Selling House in USA - Realtor commissions

kovai23 · Post by **kovai23** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 10:10 pm

Hi All,

I am preparing my to sell my house before R2I. Got the following quote from a Seller Agent (REMax agent):
Total Commission : 4.25% (Buyer Agent: 2.5% + Seller Agent: 1.75%).

I also put up my info at www.hungryagents.com and 20+ agents bid on it. A couple of those bids (both ReMax agents):
1. Total Commission: 3.75% ( Buyer Agent: 2.5% + Seller Agent: 1.25%)
2. Total Commission: 3.25% (Buyer Agent: 2.5% + Seller Agent: 0.75%)

Are there any risks in going with these discount brokers? When compared with full service guys who are demanding 5% to 6%, I can save a lot of money if I go with one of these guys. They are all agreeing to pay the buyer agent 2.5%. I also got some bids from Independent Agents who were going even lower on the Seller Agent's cut.

Do the full service agents provide any service that the discount agents don't provide?

Thank you in advance for any input..

LLLLWhenR2I · Post by **LLLLWhenR2I** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 2:22 am

I would say that even your Remax agent is also on low side. In CA it is 6%.
In this slow market (as in CA currently), I would advised to go with a reputed agent. They know the tricks and trades of the profession.
If your market is going north then you may be able to sel yourself.

kovai23 · Post by **kovai23** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 2:50 am

LLLLWhenR2I,

I live in a Chicago Suburb and market is definitely going down here. I was expecting the agent to quote 6% and then say, in special circumstances, blah blah blah.. and then quote 5%. I was surprised he quoted 4.25%. Maybe that is an indicator that market is very soft. Have noticed that in the area I live in, most houses take atleast 6 to 9 months to sell.

I wonder if there is really any "tricks and trades of the profession" that a reputed agent might be able to provide or is purely listing in the mls and waiting for the right buyer to turn up. If it is the latter case, I might as well use the agent with the lowest commission.

realentity · Post by **realentity** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 3:01 am

Try putting up a "For Sale by owner" board outside your house. Instead of giving the agent 4.25%, you can give the buyer a discount of 4.25%. Change the board to say "For Sale by owner + $10,000 cash back" (4.25% on a $250,000 house).

r2idude1 · Post by **r2idude1** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 3:15 am

If you are looking to sell quickly - go with a reputed RE brokers.

We sold our house in a down market in 25 days. We made some money on the house but we paid handsome commission to the buyer's agent and selling agent. We offered extra $2,000 selling bonus to the buyer's agent(not the buyer) if the there was an accepted offer before XXXX date .

this bonus won't show up on the listing. It will display only to the agents. First two weeks after listing we got very few responses but the moment we offered the bonus there were heavy traffic and got an offer within 2 weeks.

BTW, this trick was from me( not our agent). He said it is a good idea. For the first time my trick worked :emwink: . Ofcourse, I got this tip from some one else.

But don't forget to pray everyday. Some of the houses in our neighborhood are on the market for more than a year now.

kovai23 · Post by **kovai23** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 6:16 am

thanks realentity & r2idude for the info.

r2idude, I am not in a hurry yet. I want to sell the house by the end of the year. Your idea sounds good. If I don't get any offers by August, I will give it a try.

The-Q · Post by **The-Q** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 1:03 am

I live in the RTP area and the RE agent here is charging 5% commission. This after
I bought the house from the same agent a 1.5yr ago. I had asked her to give me
a 4% deal if I sold the house and she conveniently pretends amnesia now.

Anyway, we want to put our house on sale and we are interviewing RE agents now.
Our concern is with keeping the house clean and presentable for the time it'll take
to sell (maybe 6 months). We have a 3yr old who makes it pretty hard to keep
the house clean (and I think we just need to suck it up and put the house on sale ;-)).

Goodluck to all

restlessdesi · Post by **restlessdesi** » Sat Mar 17, 2007 3:53 pm

The trick is to offer more % to the buyer's agent in this market. The seller agent is not going to be able to do much to sell your house. It is just the price (i.e. you) that will sell a house in this market.

My recommendation is post your listing on the MLS with 3.5% or even 4% to the buyer's agent. Find a buddy or some realtor and get them to post it on MLS for 1% commission. Mention in the listing that you (the seller) can show the home. The buying agent's commission does not show up on the regular listing, even the buyer is not aware of this, and let the buyer's agent go to work for you. As someone mentioned, even $2K made a difference.

My 2 cents. I have seen this work very well.

-restlessdesi

kovai23 · Post by **kovai23** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 11:00 pm

restlessdesi;13408The trick is to offer more % to the buyer's agent in this market. The seller agent is not going to be able to do much to sell your house. It is just the price (i.e. you) that will sell a house in this market.

My recommendation is post your listing on the MLS with 3.5% or even 4% to the buyer's agent. Find a buddy or some realtor and get them to post it on MLS for 1% commission. Mention in the listing that you (the seller) can show the home. The buying agent's commission does not show up on the regular listing, even the buyer is not aware of this, and let the buyer's agent go to work for you. As someone mentioned, even $2K made a difference.

My 2 cents. I have seen this work very well.

-restlessdesi

restlessdesi, I am thinking of following your and r2idude's idea. Is there any difference between the agents who charge about 1% commision vs the guys who offer to post your ad on MLS for about 500$?? If it is the same listing, I would rather post it through the 500$ dudes and use the saved money to increase the pot for the buyer agents.

I had sold my previous house as For Sale by Owner. But, in this market and also in the location I am in, not many people will be looking at FSBO houses. Hopefully increasing the cut for Buyer Agents will be able to sell the house this time.

The-Q, did you give www.hungryagents.com a try? For the Chicagoland area I got about 25 bids from seller agents quoting reasonable percentage. Not sure if the site has a nationwide audience.

r2ikyon · Post by **r2ikyon** » Mon Mar 19, 2007 11:06 pm

I came accross a article in Readers Digest where realtors have a mutual understanding not to promote the homes listed through MLS. It was shocking to read it but the realtors collude to promote their interests and do not show the buyers the homes which are not listed through conventional means. But even with such evil realtors I guess making 1500-2000 offer more to the seller might fetch some results?