I had lunch with a friend of mine the other day. As usual conversations moved towards real estate. He expressed some displeasure with his real estate agent and I wanted to post in my blog what he said as I think that is good feedback.
My friend was selling his condo as well as looking to buy a new one. He choose one agent to do both tasks. Everything went well on both sides of the transaction (for the most part).
When it came time to accepting offers he felt very presured to accept an offer that was less than he wanted. Long story short, he accepted the deal after the Realtor convinced him that he should and that he could not get the amount that he was looking for. (the difference was around $8000.00 on a $300,000 condo – big price difference, not a big commission difference)
Now that everything has settled, he sold the condo, bought a new one and the day that we had lunch he was thinking about upgrading again (about 1 year later). That was sort of how this all came up… I asked him what real estate agent he was going to use? same as last time? He said NO, and then told me the above story. He thinks that the agent was too eager to do the deal and not too eager to get the best price for him. Now because of the way he feels, that agent will not do more work with my friend.
The moral of the story – ensure that your client knows that you are doing your best for them and that commissions is not your first priority, their happiness is!
If that agent was pushing to get the deal done just to get the commission it was very short sighted. They did get paid, but now have lost out on future deals with their client… when in the long term is a much better way to get paid.
If you are an agent and are pushing your client to accept an offer less than that they want – ensure that your client know why you think they should accept it. Bring up the commission discussion as I’m sure the homeowner is thinking that might be the reason you are pushing to accept the deal. Just make sure that the client understands your reasoning… you don’t want them to do the deal and then never use you again.