if needed. Each party spends no more than a few thousand total.

Anonymous wrote:Mine got us way more for our house than we were expecting. The value in someone good is not in the physical activity they do per hour but for positioning your house well, negotiating on your behalf, getting the right people in to help, and minimizing your risk. It’s a big transaction, and for us is worth the commission vs going with some Redfin agent who wants to slap your home on the MLS and sell it at any price.

Anonymous wrote:Our agent definitely did more work to help us buy a new house than to sell our old house because in last summer's market, houses were basically selling themselves, but to help us maximize the price for value, she:
- Gave us names for her preferred vendors (although we did call other people, but most of her vendors were a good price) and someone on her team coordinated the timing and access
- Paid for staging (two out of three floors), landscaping, and cleaning
- Called the listing agent of a house that went under contract in our neighborhood to find out what price they sold it for, and then recommended that we increase our listing price based on that (we did, by $25K and our house sold for $25K over that).
- Negotiated with the people who put down offers to get rid of all contingencies and get the fastest closing possible (two weeks)
- Coordinated the closing so that we could do everything virtually

Anonymous wrote:Do the public a favor and write an honest review about the realtor. It's really the only way people will know not to use him. What brokerage?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mine got us way more for our house than we were expecting. The value in someone good is not in the physical activity they do per hour but for positioning your house well, negotiating on your behalf, getting the right people in to help, and minimizing your risk. It’s a big transaction, and for us is worth the commission vs going with some Redfin agent who wants to slap your home on the MLS and sell it at any price.

Odds are good you'd have gotten the same price with a terrible agent. They don't really negotiate but review the offers and best and final offers with escalation clauses. I'm sure she did a decent job staging if it didn't cost you money but staging is meaningless to me. A good RE transaction lawyer can minimize risk for you by reviewing the contracts.

The simple reality is that RE agents are in a precarious position because much of their old value is now replaced by the internet and the comps data is available to everyone at their fingerprints and all it takes is a few decisive changes to wipe out the profession. There's no reason why a mortgage company can't offer RE transaction services and prepare the offer for you and review the contract for you before you sign to it, all for a few hundred dollars.

There can be a place for a RE agent with a first time buyer to walk them through the process and to help them understand comps, and ditto for some sellers who can't understand why their old kitchens and worn bathrooms mean the house is worth 200k less than the one next door that sold with a fully remodeled kitchen and bathrooms, but for experienced buyers/sellers, RE agents are useless and very much a cartel that needs destroying.

Anonymous wrote:It sounds like the 54K was to split between the listing and buying agent. I generally think real estate agents are pretty useless, but my agent when I last sold my house did a good bit of work that I wouldn't want to have done (or had the time to do), and he really only made 2.5% on the sale because the buyer's agent made the other 2.5%. That's really not that much money when you consider staging, marketing, making and returning calls to drum up interest, coordinating the people who do the work to fix it before the sale, etc. Not to mention the overhead of the job. I think some agents make a ton of money, but not many, with the vast majority barely making any.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It sounds like you just had a crappy agent.

At the end of the day I wouldn’t buy a house FSBO. I think they’re disproportionately cheap and difficult to work with.

I would! Prefer it actually.

Same here; I have no problem buying a FSBO. And with all of the talk on here about low inventory, is someone really going to boycott a property that fits their criteria because it's FSBO? I sure hope not. I know someone who recently sold their townhouse FSBO in a close-in suburb, and it went for a record price in their development.

I personally don't look at FSBO houses.