Posted on 12/20/2023 5:15:28 PM PST by Reno89519
Things are not OK in Realtorland. The US housing market is still reeling from pandemic-era shocks, home sales are stuck in a rut, and mortgage rates, while inching downward, are still near two-decade highs. It's a bad time to be a buyer, and maybe a worse time to be a seller.
Despite all this upheaval, there's another story brewing in which the stakes for everyone in real estate, from agents to the average consumer, are even higher. It won't have anything to do with the debate over whether you should put your hard-earned cash toward rent or a down payment. Instead, it'll be about court cases.
The biggest threat facing the industry is a mounting wave of class-action lawsuits that accuse the National Association of Realtors, along with some of the country's biggest real-estate brokerages, of conspiring to rip off consumers by keeping the commissions paid to agents unfairly high. These cases are expected to reach major milestones in the next year, and the ramifications could be staggering: Tens, if not hundreds, of billions of dollars hang in the balance. Hundreds of thousands of Realtors could see their commissions slashed, which might force many out of the business. The old way of buying and selling homes could go away forever.
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(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...
Fantastic news and I hope the Supreme Court ends the realtor rip-off and forces billions of dollars in refunds and damage. Too bad my last real estate transactions are too long ago to benefit from this.
Realtors are way overpaid. Sorry for any freeper realtors out there, but 5%-6% of the selling price just to fill out some PDF forms is ludicrous.
Maybe just turn it over directly to Black Rock without a small business middleman
One of my daughters is a realtor. She makes 3%, sometimes 2% if she needs the sale. Years ago, we had to pay 5-7% commission if we sold a house.
And yes, sorry, I know there are other costs - pictures, listings, showings. All of that can be an hourly rate. Heck a lot of the time the realtor sends an apprentice to handle open houses anyway - paid by the hour.
Have you ever sold real estate for a living?
Like anything else a realtor will likely spend months or years cultivating a listing. Hundreds of cold calls. Buyers who take up 8 weekends of your time and end up buying nothing or use someone else to buy in the end.
There are far more starving than millionaire realtors.
5% of a $100,000 house is not a lot of money. But 5% of a $1-$2 million house IS a lot of money and that is the low-end price of many homes in the major blue cities esp the big blue cities. Same work, vastly different payoffs. Where I live, you can’t really touch a decent house for under $1 million - and a semi-decent one would cost $750k.
Couldn’t happen to a better group of people. Most people can do their own but the way things are they realtors will conspire against you if you do a for sale by owner.
That is the goal. While we are at it, let’s eliminate car salesmen, clothing sales, boat sales, rv sales, waiters, waitresses…anyone who sells items or services. They all overcharge. It’s not fair when people get paid for services or goods.
Every good little leftist wants realtors gone.
You have no idea or concept of what goes into RE sales. Educate yourself before you bloviate!
We’ve had some bad luck with realtors. We rate them close to politicians in terms of abilities and trustworthiness.
Our first home wouldn’t sell. So we ran an add in the newspaper, found a buyer, it sold and our realtor got her commission.
The second effort was much worse. The realtor did sell the home but had the title company hold several thousand back for roof repairs that were never made.
The best real estate deal we ever made bypassed the realtor altogether. We found the property we live on today, went direct to the owner, had a lawyer draw up the paperwork and BINGO! The place was ours at an absolute fraction of what it would have been if some stinky realtor got their hands on it.
I’m in real estate. I’ll do whatever I possibly can to avoid real estate agents and banks. That means sniffing out properties BEFORE the realtor puts his sign on it, and offering cash. Realtors can drag out a sales agreement for weeks. Banks can drag it out for months. Realtors don’t find me buyers when I’m selling, and I accept cash from buyers, or I’ll do a fsbo, but if they need a bank, no dice.
My 3 guidelines: no tenants, no banks, no realtors, in that order.
So far no regrets.
Just like everything these days, they are over complicating it. So happy I’ll never buy or sell a house or property again. Realtors on both sides have a built in conflict of interest so long as they are paid a % of the sale price. They have had a monopoly and they know it. Time for it to be busted up.
The selling agent helps promote the house, pays for advertising it via fliers and signs, holds open houses (often several times a week) which take up 3-4 hours of their time, helps stage the house, etc., all of which cost money. He can also be fired if it doesn’t sell, which means the realtor doesn’t make a dime.
The buyer’s agent helps the buyer narrow down their choices by pointing out unseen pros and cons with each home, works with mortgage brokers to find the best deal for their client, is present when the buyer wants to see the house, makes sure the house is inspected thoroughly and points out possible defects to the often clueless buyer, and then completes the myriad paperwork accompanying each sale. If the buyer decides not to buy a house after all, the agent receives no money for his time or trouble.
It’s far from “filling out some forms,” FFS! If realtors go the way of dodo birds, get ready for the onslaught of lawsuits filed by unhappy home buyers who have no idea the pitfalls awaiting them.
My husband is a part time real estate agent. He pays for everything out of pocket. The average full time agent makes a whopping $46,000 a yr. and doesn’t have an assistant. Please educate yourself about the subject before posting your support for the demise of a career that affects thousands of middle class Americans.
Begs the question, is Black Rock paying the way for the suit?
Instead you gave a stinky lawyer the money you would have paid to a hardworking realtor. Good thing lawyers are such trustworthy individuals. BTW paralegals do most of the work for those stinky lawyers.
When I sold my house, I did all the work and they took a huge commission.
Warren Buffett is none too happy. He owns the largest real estate brokerage Berkshire Hathaway real estate that is all over the country and he will lose millions and millions of dollars you can’t do that to him. Do not harm warren. After all he voted for walkaway Joe Biden.
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