[quote=drboom]I think we’ll need some data to back up that assertion.
Also, do you care to answer the questions I asked in the last part of my post above? I think you owe me that much after all the questions I answered. :-)[/quote]
drboom, you really HAVEN’T clarified all my questions because you were UNCLEAR as to WHO performed your RE services for you PRIOR to when you entered into your (failed) short-sale and the legal relationship (if any) you had to those agents. You staunchly maintained you represented yourself throughout your posts on the “How to Buy w/out a Realtor” thread. You HAD to have viewed more properties and possibly made other offers that were rejected. How did you get into those properties and who made any previous offers for you? My point was that, like it or not, you were represented or “working” with an agent. You were not “self-represented.” In my lengthy experience, I have never seen such an arrangement (except with a FSBO property and often the buyer had a lawyer on retainer). You came off on that thread as having caused LESS COMMISSION TO BE PAID on your deal and this is just NOT the case. No money was saved by your sellers. You just managed to find an agent that was willing to rebate you without even a formal agreement. If you had tried to collect your commission (in small claims ct) from that agent (because he didn’t pay you in the end), you would have had to PROVE you had an oral agreement with him for a cut of his commission. Your spouse wouldn’t be able to help you because she would be a party also. I believe you would have been stuck and unable to prevail.
As far as the data you are seeking on FSBO’s, I don’t have that data, do you? I only “surmised” that it would be true because the “internationally known” economist who did the extensive survey stated that sellers typically recovered their 3% (buyers side) commission when they sold FSBO and didn’t have to to sell for a lower price than that of a listed property (in competition). Therefore, my point stands that a buyer CANNOT get any better deal if they are able to squeeze any portion of the commission out of it.
As to your question about my participation as a licensee in the recent “RE bubble,” I took my license down in approx. the third quarter of 2002 and have not rehung it since. My principal business has NEVER been RE sales. I have “hung” my license about five times for a few years each in the span of nearly three decades but never engaged in the business of RE sales as my principal source of income.
