Email ElizabethRealtor Ethics Violations Not Available to the Public
While I hung out in Hawaii last week, Ken Harney from the Washington Post contacted me about Realtor ethics violations and the new policy changes at NAR effective this January. The new policies now allow for publication of Realtor ethics violations, meeting certain criteria. Supposedly, this is so agents can find out which other agents have been found guilty of violating the Realtor Code of Ethics. However, the information is not available to the public.
Well, I’ve got news for ya. Most Realtors already know who the perpetrators are.
Ken Harney had made a comment that alluded to the notion paid subscribers of certain websites could monitor or change their online reviews. Which is not really true. I know for certain that many popular websites publish anything any member of that websites cares to write. Especially when the person writing the nastygram is not a client of the agent, makes up some crap, and you can’t get rid of it. Take Zillow for example. A poster of a review needs to satisfy only two conditions: to NOT be a real estate professional and to establish an account on Zillow. Then the reviewer can write anything that pops into her head, sort of like Trump, and the victim can’t take it down.
Harney says you can look at reviews or no reviews on Realtor.com; however, I don’t ask clients to post a review there. Because it’s not as widely read as Yelp or Zillow. You can’t ask clients to post their reviews everywhere for you online. Realtor.com is on the bottom of many agent’s lists. Further, I understand that an agent can remove bad reviews from Realtor.com by not approving them, but I haven’t verified this. However, you can find my client’s testimonials at Sacramentorealtorreviews.com.
As for Realtor ethics violations being available to the public, I replied via email to Ken Harney’s request: The public viewing of dirty laundry is never gonna happen. I see the Washington Post changed my comment to “not going to happen.” But another newspaper did not. I think it lessens the impact to change what I said. It’s not meant to be assertive or in favor or against, just a fact.
Very clearly Realtors attempt to police themselves and, as such, sometimes they are wrong and sometimes they are right. A person was once pursued for an ethics violation when she excitedly wrote online that her business had exploded like 1,000 percent, it was so crazy. Do you think people are serious when they say something like that? Who do you think turns in so-called ethics violations of false advertising like this? Jealous agents, that’s who. These are NOT agents concerned about raising the bar.
Agents concerned about raising the bar are out there setting good examples.
On top of this, many years ago I got hauled into a ethics hearing that was so bogus, so contrived, so over-the-top idiotic, yet the abuse upon full disclosure failed to cease. Not even when an association lawyer who is now in management at the Board tried to stop it. The ethics committee jumped all over that claim and forced me to show up for a hearing that I should never have been called in for. Required to show my 1099 from the New York Times to prove I was also a paid freelancer. Brought my laptop to the hearing so I could visually explain how the internet works. They had no claim. Of course, I was found innocent.
But what a mess that should never have happened. That experience erased any feelings of good will toward the procedures. Such a dog-and-pony show. It most likely happened because some green-eyed agent noticed my content ranks high in Google for real estate-related material online. This individual evidently searched hard for something to report for a Realtor ethics violation because nobody goes to that extent on impulse. The person decided, in error, that the website, owned by the New York Times, had failed to disclose my Realtor status online. Which was untrue. Flat-out wrong.
Why aren’t they out there busting the agents who lie to your face? Doctor documents over a client’s signature? Insist there is no variable commission when there is? Tell buyers if they write an offer with the listing agent, they will make sure they get the property so they should drop their buyer’s agent? Submit earnest money deposits on transactions that are already deposited in another escrow? Independently make decisions for their clients? Squeeze buyer’s agents out of a listing on purpose? Tell a buyer a listing with a release clause is sold?
Those are a hideous bunch of infractors.
As long as Realtor Associations are in charge of ethics violations, there will always be drama. It’s like incest in some ways. And they will never publish that information to the public. They aren’t even that sure of it themselves.
Managing Buyer Repair Requests to Buy a Home in Elk Grove
Managing buyer repair requests is an art form. I can always spot that experienced buyer’s agent who invests the time to educate her buyers. It’s as plain as day. Some buyer’s agents simply take orders from their buyers. Don’t know why. Who is the professional and who is the client? I suspect some agents don’t know the answer to that question, so they allow their insecurities to bubble, to thrive and to rule. Agents don’t want to tell a buyer to back off or calm down or listen to reason, not in those words, of course. They want to be a buddy. And that’s the problem.
If an agent can’t find a way to explain to a client why the buyer’s chosen plan of action is harmful and a really bad idea, then how is a buyer’s agent representing that client? What kind of service is that? I tell you what it is. It’s called lip service, for some of you younger guys. Lip service is a disservice. Just like agreeing for the sake of harmony when the agent knows it is wrong. The best way to engage in managing buyer repair requests is to have a conversation with the buyer prior to inspections. To review other types of inspections and to prepare the buyer for the inevitable: The fact their dream home has things wrong with it and damages the seller might not fix.
This is never time “wasted” on behalf of the buyer’s agent. Yet so few set aside time to discuss aspects of the transaction with their clients.
I’ll give you a case in point. Yesterday, I closed a listing in Elk Grove. A sale which I sold twice and got paid once. Nobody likes to do that, albeit it is less work for me than the poor buyer’s agent who now has to hit the street to show more property or, worse, lost a client over it. In this scenario, a buyer’s agent begged me to show compassion toward his buyers. The agent made a plethora of promises he ultimately could not keep. When I hear from that agent in the future, I shall no longer hold a high opinion of that agent. The opposite. He lied. Repeatedly.
— Which is unacceptable in my book. Other agents say, hey, we all huff and puff and fluff, get over it. But, no. We all don’t huff and puff and fluff. —
After promising his buyer would purchase AS IS, he sent the sellers a 14-item request for repairs. It included things like replace all the fixtures and faucets in the house, replace the siding, install new windows. Crazy-ass stuff. The one thing he should have focused on was replacing the leaking water heater and he might have closed. Focusing on one major item is a sign of a smart agent. But no, they tend to get caught up in drama.
I tell sellers not to do repairs after they get a home inspection. But they take it personally. They actually want to fix broken things. It’s hard to get them to back off and wait for a request. Because what they think a buyer will want fixed and what a buyer really wants are two completely different viewpoints. No sense fixing stuff the buyer doesn’t care about. No two buyers are ever the same. After the existing buyers canceled, we found another buyer right away. Of course, this new buyer did not care at all about the home inspection. Just like I said. Those buyers had an agent who was adept at managing buyer repair requests.
Also, in this particular transaction, when our winning offer arrived, we already had a counter offer out to another buyer. That buyer was slow to respond. His agent did not appear overly motivated, either. While that counter offer was out and awaiting buyer approval, we received the offer we really wanted. Bay area buyer. Cash. $5K over. So we sent the second buyer a withdrawal of offer, withdrew that counter offer, and accepted the offer we preferred.
The sellers had already decided at that point to replace the water heater. It was expensive. Cost $1,400 to replace a 40-gallon water heater. Yikes. For that price, one may as well go tankless, but I digress. Last water heater I helped a seller replace was $750. Only a few years ago. However, these particular buyers had paid for a pest report. The first set of buyers did not. See? They don’t always get a pest. The pest showed $7,500 of Section 1 work, plus more for Section 2.
We had bumped up the sales price by $5,000, so we reduced it by $5,000, which made the sellers even. Even Steven. No pest work, and we closed with a cash offer. 9089 Paseo Grande Way, Elk Grove, CA 95758 closed escrow on September 12, 2018 at $339,999.
Throw Back to the Days of Sacramento Short Sales
Tropical storm Olivia approaches eastern Kauai. by: Josh Amolsch
If I didn’t know this was 2018 and not 2008, I would pinch myself and be happy we are not dealing with the attitudes of Sacramento short sales. Although, I did receive a call about a property in Elk Grove that was listed a bit over $400K, which suddenly dropped to $330K. The caller asked me if I thought $340K would work as an offer, so we had to discuss how short sales work. Why a bank would accept an offer, and how banks look at their BPOs. Still, I could work the comparable sales to arrange for a pretty good value that we could substantiate, but then the buyer never called back.
Almost 70% of my listings have been sold more than once and are now back on the market. You know what that means, right? It means that buyers are acting like the days of Sacramento short sales, i.e., eager to get into escrow but reluctant to stay put. When I talk with the exclusive buyer’s agents on the Elizabeth Weintraub Team, they say it is not unusual for them to spend a lot of time on the basics. Such as going over the purchase contract in detail, discussing how individual properties would meet long-term goals. Managing expectations.
This helps to prevent cold feet. Counseling buyers, making sure their needs are met. Not dragging them kicking and crying into escrow. Not every buyer is cut out to buy a house.
It was very common during the heydays of Sacramento short sales to have buyers cancel. But today, there is no reason other than anxiety, I suppose. Example, a starter home near downtown Sacramento has been in escrow four times. There is nothing wrong with the house. It’s been babied like no tomorrow, and the seller has been on top of every maintenance issue. We have a clear pest. But buyers are afraid.
I hope this stream of flakey buyers is just a quick rash that has stopped spreading. At least one thing is certain. We will never go back to the days of Sacramento short sales. The market might come to a slow-as-molasses rolling stop before leveling off, but it will never be a bubble bursting. Conditions for that kind of storm are non existent.
August 2018 Sacramento Housing Report
Our August 2018 Sacramento housing report is not a pretty picture, so there is no sugar coating what is happening. Although, I imagine many will try. It’s the nature of real estate agents to put a spin on the facts and make them seem more interesting, enticing and exciting. Some of you might look at this chart and note the pending sales have risen. But does that equate to closed sales? Good question. Probably not.
Looking at my own production, right now I have 6 listings, and four of those listings have already been sold once after the buyers flaked. One listing has been sold 4 times. I am not witnessing dedicated buyers.
The most astounding thing about the August 2018 Sacramento housing report is the uptick in inventory. Fact is our inventory has about doubled since the beginning of the year. We began the year with 1,570 homes for sale in Sacramento County. As of the August 2018 Sacramento housing report, the number of homes for sale has leapfrogged to 3,007.
When people ask me if they should put their home on the market in our fall market or wait until spring, my standard answer for the past 7 years has been wait until spring. However, my gut instincts tell me spring won’t be any better than right now and might not be kind to certain sellers. For all practical purposes, we have fewer than two months of inventory, so that makes it still a seller’s market on paper, but in the real world, it does not feel like a seller’s market.
It feels like a market in slow motion.
Where everybody has dropped acid and speaks very slowly, like changing the RPM from 33-1/3 to 5.
We have a slight uptick in days on market, but our median price at $370K is still strong. So strong that I worry if buyers can still afford to buy a home in Sacramento. Especially in the upper-end price points. Further, everybody seems to expect a “deal” and there are no “deals.” There are only homes you may wish you had bought but didn’t, and then it is too late.
Sacramento Home Sellers Asked to Provide Receipts for Repairs
Sacramento home sellers rarely understand why a buyer expects receipts for repairs. I know this because some sellers think it’s unnecessary. The buyers can see the new A/C unit in the yard, sellers say. Or they ask: should we take a photograph and email the photo? But I suspect sellers think it is very odd and peculiar that buyers ask for receipts for repairs because they are not a buyer. Further, they are probably still reeling from the unexpected cost. Because nobody installs a new A/C unit unless it is required. Spending large sums of money out-of-pocket that was not anticipated can throw some people for a loop.
Hard to focus on where the buyers are coming from when a person is staring at a depleted bank account. Not only that, but it’s generally not the buyers who ask for receipts for repairs. It is the buyer’s agent. The reason the agent wants the receipts for repairs in part is to partially transfer liability. They crafted a request for repair, generally, and expect to see verifiable results after completion of the agreed-upon work.
Also, the receipts for repairs tell the buyer who did the work and how much it cost. That invoice probably won’t disclose whether the contractor pulled a permit, though. Many contractors and handy men/women do not get a permit because it’s a hassle or they don’t know if it’s required. I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out that some permits require other types of upgrades the home owner does not want to pay for.
I’ve had escrows in which the seller shot a cellphone pic of the invoice but it was rendered unreadable or too small to enlarge. Scanner apps tend to work better than taking a cell photo. But not every seller wants to fuss with downloading an app. They could mail or fax or ask the contractor to drop it off their agent’s office. But no matter how you cut it, buyers still need receipts for repairs when a seller fixes or installs something new during escrow.
If it’s a sudden repair, the seller might also want to update her seller disclosures for the buyer. This can be accomplished through an addendum to the SPQ. I understand why sellers are reluctant to produce receipts for repair, but it’s better than having the buyers try to track them down after closing to ask who did that work?
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