Real Estate Agents and service business FLUFF

I have been cognisant of the fluffery surrounding all service businesses for a while now, but have never seen it used as much as I have in the Real Estate Brokerage Industry. I am a Broker and have been for only 3 years, and I typically work on rentals and sales as a renter/buyer representative. I'd like to share with you the truth about some of the fluffery that brokers will tell you to get you to use them rather than using a "discounter" like myself.

EXPERIENCE. This is the first thing you will hear about a brokerage when you sign up with them. They all want to tell you how many years they have under their belt, how many transactions they've closed, and how valuable this experience will be in helping you make up your minds about a place to live (possibly the most important decision of one's life).

Don't get me wrong it's always best to pick someone with a proven track record to help you make such an important decision. However, why do you have to pay a premium for this? You can find this amongst a variety of discounters, the only thing you really have to lose is the commission. Afterall, what will their experience do for you? Will they be any better at searching MLS, Craigslist, bostonapartments.com, etc than the next guy? Probably not. Will they get the paperwork done faster, be more efficient and let you worry about the moving part rather than the over-abundance of paperwork that is a real estate transaction? Maybe in some cases. But you have to decide what this is worth to you. Eleven Park Realty, Redfin, and Exit Realty will allow you to save up to 75% of their commission (which you were likely to pay whether you hired them or not unless you have a relative who's going to hook you up big time) on the purchase of a property, which we all know can amount to 10's of thousands of dollars. I'm not a millionaire, maybe you are and that's great but I am not willing to spend 5-10%+ of my net worth on a broker.

YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR, DISCOUNTERS WON'T HOLD YOUR HAND LIKE WE WILL. This is another point in the debate between discounters and full service brokers. I tend to agree with this one. We feel as discounters that the money that you save is, and should be, priority number one in choosing us as your brokers. Of course there will be some kind of cut in the service that we will provide you, we can't afford to hold your hands like they can. But that's okay. They need to realize that the people who need their hands held, ARE NOT PART OF OUR TARGET MARKET. We expect you to know what is going on, know how to surf the web and find posts like this to educate you on the industry, and most importantly know where your money goes. There's nothing I respect more than when a customer asks me, "How much are you making on this deal?" I wish that people would ask the hard and more awkward questions more often, that way they would know how much money they are handing off to their undeserving broker.

Want more information on how to save money finding an apartment? Visit Eleven Park Realty.