Real Estate Agents................................

[MMDad]

Seriously Dad. If you don’t understand the difference between a commissioned based and a salaried position, some words of advice for ya: Never step foot on a used car lot.

So, what makes you think the fence builder is a salaried position? Or are you hiding your obvious error by trying to change the subject?

For someone who thinks he's an expert, your knowledge is seriously lacking.

 

[somdrenter]

So, what makes you think the fence builder is a salaried position? Or are you hiding your obvious error by trying to change the subject?

For someone who thinks he's an expert, your knowledge is seriously lacking.

So, what make’s you think the fence builder is commissioned? (as far as the consumer is concerned)

 

[vraiblonde]

There’s plenty of blame to go around, real estate agents deserve a portion of that blame.

Why? What part of the financial aspect of buying a home are the responsible for?

 

[MMDad]

So, what make’s you think the fence builder is commissioned? (as far as the consumer is concerned)

I never said he was. But it is very similar since the builder is usually a small businessman. The only way he makes a profit is by keeping costs low and charging as much as he can get away with. And just like a real estate agent, no sale = no paycheck.

The grunts actually doing the work may be salaried, but that's not what we're talking about.

Are you going to expect me to keep teaching you the basics?

 

[designer300z]

I think there's a couple of fundamentally flawed points in this argument. (Bear in mind that I am a Realtor, so I do have a natural bias). First, you would be correct to say that an agent is not NECESSARY to sell a home. However, to say that an agent does so little is inaccurate as well.

Not all agents are equal and there are some that do the bare minimum, but there are also some that put in considerable time/money to get a listing sold. If it doesn't sell, they don't get paid, and they're out the cash in marketing, not the homeowner.

Also, an investment planner is not NECESSARY to determine how to diversify your finances, and not everyone uses them. Why? Well, the simple answer is that what they do is possible for any individual to do at it's core. The same holds true for real estatae You're paying not only for what agents do, but also their experience, i.e. what they KNOW as well as what they DO.

Can an owner pay a few hundred bucks to get a listing on the MLS? Yes, but when it hits realtor.com, it would return higher on searches if I had listed it, plain and simple. Why? because I spent the extra $1,500 to ensure priority visibility, and I understand how various websites rank their homes. In many cases is comes down to how much was spent on the listings (much like ebay does), how many photos were included, virtual tour inclusion, etc.

People aren't just contracting me to post it on the MLS and stick a sign in the yard. They're hiring me to get it on craigslist, trulia, zillow, hotpads, kajiji, century21.com, localism.com, teambenya.com, yahoo, google, wall street journal, homes.com, excite, house.com, justlisted.com, juno, and a few dozen others. Can an individual do it themselves? Sure, but I'm the one who's done it time after time and has the experience working quickly and efficently with each interface. I don't need to experiment to find what works best on those sites, and individual owner would.

I'm also the one sending out that information directly to other realtors, brokerages, military bases, etc. I'm mailing information to neighbors, clients, on any given listing it's usally about 200-300 postcards in the first week to get the buzz out there on the property.

I'm stitching photos together to build virtual tours, making sure that those are loaded onto every website possible, maximizing photo counts, optimizing web search results, making recommendations of how to optimize showing quality, following up with feedback for each showing, and pushing other realtors to get their clients in the door.

All of the is happening without a sales contract. Once a contract is negotiated/accepted, a realtor is babysitting lenders, appraisers, underwriters, inspectors, repairmen, the other realtor involved, etc. To ensure that the deal gets to closing for their clients.

All that being said, the process can be done without me involved, and that's completely fine. I'm not making my money just for what I do, but also for what I know, who I have connections with, and my experience with the local area and market.

I'm not the type of person to say that it can't be done without an agent, but there is a reason and a value for my services, and I believe that some agent's services are more valuable than others. I've seen first hand listings that have sat on the market for months without a bite. In many cases, if it's priced right, the fact it was not marketed/promoted well was prohibitive to it ability to attract a buyer.

 

[Sonsie]

Practically every point in that article is an exercise in ignorance.

Selling your home: Go ahead and pay for your own advertising, website, print your own flyers and stick signs in your yard. See how much you spend vs. how many people come see your house. You can also enjoy having strangers traipse through your home just because they "wanted to see it", yet have no intention of buying.

RE agents spend a fortune on advertising, and your prospects come pre-qualified and ready to buy.

Buying a home: Go ahead and spend countless hours tracking down suitable homes and scheduling a time to see them. Have fun lining up the home inspection, then fighting with the owner about repairs. Oh, and you can also enjoy the negotiating process, where price reductions and who pays points can become rather heated. And you better bring a friend around when looking because one pair of eyes can't see everything.

Buyers agents negotiate on your behalf to get you the best deal. If you as an inexperienced layman want to go toe-to-toe with a listing agent or even the homeowner themselves, have at it. You can also spend your life sitting in front of the computer running down every detail of the transaction process and the legalities involved.

Obviously I am not a real estate agent, but I am very familiar with what they do for a living. When I bought my house, all I did was look at houses from the list provided by my agent, and put my financing together. She did everything else, INCLUDING walking me through the closing process and fighting it out with the listing agent.

We got a great agent down here in TX, all by word of mouth reccomendations. She hauled us all over 2 counties for over a week, dealing with hubby, me and 2 kids in diapers. She found me my dream house and hobby farm all in one. I don't begrudge her the fee, she was an angel and full of info. She knew up and coming areas, good vs. bad school districts, and all kinds of stuff about agricultural set asides/tax bases in TX that will save us good money. She was a 25 year vet in realty and was really good to us. We had her undivided attention for over 5 work days, she set up everything and dealt with every hurtle in our path. She was worth it.

 

[somdrenter]

I never said he was. But it is very similar since the builder is usually a small businessman. The only way he makes a profit is by keeping costs low and charging as much as he can get away with. And just like a real estate agent, no sale = no paycheck.

The grunts actually doing the work may be salaried, but that's not what we're talking about.
Are you going to expect me to keep teaching you the basics?

Please, do teach Dad. Along with my previous recommendation of staying away from car salesmen, I would further recommend that you stay away from any fence builders. Most folks get an estimate from several builders, chooses a builder based in part of that estimate, and barring major unforeseen circumstances, pays the agreed upon price. Realtors however, speaking of buyers agents specifically, have a direct financial incentive to negate any buying power the purchaser may have. This could range anywhere from divulging pertinent information to the selling agent, from withholding information from the potential buyer. I’ll be the first to say that yes, it’s a business; realtors want and deserved to be paid. However, when they advertise their service as working on behalf of a buyer, their financial motivations indicate otherwise. Unless of course, they operate on a fixed fee basis, something I have yet to see, locally anyway.

 

[somdrenter]

Why? What part of the financial aspect of buying a home are the responsible for?

They are the face of the REI. Usually the first contact someone has in dealing with purchasing a home. They have the responsibility (financially anyway) to prop up prices regardless of conditions and by any means necessary.

 

[somdrenter]

I'm not the type of person to say that it can't be done without an agent, but there is a reason and a value for my services, and I believe that some agent's services are more valuable than others. I've seen first hand listings that have sat on the market for months without a bite. In many cases, if it's priced right, the fact it was not marketed/promoted well was prohibitive to it ability to attract a buyer.

You describe perfectly the benefits of a sellers agent. And I think your commission is commensurate with the sellers desires. However, given the proliferation of online services, information, and advertising, I could see the realtor profession going the way of the travel agent.

“People aren't just contracting me to post it on the MLS and stick a sign in the yard. They're hiring me to get it on craigslist, trulia, zillow, hotpads, kajiji, century21.com, localism.com, teambenya.com, yahoo, google, wall street journal, homes.com, excite, house.com, justlisted.com, juno, and a few dozen others.

Quite a few of those advertising mediums are already accessible to the seller. The others could possibly be opened up by fixed prices services.

 

[designer300z]

You describe perfectly the benefits of a sellers agent. And I think your commission is commensurate with the sellers desires. However, given the proliferation of online services, information, and advertising, I could see the realtor profession going the way of the travel agent.

Quite a few of those advertising mediums are already accessible to the seller. The others could possibly be opened up by fixed prices services.

I think we have to agree to disagree here. Yes, the commission is commensurate, and people have sold successfully without agents and even with limited service agents, and will continue to do so. Real estate is about more than just listing, it's also about people, marketing, management, and consumer protection, and it's the combination of all these things that make a realtor valuable to so many people.

As far as the mediums being accesible, some are, but not all, naturally. The problem I've seen generally with fixed price services is two-fold.

1) They do not seem to put together as effective a "plan" for marketing. "Yes, it'll be on the MLS and Realtor.com with a photo" is not a plan, IMHO. They are able to fulfill the bare minimum, but I personally do not feel that is conducive to maximizng sales potential. It's all the little things combined that make the difference, such as Virtual Tours, Good Photos, Enticing Descriptions, Distribution of Materials, Promoting Homes to Likely Buyer Demographics, and so forth. I have yet to see a flat fee (or even discount broker) MLS listing that had the exposure I provide.

Yes they may be able to add your listing to zillow, but how will it stack up to other zillow listings? Will it have multiple photos there? Will the Virtual Tour Be There? Will the description be expanded since there is more room to write promotional blurbs? I'm not saying they won't, but we all know what online attention spans are like, and that's why these types of details are important.

2) Who are these people that provide flat fee services, and what is their motivation? If you're paying $500 to put the home on the MLS, what is their motivation to get the home sold? If it doesn't sell you're out the money regardless. The problem is that any listing is going to run me a couple grand in marketing costs, not to mention time spent working on it, and if it fails to sell, I'm out of luck. Not every agent spends that kind of money, but I notice higher volume agents do, and it's because they are confident of their ability to get the home sold. If they couldn't sell homes, they'd be out of business, right? The problem is that it can be hard to understand what you are getting from an individual agent, because it's an agent's job to say "Pick Me, I'm Great At Selling Homes!", and not all Realtors are cut from the same cloth.

 

[somdrenter]

I think we have to agree to disagree here. Yes, the commission is commensurate, and people have sold successfully without agents and even with limited service agents, and will continue to do so. Real estate is about more than just listing, it's also about people, marketing, management, and consumer protection, and it's the combination of all these things that make a realtor valuable to so many people.

As far as the mediums being accesible, some are, but not all, naturally. The problem I've seen generally with fixed price services is two-fold.

1) They do not seem to put together as effective a "plan" for marketing. "Yes, it'll be on the MLS and Realtor.com with a photo" is not a plan, IMHO. They are able to fulfill the bare minimum, but I personally do not feel that is conducive to maximizng sales potential. It's all the little things combined that make the difference, such as Virtual Tours, Good Photos, Enticing Descriptions, Distribution of Materials, Promoting Homes to Likely Buyer Demographics, and so forth. I have yet to see a flat fee (or even discount broker) MLS listing that had the exposure I provide.

Yes they may be able to add your listing to zillow, but how will it stack up to other zillow listings? Will it have multiple photos there? Will the Virtual Tour Be There? Will the description be expanded since there is more room to write promotional blurbs? I'm not saying they won't, but we all know what online attention spans are like, and that's why these types of details are important.

2) Who are these people that provide flat fee services, and what is their motivation? If you're paying $500 to put the home on the MLS, what is their motivation to get the home sold? If it doesn't sell you're out the money regardless. The problem is that any listing is going to run me a couple grand in marketing costs, not to mention time spent working on it, and if it fails to sell, I'm out of luck. Not every agent spends that kind of money, but I notice higher volume agents do, and it's because they are confident of their ability to get the home sold. If they couldn't sell homes, they'd be out of business, right? The problem is that it can be hard to understand what you are getting from an individual agent, because it's an agent's job to say "Pick Me, I'm Great At Selling Homes!", and not all Realtors are cut from the same cloth.

I’m not so sure what we’re disagreeing on. You indicate that somehow, flat fee services have the capability to display a photo. But for some reason, second and multiple photos are out of the question. You indicate that a flat fee service does not have “virtual tours”. What’s stopping them? That could be just one more thing ala cart. As far as “Will the description be expanded since there is more room to write promotional blurbs?”, I ‘ve notice that local realtors have trouble inputting the Sq. ft on the listing, much less a decent description.

At some point, the ala cart services are more economical than a 3% commission. That’s a large chunk of change on a $300K-$400K home.

 

[designer300z]

I’m not so sure what we’re disagreeing on. You indicate that somehow, flat fee services have the capability to display a photo. But for some reason, second and multiple photos are out of the question. You indicate that a flat fee service does not have “virtual tours”. What’s stopping them? That could be just one more thing ala cart. As far as “Will the description be expanded since there is more room to write promotional blurbs?”, I ‘ve notice that local realtors have trouble inputting the Sq. ft on the listing, much less a decent description.

At some point, the ala cart services are more economical than a 3% commission. That’s a large chunk of change on a $300K-$400K home.

I'm not saying it's out of the question, just that I don't see it actually done. Regarding virtual tours, I don't know what's stopping them, aside from the time and money it takes to build one. The photo stitching can be time consuming, especially if you did not color balance your photos. Again, some realtors don't put it s.f., some do write poor blurbs, and not all are realtors are created equally.

The cost for a la carte may be cheaper at some point, but you're not paying for experience or expertise necessarily, which can be a huge difference when it comes to buying or selling a home. What gets me about those services is that they cost less than what I spend in the first 2 weeks of marketing alone. The scope of promotion is limited because the money spent marketing is minimal. I think that if you feel that flat fee is better for you, then go ahead and try it! For some people it works just fine, but I think it's a lot more headache, stress, and compromise when it comes to trying to sell your home.

 

[smilin]

I'm not saying it's out of the question, just that I don't see it actually done. Regarding virtual tours, I don't know what's stopping them, aside from the time and money it takes to build one. The photo stitching can be time consuming, especially if you did not color balance your photos. Again, some realtors don't put it s.f., some do write poor blurbs, and not all are realtors are created equally.

The cost for a la carte may be cheaper at some point, but you're not paying for experience or expertise necessarily, which can be a huge difference when it comes to buying or selling a home. What gets me about those services is that they cost less than what I spend in the first 2 weeks of marketing alone. The scope of promotion is limited because the money spent marketing is minimal. I think that if you feel that flat fee is better for you, then go ahead and try it! For some people it works just fine, but I think it's a lot more headache, stress, and compromise when it comes to trying to sell your home.

Well thought out and well put.

The only thing I could add is the real estate agent has no control over the financial process, appraisal process nor the underwriting process. Bundling marginal loans to Wall Street investors is also just a teeny bit out of the average real estate agent's purview.

 

[remaxrealtor]

One blogger's view on Real Estate Agents (16 04 2007)

This world is full of people who set out on a career path pursuing illegal activities and end up becoming criminals. They rob banks, set up monopolies, commit fraud, engage in racketeering, etc. You may think these guys are scary, but the good news is that the law is on your side. The real scary criminals out there can do all those criminal activities and get away with it, legally. I call these guys…..Real Estate Agents.

Real Estate Agents are the modern day snake oil salesmen, the real bottom of the feedbag. These guys take; or rather steal an unbelievable amount of money from you without selling anything for you or to you. Let’s take a look at what I mean by examining what they want you to perceive is happening and what actually happens:

When Selling a Home - Perception: Realtors want you to think that they will sell your house for a nominal fee, usually 6% of the gross sales price. They will handle all of the set up, advertise the home, sell and negotiate with prospective buyers to get the most $’s for your home as possible. All with a friendly smile.

When Selling a Home – Reality: Realtors sell nothing for you. Their only sales job is to get you to “List” with them however they don’t sell anything. The word “List” is commonly used in place of sell and most people believe that is what they mean. It isn’t. It simply means they will put it on Realtor.com, place a sign in your yard and perhaps make up a flyer that people can take as they drive by. If you’re lucky, they will come and sit once for an open house, but trust me; even at the open house they aren’t selling the home. All of this you can do yourself for a mere fraction of what they charge. I have never seen them negotiate with a perspective buyer. If they negotiate anything, they negotiate with me, working to get me to reduce the price of the home or take that lower offer because there may not be another. Sure, they tell me how great the home is and float out these high numbers when they are trying to get me to “list” with them, but then once they have the listing and an offer comes in, the story becomes one of a sagging market and few buyers and we should be lucky and this may not come again.

When Selling a Home – Conclusion: Realtors just want the listing. Once they have that listing contract, they are in. As we will look at in When Buying a Home, realtors can show any other agents product so it is just a matter of time before another agent brings along a family that will place an offer. Realtors know this and don’t work hard after the contract. If you are in a hurry, you may be stuck. However, if you have time, sell your own home.

When Buying a Home – Perception: The agent wants you to think he is needed because they know the area or they can get the listings, or they will negotiate the lowest and best price. They will also claim to lend their personal experience as to whether you should consider a home or not as well as guide you through the difficult closing process. The agent will require you to sign a contract before they start pulling listings and working for you. All of this, they will repeatedly say is at zero cost to you.

When Buying a Home – Reality: You don’t need an agent for any of this! On a $300,000 house you would be giving away 3% or $9000 for nothing. That is right, it costs you $9000 to have an agent help you buy a house. What? You mean they lied? You bet. They always come back with the fact that the seller pays that money but let me remind you who has to go to the bank and sign a mortgage for it, YOU DO. Yes you are paying for it and buying nothing. Let’s look at that step by step:

1) Your agent provides listings – Try Realtor.com or FSBO.com or many other realty sites dedicated to home listing. You search homes in your area in great detail from asking price to how many bathrooms you want. The internet is a great tool and can be used for pennies. Realtors know this makes them useless and are creating sites that require a password, setting this up so that the only person who can give you a password is your contracted realtor. In conjunction, they are showing fewer houses on free sites like Realtor.com. That is criminal.

2) Personal Experience of the Home – Over 90% of the homes that a realtor has taken me to see have been homes they themselves have never seen. How can they sell me a product that they don’t know anything about? Actually, many of the instances have been complete wastes of time that if the realtor did his job, we would have never gone to see.

3) The Agent Sells the Home – The agent sells nothing. Whether it was my agent or an agent sitting at an open house, there is nothing actually being “sold”. Generally it goes like this, we walk in, look at the house, decide if we like it, the agent will ask if we like it, we will say no, and he will say no problem, I have more to show you. I would be really mad if I was the seller paying big money and nobody selling my house.

4) The Agent Guides you through the difficult closing process – Wrong. The closing agency does that. The realtor may help with a suggestion, but in the end I would suggest read the paperwork. Worst case, you can hire a real estate lawyer for $500 or less.

When Buying a Home – Conclusion: DO NOT USE A REALTOR! Believe me, take the time, and find a home you like then use the $9000 that the sellers already have baked into their asking price to negotiate a lower price, for closing costs, cash back, repairs, whatever, it is yours spend it wisely.

Lastly, have said all of this, the Real Estate world is one big racket. I can’t think of any other market that allows one company to sell another companies product. Thus there is no real competition. It is like trying to get the Ford dealer to sell you a new
Toyota, or wanting Dell to make you a Compaq computer. Even used car salesmen rank higher than these guys since they are trying to sell you what is on their lot. You can’t go to one lot and have them sell you a car on the lot next door. But Realtors get away with it. Their true con job is that big fat smile that they try to get you to buy because that is all that you end up getting. That is also why they put their picture on their business cards because that is all you are buying.

Dave’s Place

 

[somdrenter]

The only thing I could add is the real estate agent has no control over the financial process, appraisal process nor the underwriting process.

Appraisers Under Pressure To Inflate Values
By Kenneth R. Harney
Saturday, February 3, 2007; Page F01

With home prices softening and sales volume sagging in many local markets, real estate appraisers say that pressure on them to inflate values has reached pandemic proportions.

A new survey of the national appraisal industry found that 90 percent of appraisers reported that mortgage brokers, real estate agents, lenders and even consumers have put pressure on them to raise property valuations to enable deals to go through. That percentage is up sharply from a parallel survey conducted in 2003, when 55 percent of appraisers reported attempts to influence their findings and 45 percent reported "never." Now the latter category is down to just 10 percent……

"You've got a situation where sales are down so everybody in the deal needs it to go through" at the contract price -- the mortgage broker, the real estate agent, the lender and the sellers, said Alan Hummel, senior vice president of Forsythe Appraisals of St. Paul, Minn., one of the largest property valuation firms in the country with 40 offices and 190 licensed appraisers. Forsythe was a co-sponsor of the new study.

Loan brokers are now routinely "dialing for values," Hummel said. "They call up appraisers and say, we've got this sale at $335,000 at such and such an address. Can you get to that number?" If an appraiser answers yes, he or she gets the assignment. If not, the appraiser is bypassed.

Worse yet, Hummel said, when an appraiser comes back with a market value estimate that is lower than the sales contract price, the appraiser may not get paid for the work, and may be blackballed by the mortgage broker or real estate agent.

Kenneth R. Harney - Appraisers Under Pressure To Inflate Values - washingtonpost.com

 

[smilin]

Appraisers Under Pressure To Inflate Values
By Kenneth R. Harney
Saturday, February 3, 2007; Page F01

With home prices softening and sales volume sagging in many local markets, real estate appraisers say that pressure on them to inflate values has reached pandemic proportions.

A new survey of the national appraisal industry found that 90 percent of appraisers reported that mortgage brokers, real estate agents, lenders and even consumers have put pressure on them to raise property valuations to enable deals to go through. That percentage is up sharply from a parallel survey conducted in 2003, when 55 percent of appraisers reported attempts to influence their findings and 45 percent reported "never." Now the latter category is down to just 10 percent……

"You've got a situation where sales are down so everybody in the deal needs it to go through" at the contract price -- the mortgage broker, the real estate agent, the lender and the sellers, said Alan Hummel, senior vice president of Forsythe Appraisals of St. Paul, Minn., one of the largest property valuation firms in the country with 40 offices and 190 licensed appraisers. Forsythe was a co-sponsor of the new study.

Loan brokers are now routinely "dialing for values," Hummel said. "They call up appraisers and say, we've got this sale at $335,000 at such and such an address. Can you get to that number?" If an appraiser answers yes, he or she gets the assignment. If not, the appraiser is bypassed.

Worse yet, Hummel said, when an appraiser comes back with a market value estimate that is lower than the sales contract price, the appraiser may not get paid for the work, and may be blackballed by the mortgage broker or real estate agent.

Kenneth R. Harney - Appraisers Under Pressure To Inflate Values - washingtonpost.com

Tee Hee.
Poor appraisers. Glad you took the time to research and copy this unbiased report. The poor appraisers who gladly use all the same information as Real Estate agents and then set the value of the home "independently" OR
face losing their license. They get paid whether you buy your home or not. Look up POC.
Where were these complaints when they were approving the outrageously high values on homes the last few years (that you have been complaining about)? Standing with their hands out.
Yup - just can't be their fault.

 

[somdrenter]

My apologies smiling. When you said:

The only thing I could add is the real estate agent has no control over the financial process, appraisal process..

I thought you meant that real estate agents have no control over the financial or appraisal process. But the only thing I can deduce from your last comment, is that what you really meant was that so long as everyone was getting paid, it matters little of ill gotten gains by fudged appraisals.

Tee Hee.
Poor appraisers. Glad you took the time to research and copy this unbiased report. The poor appraisers who gladly use all the same information as Real Estate agents and then set the value of the home "independently" OR
face losing their license. They get paid whether you buy your home or not. Look up POC.
Where were these complaints when they were approving the outrageously high values on homes the last few years (that you have been complaining about)? Standing with their hands out.
Yup - just can't be their fault.

 

[CREResident]

Why You Must Use a Real Estate Agent...

Because all the real estate brokers are stealing your money by having agents refuse to show houses that are not listed by another agent... But I wish someone could tell me what any agent does to earn 5% commission (I know, it's split).

This is a business that needs reform. All the listing agent is put your house on the computer, and all the selling agent does is provide an escort service from house to house.

I agree agents do nothing. But if you don't list your house with an agent, other agents won't show your house to a buyer. And people buying a for sale by owner house expect to get the house cheaper because you are not paying an agent commission.

The listing agent does nothing but get the listing on realtor.com. It doesn't cost much to MLS list a house or buy a sign. Agents do NOT spend money on advertising other than listings on realtor.com. Other advertising is useless. People look on realtor.com or another web site. Open houses result in nothing.

The selling agent also does nothing. The majority of buyers look on the internet, pick out a few houses, and call an agent to show them. So the agent follows you around in their car with the codes for the lockboxes. Few agents will preview houses for a buyer and most don't know anything anyway about construction.

Agents know nothing about law, don't buy/sell a house or sign any contracts without a lawyer reviewing everything. Agents contracts are written to protect them and their broker -- if you're smart, write your own with help from a lawyer.

Agents DO NOT screen buyers. I've had many agents show me houses without asking for one bit of identification. I've had agents leave without shutting doors/windows, locking them, and not re-setting my alarm.

Agents may or may not be good negotiators.... I'd expect that most are not. They are out to make a sale and get some commission. They are working in their own interest.... and if that means persuading a seller to list or sell low so a quick sale is made... they will do it.

Agents don't know anything about construction. Get a real good home inspector and someone in construction you really trust to look at the house. Give them some money for walking with you to look at a house.

Agents don't help you put your finances together. They don't know squat about financing either... That's what the bank does... and it's called prequalification.

The closing process isn't rocket science either. The BANK will walk you through the closing process -- it's their fees at closing, you will be paying!

As for whatever else agents do -- market analysis, etc.... anyone can do that. and Agents are not appraisers! One has to either be real dumb or just real lazy to really need an agent.