When it comes to the opinions people hold about real estate agents, they are something like the opinions they have a for lawyers – it's not that they hate them, it's just that they find so many who aren't to their liking (to say the least). It doesn't help that they charge as much as they do for their services too. It predisposes people to disliking them right off. Basically, it's pretty easy to say that to find a real estate agent that you can like and can work with, is not an easy matter.
If you find it hard to tolerate your real estate agent, just think about how hard it must for him to tolerate himself. Like Annette Bening in American beauty, most of them hate the job. There are about 1 million realtors working at the job at any given time in America. Nine out of ten quit within the first year. Of those that remain, many quit in the next five years. All of which goes to say that if you're going to find a real estate agent, you'd better work really hard to find someone who likes his job and is a good at his job. Here are a few pointers.
About the first thing you want to do when you try to find a real estate agent you can like and trust is – go with word-of-mouth. Ask everyone you know if they've worked with a real estate agent who's really good. You want to be careful that you don't ask someone who has a budding realtor in the family and who’ll just palm him off on you. Go ask someone you trust. Once you do get your referrals, you do need to do your best to research them on Internet.
One good way to check a real estate agent out in real life would be to visit an open house that he is selling. You can size them up there. You can also sign up for a couple of home buying or home selling seminars. There are always a few realtors there. You can meet with them and find out how they work. You'll also learn a lot about buying and selling homes at the seminar.
Basically, you're looking for a realtor who’s successful. The capable ones usually put out lots of ads in the local papers. The ones that have the most ads are the ones who have the most customers. You could give them a try.
Once you do have an agent or two that you're keen on (not that way), you need to work on your sizing-up method. How do you decide which one to go with? Going with your gut feeling could be one way to do it. You may instinctively like one person and not the next. But of course, your gut can be outrageously wrong at times. Ask them about how long they've been in the business, whether they sell property full-time, how long they expect it to take to sell a house once they get a listing, and so on.
Realtors come in two varieties – some are buyer agents, and some are seller’s agents. If you are a buyer, you want to go with buyer’s agent and so forth. This is important. If you are a buyer and you're going with a seller’s agent, it's a conflict of interest for the realtor. Try to talk to them about how they plan to go about selling your home (if you are there to sell).
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