Decorating & Renovating
TTC Baby #2 - BFP on 12/14/11 @ 10DPO - CP confirmed 12/18/11
BFP #2 on 1/13/12
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Did you "realtor shop"?
Did you consult with more than one realtor when listing your house?
I want to do this (first realtor was gloom and doom about what we could get for our house) but H wants to just go with him because a) he gave us a 1% discount on his commission since we were referred to him and b) he went to the same school as H's sister. I want a second opinion because our market is actually rebounding (it never dropped like other markets) so for us to lose money on our house seems silly.
Of course, I told him this Tuesday and he didn't say anything about it, contacted another realtor yesterday afternoon and then suddenly, last night, it's a dumb idea.
TTC Baby #2 - BFP on 12/14/11 @ 10DPO - CP confirmed 12/18/11
BFP #2 on 1/13/12
Re: Did you "realtor shop"?
I suggest shopping around. This is a high dollar transaction that might require a decent length of time and skill to get the home sold. You should feel comfortable with the person you choose.
There are several things you might want to consider. How long have they been in the business? Is this their full-time job? Why do they want to price your house at a certain amount? Can they offer suggestions (decorating, decluttering,etc) to get you a better price? I, personally, wouldn't go with an agent that will list it for whatever you want without offering their opinion with comps to support it. I also would not go with the cheapest unless he/she was lso the best for your situation and house.
For the agent that was humdrum, did he have comps to support the price but they were lower than you'd expected or did he want to price it lower to sell it quicker or did he really not do very well overall? If you guys didn't click, def go with someone you do click with. Sorry so long
Yes we did. We met with three different realtors. One realtor I really liked, I felt like our goals were the same, our views were the same, and we just meshed well. We did not chose this realtor though because we felt she didn't have quite as much experience in our area as the others we met with.
Another realtor gave us a ridiculously low list price. It was a complete joke! The houses they tried to use as comps were not even comparable. They looked at 3 bedroom/1 bath homes that were completely outdated. Ours was completely up to date and had 4 bedrooms/2 full baths. So we ruled them out completely.
The third realtor we went with, I actually hated her personality. I didn't really want to go with her, but she had the most experience, she knew the area well, and she was pretty aggressive (which is why I didn't like her personality, but thought that this would work to our advantage when selling). I absolutely hated working with her, but in the end she held out for a really great price on our house, so I can't complain too much.
I didn't shop around, we found our realtor through redfin, though we're not in a redfin service area, so she isn't a redfin agent. That said, I really like her. I trusted her, she has had a long career, and knew what she was doing and we spent a lot of time with her. She never made us feel like we were wasting her time, even when we were looking at properties that we knew we weren't really going to be bidding on.
I just think it's really important to have a good relationship with a your realtor, and you should spend some time to find one that you like. Because, you're going to be spending a lot of time with them, and they will be making a good chunk of money off of you in the end.
There are a lot of websites out there other than redfin with reviews from buyers, and sales records. You might want to check some of them out.
We had an agent out 6+ months before this last one. A friend "helpfully" called her for us and she came to visit to give us opinions. One of our to do tasks was decluttered, which we have done a lot of. Our house is pretty neutral re: decorating and she said all of the updates we were planning on doing (like installing a new water heater, we had new pipes installed in the house, we put on a new roof after having storm damage, we're putting new carpet throughout, etc.) were all what she would have suggested.
The comps the guy brought were pretty slim. Our house was nicer than most (a lot of them have wood siding still, ours has vinyl, plus we have a privacy fence, wood deck and are 2 blocks from the elementary school; our layout is more open than the ones on the market, the ones he brought as comps were all awkward layouts; I believe one of them still had baseboard heating and original 1950s cabinets & counters -- ours has cabinets that are no less than 10 years old and are oak front, laminate side) and two of the three or four he brought were either empty or had no interior pictures. He said he thinks it'll sell for $66,000 based on the comps (the nicer houses in our area have sold quickly, even if they are on the main road) and wants to price it at $68,500.
He used to flip houses, so I'm afraid that he's coming at this from a "flip this house" sort of situation and not a "seller's agent who works hard for his kids" situation.
TTC Baby #2 - BFP on 12/14/11 @ 10DPO - CP confirmed 12/18/11
BFP #2 on 1/13/12
I've never sold a house, but we realtor shopped when we were buying. It's a huge financial transaction. I think it makes perfect sense to shop around, and I think they fully expect you to.
If another realtor can get you more for your house, they might be worth the 1% discount.
I was given the wrong email, so it never went through apparently (never bounced back though!) so now I'm at a cross roads of emailing the correct email or just letting my H do whatever he wants. The guy he wants to go through has a "if you want out of our contract, no problems" policy so if we go a month and nothing progresses, then we can get out of it and go elsewhere, but I really don't know if that's a good sign or a bad sign.
TTC Baby #2 - BFP on 12/14/11 @ 10DPO - CP confirmed 12/18/11
BFP #2 on 1/13/12
We went to many open houses in our neighborhood and we met many realtor's as we toured the homes. (Some that we could afford, others that were just beautiful!)
We chose our realtor after she sent us a terrific follow-up e-mail, and she turned out amazing. We had met with another realtor who was very pushy. Our realtor really listened to what we were looking for and respected our budget and our wish list.
If you're not comfortable with the realtor, I would keep looking.