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Working with People You Like in Real Estate
Real estate is one of the few professions in the world in which one can pretty much choose to work with people you like and ignore the ones you don’t. People who don’t work in the real industry and view it only from the outside have a completely different viewpoint of what’s going on and how it works — but that’s true for just about any industry. It always looks simpler and easier when you’re not the one doing the work. Clients try to be helpful and offer suggestions which, to them, may seem like wonderful ideas but are often unrelated to the real estate market at hand. Maybe they got these ideas from a book, somewhere online, or from a family member who sold a home 20 years ago, and it can be hard for these types of clients to let go and let a professional do her job.
There’s not a real estate agent working hard in Sacramento right now who doesn’t know exactly what I’m talking about.
Even when we lay out the principles of real estate in an ABC format, people still have their own ideas about what a real estate agent should do and how they want their property sold. It’s OK because they wouldn’t be human if they didn’t have preconceived notions. It’s tough for us agents to explain because we don’t want to come right out and say to a seller, for example, that the seller is wrong. Nobody wants to be wrong. But sellers can be less right than they may have a right to be.
It’s a delicate balance. To inform, educate, bring about an agreement, a mutual understanding, a mutual agreement and to overcome stubbornness that might be staring us in the face, but it’s all part of the job of a Sacramento real estate agent.
There are times in the real estate business when you can’t come to an agreement. There might be no compromise. A client could be working within the realm of a distorted reality. So, what do you do when that happens? Some agents will take the listing anyway and figure they can ignore the yelling and screaming later. Other agents will walk away and decide to work with only clients who are more reasonable.
I try to keep it simple. If I like the person, even if we don’t see eye-to-eye on every single aspect, I might still work with them. I don’t have to agree with their premise to do a job for them. If I don’t like them, there is nothing they could say to make me want to work with them. Not enough money in the world could make me do it. Money is not a motivator to me. I don’t sell out for money; I don’t compromise who I am.
There are agents who say they would have no clients whatsoever if they worked only with people they liked. I guess I’ve been more fortunate.
Dealing With Unreasonable Buyers After a Home Inspection
A home inspection is only for a buyer’s edification and not a license to ask for repairs after a home inspection, but what do buyers know? When it comes to advising clients in a real estate transaction, this Sacramento real estate agent is direct with her advice. There is no skirting around the issue. I try to present a balanced picture for clients, pros and cons of actions they could take or ignore, especially when it comes to the dreaded Request for Repairs, which are often a buyer’s response to a home inspection. I wish often that agents would provide a better education for their clients, but then that would involve recommending top-notch home inspectors at all times, and that’s just not a reality.
Sometimes, the buyers don’t want to hire the agent’s home inspector because they don’t trust their agent. Which is always a lovely situation. They might think their agent is likely to recommend some doofus home inspector who won’t do a thorough job or who will gloss over some stupid repair, which is idiotic thinking, but what are ya gonna do? You can’t easily change how a stubborn person thinks, especially if they won’t listen. Therefore, often what perpetrates a problematic request for repair is a home inspector’s bad home inspection report.
It’s not bad in the way that a buyer would think in that a home inspector was covering up an issue. To start with, home inspectors don’t cover up issues. They expose issues. The main problems are some that home inspectors expose issues that don’t exist or insist that items are broken / need repair when said whatchamacallits are perfectly fine.
One can also throw into that mix an agent who whips out a pad and starts writing down all of the buyer’s concerns without so much as lifting the pen from the page or discussing them. Being an order taker is not what a buyer’s agent is all about. I would shrivel up and die if I presented a Request for Repair to a listing agent like some of the documents I receive. Some of the requests are just a list of every defect from the home inspection. What that tells me is the buyer’s agent either has absolutely no guts or else no clue — either way it’s bad. Sometimes agents behave like they are order takers and not real estate agents.
Maybe they’re simply exhausted and worn down by the buyer? That can happen. But then the rest of us are stuck with explaining why the home inspector was wrong in the report and why we can’t perform the repair requested. Besides, sellers are not required to fix anything the buyer complains about. Every home in California is sold AS IS. But most sellers want the buyers happy with their new home, so we try to find a way to keep everybody on the path to closing.
I just wish buyers would select one or two major issues like most sensible buyers would do. But then, this is Sacramento real estate wherein expecting things to make sense could render one a crazy person. You know the definition of insanity, right?
Guiding Sellers to Correctly Complete Seller Disclosures
Talk about dumb and dumber regarding seller disclosures and an irate buyer. I don’t know what’s worse — that a buyer could think that a real estate agent would be so dumb as to complete a set of disclosures on behalf of the agent’s seller or that the buyer could believe that an agent could be so much dumber as to complete them incorrectly. On top of which, it’s against the law for an agent to prepare a seller disclosure. But that’s what a buyer accused a Sacramento listing agent of doing without so much as batting an eyelash. That’s enough to make one feel incredibly empathetic for the poor buyer’s agent who probably has to put up with much worse crap from the guy.
When I take a listing, I discuss disclosures in depth with my clients. We talk about material facts and whether something small and insignificant needs to be disclosed. Most of the time, the answer is yes when you wonder if it needs to be disclosed — unless it doesn’t apply at all, and I’ve seen a few of those. The seller might ask about a fire that happened years ago on the other side of town, something that doesn’t affect his property. But if something affects your property in any form, shape or manner, then disclose it.
I once made a seller so paranoid about disclosing that he composed a small horror novel and delivered it to me — pages upon pages of stuff that might happen, ending with the foundation could collapse and the walls could cave in. He was just thinking about stuff that could happen, which wasn’t at all what I meant when I told him to disclose. Now I was stuck with that disclosure because I couldn’t send it back or pretend I never received it. I was required to give it to the buyer.
You might wonder why, why would I have to do such a thing when I represent the seller? I have to do it because I am required to disclose everything I receive. I must also treat both sides honestly. I can’t take it upon myself to choose which documents the buyer sees and what the buyer doesn’t see. The buyer sees everything.
If a neighbor calls to say his fence is on my seller’s property, I disclose it to the buyer. You’d be amazed at how many neighbors are defiant about such matters and wrongly believe that agents care about their opinions. I don’t disclose it as a fact because I don’t know where the property lines fall, but I do tell the buyer the neighbor says the property lines encroach. It’s up to the buyer to investigate or otherwise perform due diligence.
Still, guiding sellers to complete disclosures correctly is sometimes a little bit like herding cats. If you have a question about a disclosure, be sure to ask your agent for help. That’s what we are here for. Sellers tend to fret far more about the disclosures than buyers. Except for that one guy who is probably making his buyer’s agent’s life a living hell.
How Being a Bad Influence Pays Off in Sacramento Real Estate
Bucking the trend, being a maverick or rebel, is often frowned upon in society because it could mean a person is not a team player, doesn’t fit the norm, but in Sacramento real estate those traits in a real estate agent are very helpful. I can’t tell you how many times I have heard as a kid some parent warn my parents: that Elizabeth is a bad influence. Up yours is what I thought when I heard that crap. I’m not making your kid do anything that kid doesn’t wanna do.
I’ve realized from a young age that a person can pretty much do whatever a person can dream up. I’ve always thought: what if we do it this way instead? Or, how about this idea? And they weren’t always popular ideas or necessarily the best ways to do things, just different. Yet they worked. I’ve never thought of myself as a trendsetter or a person with followers, no entourage, I don’t care how many people read my prattle on Twitter and, quite frankly, if you’d have me in your organization, I’m not so sure I want to belong there; yet I know people still gravitate to stuff I write.
I don’t have anything out of the ordinary to say. I call it like I see it. This is a reason why people trust me, and why my clients can rely on my advice. I don’t generally say stupid things.
But there’s always tomorrow.
Being a bad influence means people often do what I want. I just give them permission to do what they already want to do.
When I met with sellers earlier this week, they asked why the price I suggested for their home was so much higher than the agent they had already dumped. Well, my price suggestion had nothing to do with the fired agent. It was based on the pending sales, peppered with the sold comps. I wet my finger and stuck it in the air to see which way the wind was blowing. It’s OK that people ask how I arrived at a conclusion. It’s OK if they ignore it, too. It’s not my house. These people took my advice, though.
I met with another seller and mentioned the smoke alarms needed to be installed in the sleeping areas. Lenders require it. She had installed a smoke alarm in the hallway and felt that was sufficient. Then she argued about it and told me I was wrong. Over and over. That she is a homeowner, so she knows the laws, and just because my profession depends on complying with regulations to close escrow, well, what would I know? She’s a maverick and I kinda like her. And she can find out the hard way. It’s not my house. This one, I’m not gonna argue with.
For a person who is a bad influence on others, real estate is the perfect place to be. If you want to know why my sellers typically get top dollar over other listings in the area, it’s because they listen to this bad influence. Call me at 916.233.6759.
Do Sacramento Agents Discount Real Estate Commissions?
Just because a real estate commission is negotiable doesn’t mean I am willing to cut a deal for a stranger. Heck, I don’t even make deals for friends because I don’t have any friends selling real estate in Sacramento. But even if I did, they would still pay me for my services. Real estate commissions must be negotiable in order to comply with the Sherman Act, but it doesn’t mean a real estate agent needs to offer a discounted commission. Yes, you can negotiate with this Sacramento real estate agent, and I’ll cut right to the chase here, my answer is no.
Not only do I charge the same percentage that I have charged since I started in this business way back in the days of bellbottoms and Beatles, but I am doing a bazillion times the work since then. I have two rules that I work by that are completely inflexible:
No discounts and
No assholes.
See, I can’t always choose the agents on the other side with whom I work nor their clients, and some of those people might be assholes, but I can choose my own clients, which is why I don’t work with the assholes. If you’re an asshole, you can go work with some other agent.
I have to save my asshole interrogating energy to work with the other side.
Would you want an agent who eagerly said Sure, I’ll give you a big fat discount? Because that kind of agent might do the same thing when you get an offer. Put pressure on you to accept a lowball offer. When I receive a purchase offer, the first thing I often think is: how is the other side putting the screws to the seller? Is the offer on the level and clean? I’m not eager to jump into escrow unless the seller is excited and the offer warrants it. Because I don’t really care about me. I care solely about what the seller wants.
Sometimes clients ask me if I will reduce my commission when they are faced with a price reduction. Although I can vaguely see how they might come up with that idea — for example, they are reducing the price so I should come down — they are not looking at the fact that by the mere percentage calculation, I am already hit by a reduced compensation. Lower sales price X percentage rate = lower fee. I share the loss with them already. I know they don’t mean to say that they want to penalize me nor do they want me to work less. They want me to work even harder. And I do. That’s my job. To sell their home.
But don’t ask an agent to give you top-notch performance and then work for less because it doesn’t work that way. Most of us earn our commission, one closing at at time. If 1% separates you from the best in the business, you’ll probably lose a lot more than THAT down the road because it means you think we are all the same. We are not all the same. All agents are not created equal.
