Choosing a Realtor

Where Do I Start?

January 2, 2009 by Sasha C. Farmer Realtor · Leave a Comment 

So I guess my attempt at creating a blog is also an attempt to streamline “frequently asked questions” into a canonical resource, so that when friends and clients ask questions that I’ve heard before once or twice, I don’t have to re-invent the wheel.  One of the questions I hear most often from my close friends, the majority of which will be first time home buyers, is  ”Where Do I Start?”

Unfortunately, most of these people have left the Charlottesville area after our fantastic college years, and are now looking to make purchases in New York, LA, DC, and the like- lots of different markets where I would never venture to represent someone!

My answer- the very first thing you need to do as a first time home buyer is get a Realtor!  Shameless Realtor promotion it’s not- I just do not believe that the average first time home buyer is equipped with the information to go at it alone.  The very worst thing you can do for yourself as a first time buyer is guess-timate the amount that you can afford on a house.  This scenario often looks a lot like this; 

1. Assume the amount you can afford for a house.
2. Do tons of research on everything in that price range.
3. Memorize listings inside and out.
4. Research neighborhoods inside and out.
5. Choose the home you love.
6. Find a Realtor to help you make sure you’ve seen everything and then to help you buy the one you’ve already chosen anyways.
7. Be put in touch with a lender by way of your Realtor.
8. Lender throws a wrench in your entire plan because s/he has to tell you that you can only afford $200,000 and not $250,000 and now everything in your price range is hugely disappointing compared to what you were shopping.

My advice:  save yourself the time and the effort and hook up with a Realtor immediately.  Your agent will not pester you.  Be clear about your expectations; if you only want to be contacted by email, let them know.  Your Realtor should be able to set you up in an automated search that will update you on properties in your market that meet your requirements, and it should save you the effort of going online to a home search aggregator that often will force you to look through many more listings than you’d like by not allowing you to narrow your search as precisely as you could.

Your agent will also recommend one or several local lenders to you, and unless you have a strong lending or banking relationship elsewhere I would recommend you use someone who they’ve had good experience with.  In the current mortgage market, I would absolutely recommend a local lender, and do not think that your mother’s lender two states away who helped her finance your family home in 1994 is a great choice.  Although there is a strong relationship there and probably several years of trust and reliability built in, it just isn’t the right choice for most people to go outside of their local lending sphere.  More about this later. 

You can share as much or as little financial information with your Realtor as you feel comfortable.  I have had clients whose entire financial history I’ve been privy to and who have wanted to tell me about every last penny to make sure we weren’t forgetting any major funds and could get them approved for the highest mortgage possible since one of the pair had just gotten a major promotion and would be making much more money in the near future.  I have also had clients who went to a lender I recommended, returned with a strong pre-qualification letter in hand, and who I rarely spoke to again about finances until we hit the closing table.  The clients in the latter situation are usually the one who have done this more than once or twice, understand their financial limits, and don’t need several opinions on what they can afford- I am willing to help either group and point them to the advice they need. 

You may have noticed that this entire post is made under the assumption that you have or can find a good Realtor and can trust their recommendations on who to use for the several different steps in the process; financing, the home inspection, home warranties, insurance, the closing company or attorney, etc.  I will try to address that topic in the next post!

Should the Listing Agent Show/Sell my Home?

March 7, 2008 by Sasha C. Farmer Realtor · Leave a Comment 

I decided that a great way to start blogging about the things that an average real estate consumer wants to know was to pull questions left over at Trulia Voices and other real estate forums and respond to them here. The question from the title of this post was left very recently and seemed like one I had heard enough myself to warrant writing more.

“Should the Agent who is Listing and Marketing my Home Bring in Buyers?”

Typically, No.

First, the agent who you have hired to list your home is really there to market it and make sure that your home gets the greatest possible exposure to the greatest number of qualified buyers that it possibly can. Unfortunately they won’t often be working with that perfect byer at just the right time, but their job, rather, is to figure out where those buyers are, which Realtors would likely be working with them, and how to target them in general.

I typically will not show buyers a home that I am listing. This scenario often results in a dual agency type of situation, wherein both the home seller and the potential home buyer would be represented by the same agent, and as a rule I do not practice dual agency. If I receive a call from an unrepresented buyer who is interested in seeing the home, I will either tour them through it with the understanding that I cannot represent them, or I will refer them out to another agent in my firm.

On a more general note, I also don’t believe the listing agent (or the sellers!) should be present for tours and showings of the home. While some people might think that the listing agent should be there to highlight the best features of the home, this is something that is much more comfortably done by the buyer’s agent when possible. It is my job as a listing agent to make sure that the buyer’s agent is well informed of the great features of the home, and that the home is chock-full of great information, photos, the plat, floor plans, recent utility bills, etc so that the buyer and their agent has no trouble getting the answers they need, but I do not typically want to be there physically pointing it all out.

Nobody buys a home before they look in the closets and cabinets, and this is something that 99% of people just aren’t comfortable doing in front of the owner of the home or the agent who represents them. I also find that as a buyers agent it can also be extremely uncomfortable trudging through a 30 minute “guided tour” on a home that we knew upon walking in the front door was not “the one.” There are many reasons to work with YOUR OWN agent, not the least of which to enjoy the comfort of working alongside someone you trust and someone who won’t judge you when you peer into the pantry or mentally place every shoebox in the walk-in closet.

Long story short, a listing agent should be guaranteeing that any qualified buyer who would be interested in your home will be able to find it easily, but they shouldn’t be guiding the tour.

Choosing a Realtor

January 3, 2008 by Sasha C. Farmer Realtor · Leave a Comment 

I think that giving advice on choosing a Realtor is extremely difficult.  A person can look great on paper, have all the designations in the world, done multi-millions in sales, and still not be a great choice for you.  A great way to choose a Realtor is by word-of-mouth or referrals from friends and family.  This is the #1 way people find me, and it is also probably the most reliable way to find someone good.  If you are moving to a new area, don’t have many recent-home-buyer friends, or just plain don’t trust the referrals that you’ve been getting, I think the next best thing to do is find someone who you know, who is a Realtor, and ask them for their referrals or recommendations.   Like Montague, Miller (my company) many real estate companies have great internal referral networks set up, that keep us in touch with strong companies all over the nation.  MM&Co specifically, is in a network called Leading Real Estate Companies of the World- a network with the following mantra; 

The mission of Leading Real Estate Companies of the WorldTM is to operate a network of the finest independent real estate companies who represent the gold standard of service while generating referral, real estate and corporate relocation business for the financial and strategic benefit of its subsidiaries, affiliates, clients and partners.

This type of company is capable of matching my clients here with strong Realtors in other parts of the country, where I may not know anyone trustworthy to refer them to. This company will take all of the contact information that I give them about a client, and will learn through me your desired timeline for a move, what you are looking for, and a little more about your personality, and will then match you up with two Realtors in your destination city. From this point you get the benefit of competition- both Realtors will be in contact with you and will explain themselves and their services, and you then have the choice of who best matches your style and needs. A small disclaimer in the hopes to promote transparency in my business; this DOES benefit me, as I would eventually receive a “referral fee” for sending business through this network. However, if I didn’t believe it wasn’t a huge benefit to my clients and friends I wouldn’t recommend it. It gives clients who would otherwise fish through a phone book or go with the first name they Googled online, an unbiased, professional referral and it also gives them the benefit of competition between the two.

If you’d rather do some Googling or phone book searching, I think the next best thing to look at is someone’s designations.  While designations aren’t everything, and plenty of not-so-great Realtors have access to them, they often show a desire to continued education in the real estate market, and they show that an individual is most likely in this business full time.  Speaking of full-time, I believe you do need a full-time agent representing you, and not one who just sells houses “in their free time” or during the off-season from their other sales job.  This person may turn out to be an incredible Realtor, but more often than not they are “out of the loop,” not up-to-date with the current market information and statistics, or they are just rusty on their real estate skills in general.

As for designations, I don’t think it is especially important upon first glance for the average consumer to understand what they each mean, but more important to choose someone who is making an honest effort to attain them and the additional training and education they require. The list of real estate designations is lengthy, with some designations requiring education only, others based mainly upon sales production, and some a combination of the two.

I currently hold the GRI designation (Graduate of the Realtor Institute) which is a series of twelve 1-day courses on everything from ethics and agency, to business development and sales. This designation is especially time consuming and is difficult to schedule and complete, as most of the twelve courses are only offered once a year at our local real estate board.

I also hold the e-Pro designation, which for me was an almost laughable achievement. This is an online course that, if broken into small segments, should take people 6-8 weeks to complete. I completed the e-Pro course in 3 hours and felt that I got little, if anything, out of it. It is just one of NAR’s little gemstones of useless knowledge. For me, the e-Pro designation is fairly unremarkable, but for agents who weren’t particularly computer savvy, it could bring them an infinite amount of helpful information. A designation means different things to different people.

I am also en route to achieving my ABR, which stands for Accredited Buyer Representative and is education and production based. It has been really worthwhile and really beats in an understanding of how careful you must be to protect home buyers and all of the extra steps, precautions, and initiatives you must take to make sure that their purchase will be a worthwhile one and that they will get exactly what they want and have bargained for.

Without any of these, a Realtor may still be great, but if you are choosing blindly or without any solid recommendations, I think this could be a good place to start.  Beyond that, I always recommend meeting at least two different Realtors.  Look for who will be the best match for you personality-wise and almost more importantly, communication-wise. The main thing a buyer needs from his/her Realtor is information, so choose the person who you believe will have the most of it at hand and who will present it to you in a way you will appreciate.