daniel2002p wrote:MotherBear wrote:For choosing a Realtor, whatever you do don't just go with your friend's cousin or your brother's old roommate or the friend of a friend from church. Find out things like how many homes they've sold in the last year, how many days their listings average on the market, what their list to sell ratio is (I know you're not selling, but if they can't sell do you think they're really good at the other stuff?), and whether or not this is their full-time job. Nothing against part-timers, but that's not really who you want and they'll be less available to you since they also have a day job. Choose someone you feel like you have a good rapport with; you'll be dealing with them a lot and you want to be comfortable asking them questions and things. Do they listen to you and what you want? Yes, they may make suggestions and offer advice that's different from what you're thinking, but there's that and then there's just plain railroading you.
As before, just my opinion.
Is there a good place to start looking? Maybe a website that shows the realtors or something. I know a couple from some coworkers but don't like them at all since I've actually met them before when they were moving in.
--Daniel
I have three different colleagues who are all REMAX agents, and all three of them are very competent. One of them is and remains my first and bestest friend here in Texas (he's the one who introduced me to deer hunting and dove hunting in Texas). When I started house hunting here, I was by myself, and my wife had not moved out here to join me yet because my son's school year wasn't over yet. I just looked up a whole bunch of homes online (Realtor.com) and I just drove around and looked at them from the outside to kind of get a sense of what kind of house you could get for how much. At one point, I was looking for a local BofA branch to open an account. It was supposed to be located right across the street from my friend's REMAX office (I didn't know him yet at the time). Turned out the bank was there all along and I had been staring right at it, but it just wasn't registering. The really funny part is this: I walked into the REMAX office just to ask if someone could point me to the bank branch, and that is when H. walked up, introduced himself, and allowed as he didn't know where the bank was (right there across the street). I introduced myself, told him that my family was moving into the area, and that I was trying to get my banking transferred. He asked if I was house hunting yet or if I had retained a realtor yet, and I told him not yet. H. handed me his card and said that he'd be glad to show us around whenever we were ready.
So 2 or 3 weeks later, my wife flew out here for a weekend, and I called H. up and asked him to take us around. He was really patient with us, and he was brave enough to suggest alternatives that we had not considered. We were not familiar with the local market, and we were used to California pricing—we bought our first home in Pasadena for $170,000 in July 1999. It was built in 1947, was only 1122 sq ft, and was located on an unremarkable 6,000 sq ft lot. Just shy of seven years later, we sold that same house—desperately in need of upgrades—for $530,000. Two weeks later, the real estate bubble burst, and the guy who bought our home is sitting on a $530,000 home worth only $340,000. That same house wouldn't sell for $100,000 in my local Grapevine market today.
And that brings me to buyer's/seller's markets and realtor knowledge about the local market you're looking in. 03LightningRocks posted above that it's a buyer's market. Maybe where he lives that is true. It is NOT currently true in the Grapevine/Southlake/Colleyville area this week. It
might be true a month from now. Your realtor is going to know this about your local market. What applies in my area may not be the same in your part of the state. Heck, it might not apply in the next county over. This same REMAX realtor who told my referrals group this information this morning was telling us just a couple of months ago that it was a
buyer's market back then. Markets change.....and they can even change rapidly. She may sound self-serving when she says that it is currently a seller's market, because she'll make more commissions in that kind of market, but she had no other reason than personal honesty to advise us when it was a buyer's market.....and she did so anyway.
As far as knowledge of local markets, she (the same person as above) gave an example this morning of a $1.3 million property she is showing, and she had to extend out to a 5 mile radius to find comps because this is a 20 acre property and there just aren't any others like it closer in. All the closer properties to this one are smaller, regular suburban properties, and there just isn't anything comparable in the closer area. It takes a knowledgeable realtor to know where to find the comps when there isn't anything at a more normal distance; but those comps are absolutely necessary to informing the buyer about a purchase that will be one of the most significant ever in his or her life.
My son and DIL just bought a home in December in North Richland Hills.....their first home. My friend H. represented them too. They found a 60 year old house (literally....it was built the year I was born) that the sellers had bought, fixed up, and flipped. They got 1800 sq ft with all new hardwood floors and builtins etc., on a HALF ACRE for in a pretty decent neighborhood for $120,000. It was more home than they ever hoped to find, and they were wondering if they would ever afford to own something bigger than a crackerbox. Instead of a crackerbox, they got a MUCH better starter home than than I had for my first home, and
certainly better than they would have gotten for themselves without a realtor to represent them.
By the way, I am NOT pumping for REMAX here. It just so happens that these three people I mentioned are REMAX agents, but all working out of different offices. My friend H. has risen from being just another realtor to being part owner of that office. But I have met several realtors from other franchises, all of whom I would be comfortable dealing with if I were new to the market and did not have any preexisting relationship with my own realtor.
Go with a realtor. If you put in all the effort you could possibly do for a whole year before buying, you could NEVER equal the experience and knowledge of someone who has been a successful realtor for 15 or 20 years or more. Keep in mind that "successful" means that they are doing well financially BECAUSE they have a track record of very satisfied customers.
“Hard times create strong men. Strong men create good times. Good times create weak men. And, weak men create hard times.”
― G. Michael Hopf, "Those Who Remain"
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