Posted on 06/17/2011 4:33:21 PM PDT by WilliamIII
Now, online real estate data is so abundant, buyers and sellers can do most of the research themselves, according to speakers at the 45th annual conference of the National Association of Real Estate Editors.
Nonetheless, speakers maintained, the Internet won't replace the real estate agent the way it did the travel agent.
(Excerpt) Read more at ocregister.com ...
OH well. It was a nice try.
As a former RE agent, I know that you have to have insured personnel (lockbox trustworthy) to take potential buyers to view properties.
You assume that the seller and buyer can’t simply arrange viewings between themselves.
I think that estate agents are going the way of travel agents...
As an owner of several rental properties, we use a realtor to help get tenants, it will end up saving you money in the end, rather than trying to find tenants yourself.
Also, the owners are probably not the best people to sell their own houses. Too much emotion and attachment usually. A good agent thinks of it as the used car that most houses are.
I’ve got it!
Old discarded Petrocks easily could replace them!
If a buyer wants to see several properties - a realtor is essential to line up viewings.
If a seller wants high traffic - use comparables for guidance - a realtor is also essential
Buying and selling houses requires attention to detail, knowing the market, pushing the product and protecting the purchaser.
It ain’t easy. I have great respect for realtors. Wouldn’t want to be one. Watching HGTV’s first time home buyers is fascinating. Couples choose houses for crazy reasons: Will their dog like it?. Will the sofa fit? The paint is the wrong color. Weird.
Big difference between Travel sites that help you book a trip, and buying a home. Realtors arrange everything and are there providing a valuable service - in person, not to mention handling the voluminous paperwork, the Escrow process, the appraisal process and ALL the other numerous inspections and other critical detail. Buyers can easily find a home on the Internet......but actually buying, or Selling -and actually closing - takes an Agent. No other way around that.
Big difference between Travel sites that help you book a trip, and buying a plane ticket through a travel agent. Travel agents arrange everything and are there providing a valuable service - in person, not to mention handling the voluminous paperwork, the ticketing process, the hotel bookings and ALL the other numerous critical details. Travelers can easily find a flight on the Internet......but actually buying a plane ticket, or vacation - takes an Agent. No other way around that.
I’m doing real estate and get leads from Trulia.com. Then I have to go out and find them a house they can actually buy.
Yeah....somebody has to do the lying with a straight face, up close and personal like...
I am a real estate appraiser who has spent 30 years studying market reaction to the locational and physical characteristics of real estate and make no mistake good real estate agents do more than simply provide access to properties. It the go go days a few years ago you could easily sell a home on your own but in normal times and especially right now a good agent is essential to effectively marketing your property.
They will be around for a long time.
That is THE reason.
Having just bought some rural property after over a year searching and quite a few offers, including a few that went to contract, here’s my opinion.
The agents — both buyer’s and seller’s — definitely added value during many parts of the process.
However, after the initial offer (the preparation of which was added value from our agent), having not ONE but TWO agents in the middle during negotiations really gums up and distorts the negotiating process. It’s like an adult version of that kid’s game “telephone”. Whatever you tell the agent gets twisted into the funniest shapes by the time it comes out the other end (except it really isn’t funny).
Several times I had to insist on cutting through the agent-intermediary crap and working directly with the seller, which saved lots of time and frustration.
There’s a place for disintermediated (i.e. direct) real estate transactions, and I wish the damned Realtors(tm) boards didn’t have such a lock on the process so that more such transactions could occur. But there is also a place for agents, and the better ones *do* add value.
Just my 2c
When we moved to another state last year, I searched the internet for houses on the MLS for that city. I viewed several thousand houses and narrowed it down to 2 to actually look at with one being the preferred choice. All the RE agent did was to let us in the house to look, and then call in our offer to the listing agent, then hook use up with a closing agent. The RE agent did almost nothing in the deal to earn a commission. There will become a time when property sales will not need the agents at all.
When I bought my previous house, I met with the seller, handed my money over in front of a notary public at the bank, and took my notarized bill of sale to the courthouse to have the deed changed over; as simple as selling a used car; no agents involved at all.
Real Estate Agents ONLY exist because lawyers can easily sue a buyer or seller for missteps. The agents keeps the buyer or seller foot out of their mouth. Well worth the expense.
LOL! Yeah, that's about right. I'm always amused, though, when looking at pictures of houses at realtor websites, that they'll highlight the shelves that are crammed with books and knick-knacks. Now I don't know if what they're trying to highlight is the storage space, but when there is so much of your frap on it, no one's going to notice the tens of square feet available for the new owner's frap. Leave a few feet uncovered, and they'd actually look more spacious!
A very successful Realtor in our area writes a newspaper column from time to time. He mentioned just that in one of this columns recently. He said he had a VERY qualified couple; both medical professionals, and even THEY had trouble getting a mortgage. That's the kind of thing that scares me, as a soon to be seller of a home. We can't sell it, if folks can't get a mortgage to buy it.
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