<p>We are getting read to put a house on the market out of town. My husband and son purchase a home for my son to live in while attend medical school in a community with great turn over; that is when we purchased it in May 2008! The value hasn’t dropped too much, but I don’t expect we will make a profit; our goal would be at least to pay off the mortgage. Many of the other homes in the neighborhood currently have renters in them, most being medical students or residents. If we can’t sell, we will look into renting, but our first choice is to sell.</p>
<p>The agent I am using was the assistant to our purchasing agent and is now a full time agent herself. Of course the home will be listed in the MLS, but what else would I want from the agent? Are there other ways I should expect her to market the house? I would think with all the social media these days that there are other venues to advertise. What should I expect to be offered, and what might be available maybe at an extra charge? What is the going rate for commission?</p>
<p>The listing on the MLS is by far the most important marketing tool she has. People don’t buy houses because they saw a mention on facebook; they buy because they engaged an agent who saw the listing. Open house is also effective.</p>
<p>You should expect to see comps, and you should expect her to come up with a realistic price based on those comps.</p>
<p>Whatever you do, don’t overprice. It’s a buyer’s market, so you don’t want to be even a couple of thousand dollars over where you should be.</p>
<p>You should expect her advice and assistance on staging (I assume the house is vacant?). A staged house is much more appealing than an empty house, even if you have to rent some furniture.</p>
<p>The agent should also design and provide ample supply of catchy flyers for the property. We did not find our two houses in MLS; we drove by, stopped, took a flyer… Sold.</p>
<p>The agent should tell you about their office’s customary commission rates. In my neck of the woods, they are typically 5-6%. We also have to pay some of the closing costs and excise tax, so the total seller’s expenses in my area are close to 8-9% of the sale price.</p>
<p>I agree, a good MLS listing is a key starting point. It will be visible to other sites such as Redfin, Trulia and Zillow for even more exposure. Top-quality photos are important so that they display well online. In some markets, houses often have a virtual tour as well. The house itself needs to be spotless, and staged if that’s appropriate for your market. Flyers with high-quality photos and NO TYPOS are good to have. </p>
<p>The agent should do a complete market analysis and be able to explain in detail how he/she would price the house. You need to look at the comps yourself (online if you’re not in the same town) to confirm that you agree with them. Some agents get listings by telling the seller a higher price than the comps support, with the result being that the house sits on the market and gets stale.</p>
<p>Open houses are important in some markets but not all. In my town we look carefully at the online listings to decide on which open houses we want to attend. Of course all the neighbors come through the open houses as well, so some Realtors don’t think they’re worthwhile. As long as the house has a lockbox, buyers can come through with their agents any time and you might not need to hold an open house.</p>
<p>Commission is highly negotiable, as is the split between buyer’s and seller’s agents. In my town it was 7% when I moved here, down to 6% when I sold my first house, and it’s at 5% now. Some agents will offer an extra incentive to the buyer’s agent, say a 2%/3% split.</p>
<p>In addition, you should ask the agent what additional efforts he will be doing for you. MLS is not the only place real estate sales, there are other advertising media also can be used. And, you should ask the agent how many houses he sold in the immediate areas, how fast did his listing went. Since there are differences between homes, even with the same square footage. What are the repairs he recommend and if staging is necessary.</p>
<p>These are the basic questions to screen for an Agent. Actually, the commission is the least (or the last)you should negotiate, to sell a house faster and at the right price is more important factor in today’s market.</p>
<p>vballmom is right to point out that different markets may be different.</p>
<p>In my large city in NC, seller’s agents never “show” a house, but lockboxes are used for the buyers’ agents to access the house. Buyers’ agents are expected to leave their cards, and the seller’s agents tend to call later and get feedback about the house. For one of the houses we sold, our agent held an open house just for the many other agents in her real estate office. Our agent told us that commissions are NEVER negotiated here.</p>
<p>In a smaller city in Massachusetts, the seller’s agents met the buyer’s agents and the buyers in most cases, walked around with us, and “showed” us the house. When we sold, our agent held an open house for all the other realtors in the area. When we purchased a house, the seller’s agent and our agent volunteered to cut their commissions when the sellers and we were at an impasse. That was probably a rare case, though–we had walked away from the first house on which we had placed an offer, so our agent knew we were willing to do so, and the seller’s house had been on the market for more than a year, so the seller’s agent probably felt she had put way too much time into it already!</p>
<p>Open houses are usually for the realtor to drum up new business unrelated to your house, and houses statistically are rarely sold through an open house. It allows strangers access to your house, including other realtors, and is an invitation to theft.</p>
<p>I think a realtor with a big office - more agents - will probably sell a house faster than a small operation.</p>
<p>Commissions and everything with a house sale is negotiable.</p>
<p>My experience buying and selling houses is that it doesn’t pay to fix up your house in any market (buyer or seller), and it is easier and better to negotiate with a buyer or seller.
REALTORS will always try to get you to spend as much money as they can to make your house easier for them to sell - but it doesn’t benefit the seller.</p>
<p>Before you believe it is a buyers’ market, look at the inventory where you live. There isn’t much where I am, so it isn’t a buyers market.</p>
<p>The house is still occupies by my son and his roommate, and while my son has real furniture in his bedroom, den and kitchen, it still looks like two single guys live there This is a small city, and most home buyers will come through the university. We plan to have flyers made to put up there. I will also ask about flyer for the yard sign; I also like to pull those before contacting the agent. </p>
<p>We have already have the market analysis done. The problem with the comps is this neighborhood only has 20 homes and is under 20 years old; there is no comparable neighborhood of that age and as close to the university. I have been told by locals of the area that they didn’t even know this street was there; it is a hidden gem! </p>
<p>While the agent offered an open house, she said they really are not effective, at least in this area and price range. </p>
<p>The commission was quoted at 3%, which I am pretty sure we paid 6-7% when we purchased. </p>
<p>My son thought we might post on the FB page of the new class coming in, with a link to the listing. Others have done that in past years, but I have no idea if it will be helpful or not. I believe the flyer at the university may be our best option and my son is willing to take some to each of the department’s personnel that deals with the new medical students and residences.</p>
<p>When I helped my mom sell her house, we found an agent she and I were both very comfortable with…then discovered it was not going to be she, but her assistant (who we had not met) who was going to show the house. We only found out by accident. We chose not to use her. Not only because we felt this should be HER job and it was SHE that we hired, not some unknown person she outsourced to for a cheap hourly wage. Also the fact that she wasn’t upfront with it (and in my case it was very important to my mom). She argued that was 'how it was done" (and maybe it was in this very hot market at the time, but it isn’t what we were willing to pay for). We found an agent who promised to show the house himself. </p>
<p>Anyways, maybe you don’t care but I think it is reasonable to expect the agent to be the front person. If they can’t invest that much of themselves, they probably aren’t investing much at all. How are they ‘selling’ if they aren’t the one’s showing the house? </p>
<p>And just remember the agents goal (as with all agents) is to close a sale, not get you the highest price. A study was done not that long ago showing that agents sold their own homes for substantially more on average than the homes they sold for others. They knew when to hold out. Most agents are not incented to do that for their clients (agents could argue “but they need happy clients to keep their business!” and that is true…but if you can convince a client to sell they don’t know they could have gotten more so of course they are happy).</p>
<p>And make sure you get multiple quotes from multiple agents to get a better sense of its real value (which is NOT necessarily the highest quote). Separate out the price quotes from the agent you choose. That is, you shouldn’t necessarily go with the agent suggesting the highest price (they might just be trying to get the sale), but use the quotes to determine what you think the price should be. Then pick the best agent you like based on other criteria and you set the price based on all the data you have.</p>
<p>Well, the house has been listed for 5 weeks now, and not one single person has come to look at it. Because this is a town centered around the medical university, it might be just a little early for the incoming residents to be looking for house. I know my son has not gone to look for housing yet as he is going across the country and is waiting a few more weeks to go. That said, if someone was buying instead of renting, I would think they would have started looking as they start work the 2nd or 3rd week of June. One would think that there would be current people in the city that were also looking for a new home. </p>
<p>I asked the agent if it was the house, or were times just slow. She didn’t really answer except to say she was also concerned that no one has even called to inquire about the house. I am not trying to lay the blame on the agent, but I am wondering if there is something different I can do to help get traffic into the house. </p>
<p>We do also have it listed for rent on Craigslist as well as through the university and have had a few come look as well as several email for more information. My son will not be at the house once this last rotation is over on April 27; he has a wedding to attend out of town and then is heading to his new city to find housing. He will spend a week here at our home, then go back for graduation. After graduation, I think he will stay with us until he moves. We figured we would just leave his furniture and stuff in the house until move day, unless the house is sold or rented before then.</p>
<p>I am thinking we will just go with one of the real estate companies rental divisions to show and manage the house once he leaves. I was thinking I could just drive the 2.5 hours and show the house when needed, but I am thinking that might not work when someone calls me one day wanted to see the house the next day as they are only in town for one day; that has happened a few times already!</p>
<p>OK, now that I just typed all that out, I have no idea if I am looking for suggestions or just needed to ***** :)</p>
<p>Do you know if the home is priced too high? How many days on market are those sold comps? Sorry about the local market condition, but in a slow market, you have to reduce the price to sell.</p>
<p>If I remember correctly, I have looked up some condos around the said area on zillow and some went very fast.</p>
<p>The one and most important service a RE agent should provide is the selling price consumated with seller’s expectations.</p>
<p>The r/e agent should help to price the home and importantly, needs to drive traffic through it and not sit back and wait for people to happen to call on it. To do this they need to do open houses (multiple), include it in r/e agent caravans (where r/e agents can see the house to suggest it to potentially their clients), and market it in ways additional to the MLS listing. </p>
<p>You also need to pick a r/e agent somewhat carefully. There are too many part time and beginning inexperienced ‘friend’ or ‘friend of a friend’ agents that aren’t the best choices. The r/e agent should be a solid professional with a good track record of sales in the area and ideally be very familiar with that particular area.</p>
<p>The r/e agent is mostly about being a salesperson but in addition to that it’s good to have a solid broker behind the agent in the event there are any issues with the sale. The agent needs to be able to leverage the resources of the broker.</p>
<p>The agent needs to be earning any commission. Just placing the property in the MLS and kicking back (I’m not saying that’s what this one is doing) isn’t worth even 3% IMO.</p>
<p>I understand there is no real comps in the area, after reading your past post. But here are some thoughts to make a guestimate.</p>
<p>You can get comps for houses sold around the time you bought this. Some times you can find some houses in the neighborhood which were sold back then and resold 3 months ago and get a sense how much discount from then. If you apply the same percentage to the price you paid then, you can get a feeling of what its worth. You probably need to separate those REO and Short Sales from Regular sales.</p>
<p>I think the price you listed might be too high.</p>
<p>I may have made a mistake with the agent I picked, although I am not blaming her. This woman was the assistant to the agent we used 4 years ago; an agent that was a top seller and a native of the city. The original agent has been selling homes for 40+ years, and has since passed away. I liked the assistant while working with the agent and knew she actually did most of the agents work, so I went with her. </p>
<p>The house is priced too high, but we figured someone will still come look. I know that sounds crazy, but we figured someone might be willing to pay close to asking price, although we would entertain all offers. Because we are not in a position to take less than the mortgage (at least today) we started at the price we paid for the house. The thought was if we couldn’t get a buyer for this price, we would rent until the market picked up.</p>
<p>Recently sold homes in the area have sold for anywhere from $49/sq ft. to $95/sq. ft.; we are at the higher end. I know we need to drop the price, something we will do in a couple of weeks I am sure. </p>
<p>artloversplus- I don’t think you have looked at this area as I have never mentioned what city my son lived in! This is a 3 bedroom house, not a condo anyway.</p>
This is a small city, and most home buyers will come through the university. We plan to have flyers made to put up there. I will also ask about flyer for the yard sign; I also like to pull those before contacting the agent. </p>