Does your real estate agent really matter or are they all kind of the same?
Well, obviously as a real estate agent myself, I have a pretty strong opinion about that, (For the record: Yes – your realtor matters and you should choose a great one.) But for me to think this is one thing… (afterall, I’m biased). You have to believe it for it to matter to you. So I’m going to share with you one of the reasons that who you work with matters.
Yes, I would say in several transactions that have come together, both with me representing the buyer and with me representing the seller, I have seen instances where the agent has really had an impact on the deal coming together.
Story Time: Why Your Real Estate Agent Can Win (or Lose) Your Deal
For example, a few months ago I was selling a house that was an estate sale, and we had a lot of interest. It was in Bothell, so there was a huge, huge number of people interested in this property.
On the review date, I got a number of offers from what seemed to be “robots.”
I wasn’t familiar with the company that was sending them in… don’t know if they were offers from discount brokerages, or they were using a team approach, or they had various VAs from overseas submitting the offers, but I had multiple different points of communication and some strange like frowny emojis when I would give them information that they didn’t like.
I am serious. This was how the brokerage was conducting business.
It was hard to tell what was going on, and I don’t think I ever talked to a real “human” from that company on the phone.
So, it was a strange customer service experience for me as the listing agent, and at the end of the day, it made me feel uneasy about working with this buyer despite his relatively strong offer.
You see, when I counsel my sellers on which offer to accept in a multiple-offer situation, one of the things that I’m doing is kind of “vouching” for that person. Like, I’m betting on them. I’m getting a vibe off of the agent and seeing how they work. I’m vetting the lending and making sure the buyer is legit and ready to close.
When we choose the buyer to work with, I really want to have a lot of confidence that, if we choose to go with a certain offer, the buyer is going to close. If they don’t buy the house (for whatever reason), it makes me look bad. It makes a lot of extra work for me. And worst: the sellers are very upset and disappointed.
To exacerbate the problem, when buyers fail to close, we may have lost momentum with our sale.
We no longer have 30 people sending in offers, and we have to start the process all over again. We may (or may not) get as strong an offer the next time.
It always looks a little sketchy to other buyers in the marketplace when they see your deal has fallen apart.
Because of all this, we did not end up taking the strong offer from the buyer represented by “robots.” The buyer we ended up working with had actually been in second place with their offer, but the agent had been constantly in touch with me and was a very strong agent, building rapport and keeping communication going the whole time.
When her offer got beat out by the “robot team” I called her back and we allowed her to come over the top of the other offer.
We gave her an option to improve her offer and stay in the mix because a) I like to negotiate and I like to circle around and see if we really truly have the highest and best offer out of everyone. And also, b) she had been communicating with me effectively from the beginning, making a pitch for her clients, making an early offer, being in good communication. I really felt that she was on the ball and her clients were very interested in this specific property and they weren’t just taking a scattershot approach to make random offers and throwing red flags as they went. The best offer one, and the good agent put her clients in the position to be at the top of our consideration set.
Get A Rock Star Agent On Your Team
So your buyer’s agent should strive to create a smooth transaction and signal to the seller’s agent from their first communication that they’re going to create a smooth transaction from the very beginning.
Your seller’s agent should always try to VET the buyer’s agents and suss out which of the agents she’s talked to has the strongest clients and the best overall package when it comes to making sure the deal closes.
So, when I’m representing buyers, I always call the listing agent to introduce myself, let them know about my clients, and find out if there’s anything special that the agent or their clients want, as far as how the offer is presented.
That’s what you need to be looking for in an agent. I am that agent. My name is Emily Cressey. I look forward to hearing from you.
