Contract with buyer?s agent?

[quote author="cherry14" date=1235322250]I'm glad most people are saying not to sign with this guy. That was my gut feeling as well.



What is a realtor supposed to do, exactly? It's not 1979, so we don't need to have the realtor give us a printout of the available houses and drive us around in a Lincoln Town Car. Basically, we've been finding all the houses we are interested in online, and then just asking our realtor to get us more info and/or show them to us. I feel like a realtor should alert us to new properties, though, and our current realtor isn't doing that at all. The only real benefit of a realtor seems to be helping with the negotiations and writing offers and all that. Is there any other reason to have a realtor? My husband initially wanted to just use an online service like Redfin, but I insisted we needed a real estate agent. Maybe I was wrong.</blockquote>
Another good test is to ask your agent to contribute part of their commission towards your closing costs. With today's access to information and listings like on realtor.com or redfin.com buyers have a lot more information and knowledge available to them and thus the agents dont have to do as much leg work. Your agent should have set up an MLS search for you that way you can see new additions and price changes as they happen. There isn't that much work the buyer's agent has to do so I think it's very reasonable for agents to kick back a part of their commission which would make the transaction more of a win-win. Most agents are worthless and only push their clients into buying something and unfortunately that gives a bad name to the good ones out there.
 
[quote author="cherry14" date=1235322250]I'm glad most people are saying not to sign with this guy. That was my gut feeling as well.



What is a realtor supposed to do, exactly? It's not 1979, so we don't need to have the realtor give us a printout of the available houses and drive us around in a Lincoln Town Car. Basically, we've been finding all the houses we are interested in online, and then just asking our realtor to get us more info and/or show them to us. I feel like a realtor should alert us to new properties, though, and our current realtor isn't doing that at all. The only real benefit of a realtor seems to be helping with the negotiations and writing offers and all that. Is there any other reason to have a realtor? My husband initially wanted to just use an online service like Redfin, but I insisted we needed a real estate agent. Maybe I was wrong.</blockquote>


Do you remember the reasons you wanted an agent and your husband did not?
 
[quote author="cherry14" date=1235322250]I'm glad most people are saying not to sign with this guy. That was my gut feeling as well.



What is a realtor supposed to do, exactly? It's not 1979, so we don't need to have the realtor give us a printout of the available houses and drive us around in a Lincoln Town Car. Basically, we've been finding all the houses we are interested in online, and then just asking our realtor to get us more info and/or show them to us. I feel like a realtor should alert us to new properties, though, and our current realtor isn't doing that at all. The only real benefit of a realtor seems to be helping with the negotiations and writing offers and all that. Is there any other reason to have a realtor? My husband initially wanted to just use an online service like Redfin, but I insisted we needed a real estate agent. Maybe I was wrong.</blockquote>


Realtors did have some usefulness back in 1979 when they were the gatekeepers of MLS information but their usefulness seems less and less these days, even in negotiation. If I were to buy a resale these days, I'd use Redfin and if I see a property I like, ask the listing agent to show it to me and if interested, just put in an appropriately low offer with the listing agent and hire an inspector. Compared to realtor's declining usefulness, an inspector's usefulness appears to be the same or even increased from 1979 to present day. Make the listing agent cut her commission to 2.5% or 3% to make the deal go through. I really think these days that wise buyers have to take responsibility for their decisions and make good use of information that's very readily available, use common sense to negotiate and not rely on typical realtors whose value-added in negotiations seems to be pretty minimal to me (exception for highly recommended realtors of course).
 
[quote author="cherry14" date=1235322250]I'm glad most people are saying not to sign with this guy. That was my gut feeling as well.



What is a realtor supposed to do, exactly? It's not 1979, so we don't need to have the realtor give us a printout of the available houses and drive us around in a Lincoln Town Car. Basically, we've been finding all the houses we are interested in online, and then just asking our realtor to get us more info and/or show them to us. I feel like a realtor should alert us to new properties, though, and our current realtor isn't doing that at all. The only real benefit of a realtor seems to be helping with the negotiations and writing offers and all that. Is there any other reason to have a realtor? My husband initially wanted to just use an online service like Redfin, but I insisted we needed a real estate agent. Maybe I was wrong.</blockquote>




I hope that stepping up will jump in here. She had a buyer's agent who went the extra mile, iirc, and found all sorts of pertinent info, workmen to get the house in shape prior to occupancy, and a ton of other stuff that i've forgotten.



Similarly, excellent buyer's agents (like IR2 or JimtheRealtor in N.SD, or stepping's) will run title searches to tell you what kind of bargaining position you are in, give you super-in depth neighborhood comps, help you structure the deal to your best advantage financially, and share their years of experience on that precise local market.



And depending on how much work it is, they may even kick you back a % or so on top of all that!
 
[quote author="freedomCM" date=1235376862][quote author="cherry14" date=1235322250]I'm glad most people are saying not to sign with this guy. That was my gut feeling as well.



What is a realtor supposed to do, exactly? It's not 1979, so we don't need to have the realtor give us a printout of the available houses and drive us around in a Lincoln Town Car. Basically, we've been finding all the houses we are interested in online, and then just asking our realtor to get us more info and/or show them to us. I feel like a realtor should alert us to new properties, though, and our current realtor isn't doing that at all. The only real benefit of a realtor seems to be helping with the negotiations and writing offers and all that. Is there any other reason to have a realtor? My husband initially wanted to just use an online service like Redfin, but I insisted we needed a real estate agent. Maybe I was wrong.</blockquote>




I hope that stepping up will jump in here. She had a buyer's agent who went the extra mile, iirc, and found all sorts of pertinent info, workmen to get the house in shape prior to occupancy, and a ton of other stuff that i've forgotten.



Similarly, excellent buyer's agents (like IR2 or JimtheRealtor in N.SD, or stepping's) will run title searches to tell you what kind of bargaining position you are in, give you super-in depth neighborhood comps, help you structure the deal to your best advantage financially, and share their years of experience on that precise local market.



And depending on how much work it is, they may even kick you back a % or so on top of all that!</blockquote>


Sounds good but if you find a different home without your buyer agent help and you decide to buy you still have to pay this buyers agent even though he did nothing to procure the sale. Is that fair, Flat out NO! This is a racket that benefits not the consumer but the Buyers agent and for an agent who has the balls to force someone to sign this or they will not show property i question their ethics and motives. Please people never sign one of these contracts... A good agent will do all the things above without the Bribery.
 
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