Things Clients do that annoy Real Estate Agents

In every industry, there are things a consumer do that well annoy them. Real Estate is no different. Prospective Buyers, Renters, and Sellers do things that annoy real estate agents and the general community. Sometimes people might not have any idea why they annoy us, and sometimes they do and just don’t care.  I hope to know the things that annoy or frustrate real estate agents that maybe the next time you work with someone you understand why and don’t do them.  

If you don’t hold a real estate license and are active in the market don’t claim to be an expert 

I have worked in Music Industry, Fitness, and Retail and have never had more times than I am amazed when I decided to be a real estate agent.    First, I have run into a lot of folks who claim to be experts in real estate. I assume they are in the industry and they respond oh I work in finance or I am a lawyer.  You are claiming you know a lot about real estate though. Reading a lot on the subject doesn’t make you an expert in the field. We all wish you all wouldn’t do this. 

I spend a lot of time quoting the law, but I would never claim to be a lawyer when my clients ask me legal issues. I often tell my clients to speak to an attorney and if they need a name happy to provide one.  This is just one thing many real estate agents do not like that the public does that really should stop. Here are a few more things that will bother your agents and we wish you wouldn’t do. 

You hired a real estate agent to work for you

Clients might think you’re being helpful by calling properties or email agents on behalf of your agent. Your agent has skills and expertise. If you don’t trust them to do a good job then why are they working with you? Let your agent do their job. Please send your agent an email about a property you are interested in. They can get to work for you. Your agent is providing you a service and part of that service is inquiring about properties you are interested in.  Buyers have never reached out to me on behalf of their agents, but I have had renters reach out on behalf of their agents. Don’t do it.  

 

The property is often not on MLS  and the client reaches out to me and when I tell him or her it’s available, and they say they want to set up a showing with themselves and their agent I am suddenly taken off the guard.  Your agent? Yes my agent, and I have to then tell them happy to get you in but your agent will not get compensated. I wish your agent had reached out to me since frankly as your agent they should be on this rental.

There is awkward silence if on the phone or if it’s in an email the client goes what difference should it make if I am reaching out or my agent.  I often say at that point please have your agent reach out to me. Agents do not like it when other agents talk to their clients. You might think you’re being helpful but it’s really not. You also are being disrespectful to your agent by going behind their back and reaching out to agents. Yes, you’re bringing them into the fold once you make the connection but remember they are providing you a service and that means contacting agents and advocating on your behalf.  

Working Directly with the listing agent you get a better deal

 Working Directly with the Listings agent to get a better deal.  Buyers think if a seller agent gets a buyer direct they will give on their commission or the price will come down more. Well, it is not the case most of the time. First off it’s important for buyers to understand the seller pays the commission in the transaction. So if you worked with a buyer’s agent  2.5% would go to them and 2.5% to the seller agent. vs the total commission goes to the Listings agent. Yes, the Seller agent might know more about a property but they work for the seller. They need to disclose the defect to you, but they can’t really advise 100% without being a conflict of interest. 

The only way an agent might be able to separate their roles is if you are working with an agent as part of a team.  You would still get the representation where both parties know the seller well.  With a team, buyer and seller can get separate representation even though both know the seller. The team might not look at the property the same way as an independent agent who is seeing it with fresh eyes, but you should get the representation that is fairer than a dual agency situation. 

If there is only one agent then you are likely to end up in a dual agency situation which means the Seller and you are represented by the same agent.  You could say the only person getting the best deal is the listing agent. You’re not helping the seller. When offers are presented to sellers we do tell clients if direct or co-broke in multiple offer situations. However,  at the end of the day, it comes down to the terms you offer.  So if you see an agent who looks perplexed when you say I only like to work with listing agents when buying your home. Now you might understand why now we dislike when buyers say this to us. 

Request to look at home outside way outside your price point

 

Your pre-approval letter tells me your agent what you can afford. If you are pre-approved for a home $600,000 then you should look at homes priced in that range. Do not always think the seller will negotiate down. Sellers might if it been on market for a really long time, but not always.  There are sellers who have their price and they won’t negotiate from it.  Sellers have a different reason for selling all the time.   Your agent will do their research. Your buyer agent will share the data with you.  Finding out a seller’s motivation to sell. Do they have another home they want to buy? Do they need to close on this home so they can buy another home? Are they relocating to a vacation home? Depending on sellers’ motivations will determine how they respond to your out-of-the-budget offer. 

 

 

Look at home multiple times and don’t make an offer on it

If you are looking at it more than three times and bring members of your family or friends to enforce your feeling then put an offer in it.  The question I always ask buyers who look at a property the second time is this. If I called you up and said 123 Main street has an offer on it. How would you feel? If you feel oh well what about 125 dream home then you shouldn’t buy it, but if you go that really makes me upset then that is the home you should put your best offer in. 

Not doing any research on where you want to live

Alright, this topic is too fold for me. It’s okay if you don’t know all the neighborhoods you want to look in, but have a ballpark. Pick an area that works with your lifestyle. Also knowing why you are moving is helpful to share. Walk around areas and have dinner and drinks and lunches in neighborhoods that peak your interest. Pick up Boston Magazine is a great resource when trying to figure out where you want to call home. Another great resources are PageInnisRealEstate.com.   Your agent can do amazing things but they need you to be able to some of the basic questions and if you don’t have answers before you meet your agent then figure out where you working and what your lifestyle is like. A great agent will take that info and run with it and find fantastic options for you and you both can narrow down the field. 

Unjustified low ball offers

When your agent puts an offer together there is research that goes into it. Your agent looks at homes that are comparable and that include actives, under contract, sold, and off the market that has sold. There is a skill to crafting that perfect offer. They might also bring data from off-market sales that they know about as well. All this data is so your putting in a realistic offer that a seller will either accept or work with. Sellers are not required to counter. The majority will if it’s a reasonable offer. If your offer is a really low ball offer the only feedback you might be getting is radio silence. The exercise of making a real lowball offer is a waste of time and insulting.   If you decide to try again and put in a reasonable offer you could have annoyed the seller the first time where they won’t come off the asking price at all.  I always say to buyers and renters you’re setting the tone when you put in an offer to be reasonable. 

Making an offer contingent

Making your offer contingent on selling your current home-  In a tight market where there is not enough inventory the buyer who has an offer contingent on selling their home will lose out unless they have their home under contract. If it’s a slower time of year a seller might work with that type of offer, but they might not. The offer that is cleaner will always be the more attractive to the seller. 

Inspection items

You make an offer and agree to make an offer that is not contingent on a home inspection.  The home inspection is done for information purposes only. You the buyer forget that the inspection was done for information purposes.  Now you want to renegotiate those issues items that came upon the home inspection. If you wanted the seller to compensate you then you shouldn’t have waived the home inspection and should have made it part of the terms of the offer.  Your agent and attorney educated you on what could happen. You can’t be mad at either party. 

Expecting the home to be perfect after the inspection

Buyers need to have reasonable expectations when they ask the seller to make repairs on items that come up during the home inspection. If the seller agreed to make the repair. The buyer has no say who a seller uses. The seller will make sure that they either make the repair or hire a contractor who can make the repair that is satisfactory. Your not buying a brand new home it will not be perfect. Friendly reminder new construction doesn’t mean it can’t come with problems.  I have found often have more issues than a home that dates back to 1980. New Construction doesn’t mean you won’t find issues during the final walk-thru.  No home is perfect and the seller did agree to repair items and will. It will meet most general standards but it might not meet yours.  The repairs will meet satisfactory conditions.  Your Real Estate agent will though admit if the job isn’t done well and if needed they will bring it up but it is still about having reasonable expectations. 

Buyers who refuse to sign buyer agency paperwork

Buyers who refuse to sign buyer agency paperwork, but expect agents to run around helping you.  I will be the first agent to say I will help prospective buyers gather info, answer their questions but as soon as I have to contact agents to set up showing my clients need to sign the paperwork. Agents do not work for free. We provide a lot of services free of charge, but we deserve to have our commission protected.   If you have us running all over town, and you stroll into an open house and put an offer in with that agent we get nothing even though we spun our wheels helping you. If we don’t have that paperwork completed we don’t compensate. Don’t put agents in that position. Please sign the paperwork when it’s presented to you. If you have questions agents will be happy to answer them, but please respect the agent’s time and energy they will put in and review and sign the paperwork. Agents only get paid when you get an accepted offer and it closes. 

What you see on TV isn’t reality

 I love Million Dollar listing or selling sunset, but it’s not the true picture of real estate.  The camera only shows you the pretty side of the industry. The fantastic homes the large commissions, swanky fun parties which well covid has been the wet blanket on fun parties.  There is always education we can learn from these shows like trends, politically correct terms in real estate. For example, Master Bedroom is out and Primary Bedroom is in. We can sometimes get a heads up on what could be coming into the marketplace. You can often find out when they started filming to pinpoint when there was a change in the real estate marketplace, and forecast when it will show up in your area. However, the real estate industry is not easy. Agents on these shows will tell you they make it look easy but it’s not.

Dedicated Long Hours of a Real Estate Agent 

They spend a lot of long hours working and can be working on a listing for months. Large amounts of money can be spent on a listing before it gets sold. The agency will pay for some, but it’s often the agent fitting part of the bill.   Agents on these series are all commission-based and willing to bet they have a lot of late nights.  Jobs all agents do that frankly are not sexy to put on tv from cleaning up after a messy tenant when they knew the place was getting a photographer that day. Too getting home inspectors in or fire dept in for a smoke inspection. Nothing glamorous spending 3 hours of our day waiting for the Boston Fire dept to show up to push a button on a ceiling and collect a check. We are sometimes property managers and other times psychologists telling everyone everything will be okay. I did a lot of that in 2020. 

 

Real Estate Agent Reality Check 

Buyers and Sellers forget we are people and, yes I know the population has some horror stories of bad agents.  I know there are more great agents than bad ones. Remember we have to work with the bad agents of the world too. The agents that are really good wish we could do something about those folks, but we can’t.

Sacrifice to be A Good Agent 

We all have families we are not spending time with, missing events to take care of you the client.  Be respectful of what agents do and don’t do these things your agent will appreciate it. To my clients, I have been lucky to work with that don’t do these things I thank you not only for your business in the past but for being wonderful clients that treat me with respect. I truly thank you.