When someone is interested in selling their home they have several options how to go about this.
- They can use a Real Estate Salesperson and pay a total of 5% commission of the purchase price, but it’s negotiable.
- They can choose to list their house for a flat fee to get noticed, do a lot of their leg work and pay 2.5% on the Selling side so that they have hundreds of salespeople assisting them in selling their home.
- They can sell privately via local websites such as Facebook. This option poses the following limitations:
- When you use a Real Estate Agent, your “house for sale” is submitted onto websites like realtor.com, trulia.com, zillow.com, local brokers’ sites, etc. This allows people from all over the world to view your house for sale.
- The seller of a home pays 5% in total. 2.5% goes to that listing agent, or Seller’s Agent, and 2.5% goes to the agent who sells the home, or Buyer’s Agent. When a Seller offers 2.5% commission on the selling side to the Buyer’s Agent, this is an incentive for a Salesperson to introduce your home to their client. In other words, you will have hundreds of Real Estate Salespeople trying to sell your home when you offer 2.5% to whomever sells it. The more commission you offer on the selling side, the harder that salesperson will work to sell your home. There is a lot more involved in selling real estate than the public realizes and the more time one puts into their work, the more they should get paid. That goes for all professions. The common rate for a Buyer’s Agent is 2.5%, so you are best to not go below this number in order to compete with other sellers.
- Real Estate Salespeople will do their due diligence in protecting you and your legal rights and guide you every step of the way. When you don’t use an agent, you may encounter several surprises that can cost you grief, money and time.
Real Estate Buyer’s Agent/Salesperson will take care of the following:
- Find you your “Perfect Home”. They will gather all the criteria that you are looking for in a home in your price range, and begin the Search.
- Schedule viewing appointments and take you to every home you are interested in.
- Disclose any potential issues they know or see with the house you are interested in.
- Advise you on market trends and competitive pricing. You can consult Salespersons on fair housing prices. They have access to the records about selling the house you are interested in and how much it was sold for. They can also advise you on whether the house is priced fairly.They have access to a list of all improvements and any past issues the house may have had.
- Prepare the paperwork for an offer
- Present the offer and multiple counter offers.
- Deal with negotiations on price, possible repairs, etc.
- Assist with finding a mortgage broker. (Although before you start to view houses, you should already have pre-approval from a bank or broker so as to not waste everybody’s time)
- Send all documents to the mortgage broker.
- Arrange for a home inspector and meet the inspector if required.
- Arrange for an insurance inspector if necessary and schedule a time for the inspection.
- Deal with any issues after inspections and do more negotiations, e.g. discussing issues, arranging times for contractors to view the potential issues, getting quotes from contractors, etc.
- Assist the client with “EVERYTHING” along the way. This typically includes countless emails and phone calls to the client and all who is involved in the transaction.
- Arrange a pre-closing inspection and spend the time to go through the entire house one last time.
- Deal with any potential issues from the pre-closing inspection and more potential negotiations.
- Deal with other issues that may come up.
The Listing Agent or Seller Agent’s duties :
- Perform a Comparative Market Analysis to assist in pricing your home.
- Take professional photographs at the property for the listing.
- Take accurate measurements of all structures and rooms for the listing.
- Submit the listing to most popular real-estate sites which will result in the listing further directed to multiple local brokers’ sites.
- Sign the property.
- Post the property on Facebook, Craigslist, etc.
- Find buyers by contacting other Real Estate Agent’s and prospective buyers.
- Schedule Open Houses if needed.
- Advertise the property in the newspaper if needed.
- Present the offer and possible counter offers to the Seller.
- Negotiate with Buyer’s Agent in terms of the offer or potential issues.
- Be in constant contact with Buyer’s Agent on the progress of all steps involved in the sale.
- Send paperwork off to both lawyers.
- Assist and advise Seller throughout the entire transaction
- Take care of countless emails and phone calls to all parties involved.
How do you choose a good Real Estate Agent?
You will be spending a lot of time in discussions with your Real Estate Agent, so should really like and trust him/her. Your Real Estate Agent must be professional and, unless otherwise stated, perform all of the duties listed above.
Your Real Estate Agent must:
- be easy to reach via phone or email;
- answer all your questions in a timely fashion and do the same for the agent on the other side or the deal can go sideways;
- be efficient in all areas related to the sale of your property;
- provide references from business partners and/ or testimonials from past clients;
- care about you and put you FIRST!