> The difference can often be one between a realtor who is
> genuinely
> motivated to act as his/her buyer's agent and negotiate
> aggressively
> for a good deal for the buyer, and one who is motivated
> more by a
> desire to get the commission from the sale and inclined to
> push the
> buyer into a fairly adverse deal just to close the sale.
> The
> population of actively working realtors in this country
> does include a
> fairly significant number who are best described as
> unethical slime
> (not my words, those of a realtor friend who sees the worst
> of the
> business every day), and a fair number of others who are
> basically
> honest but largely incompetent, and even a few who are
> fairly
> unethical *and* not all that good at navigating the
> business for
> themselves, let alone buyers/sellers.
>
> I always wonder what's going on when I hear about a
> buyer or seller
> who "did what the realtor said", because it seems
> to me that that
> power balance is exactly backwards if that's how
> it's really working
> for them. (And there are realtors who won't talk to
> you until they
> have a signed buyer agreement from you, and after that
> point, feel
> free to do a least-common-denominator level of work for you
> because
> they know they have you contractually bound to them and
> they literally
> *can't* be fired at that point.)
i seem to have encountered the " unethical slime" type of realtors, bruce. My
first purchase was a condo in concord for my son while he was at berkeley. i
had no credit because i always pay cash, so the owner carried the loan, when my
son graduated, i hired a rental agent and he put in tenants who would trash the
place and i would have to evict them.
he referred me to a realtor (my first mistake) who found a new tenant while it
was listed and after two years it still had not sold. i suspect he was putting
in bad tenants to coerce me into accepting his offer. i went to another
realtor who said it was not a good time to sell and offered to take it off my
hands. by then i was fed up and just wanted to get out. i told the first
realtor, who then raised his offer, but said i had to accept it right there, or
it would be off the table.
i found out from the home owners association that three days after closing, he
sold it for over twice what he paid me. evidently, that little corner of
concord was incorporated into walnut creek and he had sent me old comps....
anyway, i had close to $20,000 in equity after closing, so i used that for a
down payment on a tiny 800 sq. ft. house in santa monica, just before housing
prices took off in the late 90s. if i had gone in with my girl friend at the
time (a title rep for fidelity) i would have gotten a much better rate, but i
didn't want to commit.
the lender told me i could always re-fi later, when my credit improved. for
some reason the lender keep changing, but i was able to keep the house by
paying the interest, taxes, and a little toward the principal. i knew the day
was coming when i would have to start paying more on the principal so i got out
while i still could. by then i had enough in equity to pay cash for my house
in eureka, which has since gone down in value.
i have learned a lot from my experiences in home buying, that you can NOT trust
anyone, including the board of realtors and lawyers you hire to sue "unethical
slime". i have also learned that you don't have to sign the standard contract,
you can make changes, and if the agent doesn't like it, you can go to someone
else.
the moral of this story is sometimes you lose when you trust unscrupulous
agents, and sometimes, IF you're lucky, you come out ahead...
jon
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