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Am I out of line Re: Realtor (long)
Hi,
I'm mostly a lurker, but this board has been great to read and learn from over the last couple of months.
Back story:
We put our house on the market about 5.5 weeks ago. The realtor we are using is THE realtor to use if you are in our area. There are others of course, but he and his office handle close to 50% of the sales in our city. He actually was the selling agent when my DH bought the house and has sold it one time before that as well. We are selling because we want more space. We are going to rent a friend's house starting in December and want to sell to be free and clear of a mortgage if possible. We can swing both payments if needed.
When we listed we asked his opinion on pricing. The price he gave us was one that he said, based on the current market; he felt would sell in 3 months or less. It is what we were hoping to list at because it would allow us to break even on the sale and we have a max of 10K we are willing to use as negotiating room. Since the price he suggested was what we had thought based on comps, etc as well we went with that price.
We have had a decent amount of showings and one really low ball offer, but other than notihng. After each showing we try to follow up with him to see if there is any feedback (usually in the next day or two) and he has become more short in his email responses that he "tries to get feedback from each showing but sometimes it isn't possible so please be patient".
Fast forward to 2 weeks ago: We had 2 second showings on the same day. He sent us an email saying that the first one had decided to go a different route. The second one sounded promising and he would keep us posted. That was the last we have heard from him. We had another open house that weekend and another realtor from his office did the open house. She gave us the feedback when we returned home so we didn't really expect him to call us and give us the same info, but we haven't heard a thing from him. One thing she told us was one of our realtor's buyer's came by during the open house for another look (was the first person to look at it a month ago)
Am I right to think that a follow up call from him is warranted? Even if it is something like, "I just wanted to touch base with you and let you know that I have requested feedback from the second showings and haven't heard anything, but I will keep you posted."
I don't think it is too much to ask, but yet when we have talked to him in the past he acts like we are over-reacting and not being patient enough and it is implied that we are pestering him and wasting his time. I'm of the mind that if I'm paying him a 5-6% commission he could at least leave us a voicemail at least once a week checking in and letting us know what he is seeing.
We have had showings in the past two weeks as well, so there would be more info to give I would expect....
I'm about to call and lay into him a bit that I understand that he isn't responsible for the fact we aren't getting offers (well, ok maybe he is) but the lack of communication is really disappointing. Am I expecting too much from our realtor? I also want to ask him to take us around to the next three homes in our area that we are up against to see where we are at (we didn't do this initially). The other 4 properties on our street and the next street over have all sold in the last month they were on the market before us or at the same time as us, so we are now the only property listed near our downtown area. Only 1 was a good comp and it sold for our asking price.
The only other realtor I have dealt with on the selling side would check in at least once a week if not more, and now I'm wondering what the norm is.
Sorry this was so long, but I appreciate your input
PS - I may DD later as I actually believe he checks here.
Re: Am I out of line Re: Realtor (long)
I feel like I read this not too long ago. Did you already post this?
I skimmed most but calm down you've been on the market for barely a month. I don't think he needs to leave you weekly voicemails saying nothing new is going on. You don't need to lay into him because it seems like you did get an offer (it's beyond his control that it was too low for you). We were on the market 6.5 months before we received our first offer and we didn't always get feedback. Our realtor would email the showin agent but you can't force someone to give feedback. Also sometimes there really isn't anything wrong with the house it's just not a good fit for the potential buyers. We saw several nice hoses but they just didn't work for us. I have no idea what our realtor said to theirs but it wasn't like it was overpriced or whatever. Our feedback wouldn't have been helpful because it's nothin the seller could change.
I honestly think you just need to take a step back and calm down. If you are emailing him asking questions and he's not responding that's one thing but it sounds like you want random emails and phone calls saying nothing has changed.
No I haven't posted on here before.
I will add the only time we have called him is for specific reasons (we are out of flyers in the front yard, or I'm travelling out of the country and they should call my husband about showings, etc) and then we would ask for feedback as part of that call. We didn't call him after every single showing asking for feedback. We were calling maybe once a week and he was irritated that we were wasting his time.
I guess on the flipside, what is normal? once a month? not at all unless an offer comes in?
I know it isn't his fault the offer was for half the price of our house, but we also told him we wanted to close before Christmas. It just feels like the clock is ticking and if he would recommend lowering our price I'd like to know that. If he thinks we should stay the course it would be nice to know that too. I'd like to think several thousands of dollars would be worth 30 seconds once a week though and that if he said he would get back to us, he actually would get back to us.
As for post-showing feedback, our realtor gave us a log-in for a website where we could go and see the feedback left by other realtors, that way we didn't need to rely on her to call us. Does your REA offer the same option?
DS1 born June 2008 | m/c at 9w March 2011 | DS2 born April 2012
40/112
I don't think laying into him will get the results you want.Tell him your expectations and ask if he can meet those. fwiw, sometimes this is the risk of taking the busiest realtor, he may not have the time to give you the personal attention you want. Our realtor does keep in very close touch with us, but she also only has 3-6 listings at a time.
Eh the feedback we got with our house on the market was pretty sporadic. It was a bonus when our Realtor forwarded us the emails, but we didn't expect to really get anything. When an offer came in he called, other than that we didn't really talk to him much.
I don't think it's reasonable to expect a piece of feedback from every single showing.
***Nestie Bestie w/ TheDeatons***
View our FOR SALE items
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Ask him.
Ask him.
Tell him.
Seriously. We saw 22 houses the first time we went out (in one day). The next time, we saw I think 10, also in one day. There's no way we could have provided helpful feedback for most of them. Some were really glaring (i.e. one house with a bedroom door from an addition that literally opened into the stairwell...not at the top of the stairs on the floor, but onto the second and third stairs) and we could remember those red flags, but the houses that were just "fine" were mostly forgettable.
It wasn't until we saw the house we bought (and that we still love) that we had legit feedback. It just felt different, it was open (the other homes were four squares like ours but hadn't had walls taken down), it was historic (the first house built in this neighborhood by two decades, and the things we've found in the attic have been amazing), it had a bigger yard, it had an amazing garage, etc. It was things that the other houses weren't. It's not that the other houses were bad or needed to fix/change things, it was that this house was so much better.
My Lunch Blog
well if would return my calls, I would. I have been trying for 2 weeks now.
Regarding feedback, it's entirely possible that the other agents aren't giving him any. As an agent myself, half the time I am not asked for feedback any longer. I usually give it anyway, but it seems like in my area for houses under $250,000, it's not typical to ask for feedback any longer. And for short sales or foreclosures--not saying yours is a SS--there's virtually no reason to give feedback, unless it's to ask preliminary questions for an offer. Again, that's been my experience in my area.
If you are concerned about keeping in touch, please give him a call and ask what's going on. Set an appointment on your calendar to call him every week at the same time.
DH is a RE broker and it is rare these days that buyer agent will call/email with feedback even when it is asked for. So this is probably not your REA fault. I mean if people were really interested in your house, they would make an offer, right?
I would call or email him with your specific questions about pricing and is it time to adjust price. It may be a good time since the holidays are approaching and housing market slows down at this time of the year.
This. The realtor that sold my last house is the top selling agent in the area, so she has a ton of clients and is very busy. When I hired her, I was very specific about what I expected her to do and what tasks I was okay with her assistants and other realtors doing. We also discussed and agreed on how and when we would communicate. It sounds like you never had this conversation with your agent and that has led to frustraition on both sides.
If it were me, I would go to his office and insist on speaking with him in person. Whether his annoyance with you is justified or not, it's very unprofessional to blow off a client for 2 weeks. I wouldn't lay into him, but I would express your expectations and make it clear that you are not happy with his level of communication up to this point. If he doesn't feel he can meet those expectations, or if you have already lost confidence in him, then you need to discuss terminating the contract.
Leave him a message, follow up with an email that says "I'm concerned that we haven't heard from you in 2 weeks. I need to talk to you today, call me at xxx-xxxx"
If he doesn't, put in a call to whoever owns/manages the office and tell them he's not getting back to you, you are not happy with the level of communication and what you want (new agent, meeting with them and him, whatever that is).
Also keep in mind, top selling realtor does not mean the best. If you want a new realtor ask friends/family/coworkers you trust for recommendations. If someone has 50% of the listings in town and the other 50% are split between 10 people I would hope the guy with the most listings also had the most sales. The odds are in his favor.
have an update, thought I'd post since enough of you read through my crazy long post.
First comment, I know that it doesn't mean he is the best, however he is like the godfather of real estate around here. It is odd, but it is what it is. He knows the area in and out and he gets it done - generally speaking.
We talked today. He claims that he talked to my DH 2 weeks ago and mentioned the market was skowing down but with the increased activity we should do another open house (which we did). He claims in that call he talked to my DH about lowering the price and we said no. First, my DH does'nt recall any such suggestion and 2) I wasn't consulted at all - the house is half mine, and would have ot be involved in lowering the price. whatever.
We had talked to him in the beginning about regular communciation and it was fine then, but had slipped away. He acknowledged that but didn't seem concerned. Then he said we should lower our price because the market has drastically changed in the last 3 weeks. When I asked why we wouldn't have lowered our price sooner then he didn't have an answer that wasn't some used car salesman BS.
We lowered our price 10K, which is our rock bottom so we now have no room for negotiation and will most likely never sell. He actually recommended that we consider borrowing out of our 401k to walk away FFS. I'm so done with this guy. My DH is going with him to look at the new homes that have caused the "major upheaval" in the market in the last 3 weeks tonight. We will see what happens but I'm guessing we will be stuck with double payments and a vacant house.
Thanks for the imput.
Even though your name is also on the house, your husband actually does not have to consult with you about lowering the price. Not saying that he shouldn't, but that is not the realtor's issue (but I'm not going to go into marriage counseling here)
If you just lowered it $10K and now have no room for negotiation, you probably are going to have a really hard time coming to a deal. In this market, no one pays asking price--it just doesn't happen. So, if you really cannot negotiate below that, then you might as well figure out plan B.
Don't be angry at the realtor for your house not selling. If you only had 10K in "wiggle room" you really limited yourself. Instead of focusing your energy on being mad at him, focus your energy on how you are going to financially recover from the mess you are in. Assume you will NOT sell the house...what is Plan B?
My Valentine Bookends (2~13~13, 2~15~09)
plan B is to pay for the house to be empty. we can't rent it (not allowed) and we can't take more than 13K to closing. lowering our price by 10K put us paying 10K (we would have broken even before), so I guess we have 3K to play with.
Double payments mean we can't keep saving for our down payment. But budget wise we are OK, just not saving like we should be to buy a house. We aren't touching our E-fund to piss it away. Luckily our new place we got at a great deal on, we are just hoping to be free and clear before buying again.
Our market is actually up year over year. so here's hoping the new price works in some way.
I get wanting more space, but since it is a "want" and not a "need" in the grand scheme of things, I would reconsider. If you stay in your current home, you can continue to make only one housing payment a month and save for a DP on a future home. Is it really worth paying double for the increased space--especially since renting your current home is not an option and selling in the near future is not looking favorable?
My Valentine Bookends (2~13~13, 2~15~09)
well I guess for some it is a "want" vs. "need" but we have less than 1000 sq ft and we have a baby. The baby is getting mobile and we have many doorways to stairs with no doors and plaster walls with no means or putting up gates (due ot the historical moldings in the archways. We are renting from a friend who is going overseas so that is a done deal, we move in a couple of months.
I also have over an hour commute each way with no traffic or snow and the new house puts me 15 minutes away and DH could help with DC pick up/drop off too. I am going crazy right now and am about to lose my job because I can't work late at all. Something has to change so this is our option.
We are lucky we don't "have" to sell. We also got lucky when we had to unload my condo, we had to sink $12K into that to walk away, but it could have been worse, much, much worse.
We lived in a less than 1000sqft house up until August and DD is 2.5 yo and many people on this board live in small houses with multiple children.
I hope it all works out for you.
My Valentine Bookends (2~13~13, 2~15~09)
I know that. Families of 8 or 10 have probably been raised in our house since it was built before the great depression. Bottom line is that it isn't safe and our child's safety is worth the double payments.
As I said, we are lucky it isn't worse. I completely agree that it is unrealistic to get a full price offer, which is why I'm guessing it won't sell. The only feedback we have received is the kitchen is too small and they want a bathroom on the upper level, both are things that are not possible to change, so it is what it is. Not much I can do about and not much use stressing, just planning on it not selling. I'm more worried about leaving the property vacant to be honest. In our neighborhood, that is a really bad idea (although I guess it isn't a good idea in many places).
Will you even get approved for a mortgage on the new house without selling the old one? Can you afford double payments out of your cash flow without tapping into your savings? If you can't I would reconsider buying the home until you can sell yours. You will be depleting your savings each month and eventually forclosing and ruining your credit for a long time.
The market will be slow now until the spring which is 6 months away. And even then no one knows how much better or worse the market and home prices will be. If you can't afford to sell now at a lower price, you may never sell.........
View our FOR SALE items
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As I said in my OP, we aren't buying another house now. We are going to rent for 18 months from a friend who is giving us a deal on rent. And yes, we can afford the double payments without touching a thing, except reducing the amount we are saving for a DP by $800 a month.
We would still get approved for another mortgage though, even with our current house, that wouldn't be an issue based on our income/debt.
If you can afford double payments, I'd keep the property on the market for your original asking price. It seems like you've had some good showings and some interest, even though the property has only been on the market for 6 weeks. Also, all other houses nearby have sold....which means the supply may no longer be able to meet the demand, which makes your house a more valuable asset than it was before those other houses sold.