We are seeing fewer and fewer coming soon signs. My understanding is that realtors will tell other agents/companies that a property will be coming on the market “soon”. Agents keep a list of people looking for properties in certain areas/price points and will reach out to those folks if there is a match. Next step is targeted mailings to neighbors. THEN, if they still don’t have interest, the coming soon signs may go up. It’s very rare that a well priced home in our area makes it 1-2 days after hitting MLS but usually the house is listed as “contingent” the second it hits MLS and is “public”.
We expected a downturn when interest rates went up but there is so little inventory that it didn’t happen.
That said, there is a house currently on the market on our street that is overpriced with a weird 1980s addition that has sat for 2 weeks. An eternity here.
I wish we had that and when interest rates start to fall, maybe it will.
Here - stuff sits and sits unless $800K or less.
I imagine, if changes happen where the buyer has to negotiate with a buyer’s agent, like always the market will adapt - and a new direction will happen.
An honest real estate broker will tell you they aren’t qualified to perform home inspections or draft legal documents, which are the two areas most buyers might need help.
This is why you hire a lawyer and a professional home inspector. I would never rely on only a broker for these two items.
It used to be that there were a lot of “broker only” open houses. So they would see stuff before the public, but those seem to have disappeared (at least where I was in NJ). A lot of home owners in hot areas do this - open house on Sunday, no other showings, all offers due by Tuesday, and owners pick one by Wednesday. In this scenario you don’t need a broker to buy.
What’s to stop me for making an offer on my own to their realtor.
The risk, of course, is what I don’t know - about inspection contingencies, etc.
Or what’s to stop a person from calling the selling realtor and asking, on their own, to see a listing - and if they want to make an offer essentially saying - you do all the paperwork and I give you 1% - which is now 4%?
If the seller is paying 3%, I assume your offer can include that the seller pays the buying realtor?
On the other hand, if in theory homes are now priced 3% less, how would we know?
on August, 17th, does the $1 million existing house price drop to $970K?
Many, many moons ago we were working with a realtor as both the buyer’s and seller’s agent. But we also knew someone who was selling FSBO in a neighborhood we were very interested in. We discussed with her (the agent) beforehand, before we started looking, before we signed any contract with her and before she listed our house that we wanted to see the FSBO house and that we would like to do that separately from our other viewings (IIRC the seller was not putting in a RE protection in her FSBO) but that she was welcome to see the house with us if she wanted to (IIRC there had been something called the “threshold rule” if she crossed the threshold with us??). We were unclear how to approach that and discussed it openly with her, and she was absolutely fine with that. We certainly did not want to in any way take advantage of her working with us, and would not want to look at any other property without her knowing about it and/or being with us. It worked out too, that the buyers of our old house came to an open house the agent held, so she got the full commission (or however she handled it- can’t recall as it was eons ago).
The TH my s just put a contract on happened to be listed by a neighbor of theirs. My DIL noticed that the open house they planned to attend was listed by their neighbor and mentioned it to my s, who also happened later to run into the neighbor and told her they’d be planning to come to the open house she was holding. She ended up cutting her commission to the seller as she was the only agent involved, and it all worked out.
We sold our home without a sellers agent and also bought a home without a buyers agent. Real estate contracts are boiler plate and as long as you have a real estate attorney to look over the paperwork doing it yourself could save lots of money. Further a buyers agent cannot vouch for any property, nor can the sellers agent, getting inspections is the most important thing one can do.
We would have never secured our current house in a very competitive market here if it weren’t for our realtor who could reach out among her channels, make sure we were the first to walk through the house and then who within a hour after that asked the sellers realtor what it would take to shut down the scheduled open house and take our bid. She could secure the info that the sellers had already left town and just wanted to get the sale done - because she had the sellers realtor connection and because that agent would trust her to be able to share what secure buyers we were.
I agree with this. I hope the ruling helps to break up the industry’s hold on the commission. After the ruling, the fixed cost is 3% rather than 6%. Remaining 3% can be negotiated. It may not be immediate but the price should come down. Most sellers are interested in the net proceed, not sales price. At minimum, it should certainly help with a double agent. It will be harder for a double agent to insist on getting all 6%. My house sold within a few days. There were only about 7 days between the time I talked to my agent for the first time and when it got sold. The agent was making about $10-20K a day from my house alone.
Don’t forget agents split the commission in some form with their broker and while commissions are large, they’re only doing so many transactions a year.
I want to pay less - don’t get me wrong.
But I understand their needs to.
I know some make a lot, especially when markets are tight like the last few years. But generally most don’t - many do it for the schedule flexibility.
Not here to defend them. I’d rather save the money but not sure they make as much per transaction as many think since the broker gets a big chunk.
Commission splits have changed a lot in the past 30 years. It used to be the agent only got 50-60% but now splits are usually much higher, except for rookie agents. A lot of agents keep 100% and just pay their broker a relatively modest fixed fee per transaction.
The agents I know have almost NO schedule flexibility. They need to be available when buyers are available and want to see homes. Very often, this is evenings and weekends. Sometimes early mornings if a home is empty. My agent friends said…they need to be available almost all the time…
But they’re not chained down 9-5. They can work around school and spousal schedules.
That’s why many get in part time or as a way back into the work force.
That’s why there’s too many. Some are wall to wall. Others do it for the scheduling flexibility. If they can’t show a house because someone has to be at home, they can do that.
Well…around here, an agent can easily lose a sale if they are not available when the clients want to see houses, and especially ones they haven’t listed.
Maybe in some areas, real estate agents can work whenever they want to, but around here, if they actually want to sell houses, that isn’t the case.
ETA…if I were a seller and some family wanted to see my house, I would expect their agent to move heaven and earth to get the client to my house whenever the client was available.
I have a RE friend whose now late H was very ill for quite a while. She also travels a lot. Not only was it a real challenge when she had to handle calls, showings, present contracts, arrange staging, arrange a schedule of showings, etc, but she had to arrange coverage when she was unavailable, which isn’t always as easy as it sounds. Being a RE agent is not for the faint of heart. I had considered getting my RE license way back when, but realized that not only would my day job make it hard to be available to those clients who wanted weekday showings, but I would have no life.
I don’t pretend to know alll the realtors and I’m sure no one anywhere knows.
If I drive 3 neighborhoods, I’ll see 20 houses and womt know 18 of the names on the sign.
I don’t think any of us, no matter where we live, knows the extent and background of every realtor except for the ones you personally know and in CA prior and now in TN, I know many. Some on their own, some as part of a team - they may staff an open house.
I think in many places there are far more realtors than any of us can possibly know.
Being flexible, btw, doesn’t necessarily mean less hours but flexibility. Kid needs to go to the Dr. mom/dad don’t need to leave work etc.
Realtor hours are not necessarily formulaic day to day, week to week.
In a seller market, the house sells itself. The hardest part would be getting the listing. What they do after that is minor. It doesn’t justify exorbitant fee. In a buyer’s market, it would be getting connected to a buyer. Again, that same. Fees are too high. If it was a true free market, there’d be more competition and fees will be much lower. I mentioned earlier. Outside the US, the fees are around 2%. What’s so different in the US real estate market? The commission is 3 times higher. Why?
I don’t disagree. My neighbor planned an open house for Sunday but had 3 offers the first day and accepted $150k over.
People never came. Three months the no showers sold for $100k more and the new buyers had work crews there for months, replacing everything so spent a ton more.
The timing is hard now this wouldn’t happen.
I’m the end, you are seeking a sale. If it takes an hour, isn’t that better than 6 months ?
The flipside is - can’t you already get a better price. In CA when we sold everyone was offering 4%. Or you can hire people for 1%.
I set up the thread to talk about the impact of the court ruling. Pricing is fair game for that.
If we return to this thread in a month, I wonder if we’ll learn anything new ?
This is not a diss to anyone but I am shocked to see so many not have much respect for or see value in a realtor.
Many people are uneducated as to the home buying process and pitfalls and mistakes that can be made. And to be fair, many of those uneducated people are actually educated people.
Re: working hours, welcome to the actual world and life of people in retail, healthcare, etc. No you can’t just always drop everything to take your child to the doctor - that 2 hours may be the only time available for Your client to see a house or that maybe the only time they can attend closing.
That way of thinking erks me just like saying a SAHM is always available to “serve” her family.
I’m sure like many professions, there are good and not so good and people’s perceptions is likely based on their experiences. And timing - red hot vs anything less.
Don’t know what an SAHM is and I inferred no gender if it involves that.
Those I know who have done real estate who did so as an entry back to work have done so for flexibility. Some are no longer in the industry. Some still are.
Everyone’s experience - including hours or commitment is different I’m sure - like any commission job. You’re obviously a strong and successful realtor but I’m sure you know many who aren’t.
It’s interesting that many of the articles related to the upcoming change (which is why I started the thread actually - to talk about the change) note that it may clear many part timers out and shrink to some extent the # of realtors overall.
But really I just started the thread to see if anyone understood the impact and could explain it. Not any other reason.
