Hahaha, I’d pay the $1000 fee!!! But they aren’t buying people’s homes any more. The only time they will “Buy” a home is if someone wants to buy your home that already has another house, they will “make a guaranteed offer” on their home so they can buy yours. My guess is they probably offer 10-20% below the appraised value so they don’t loose their shirts on that guarantee.
You mention if a realtor has a better system then they deserve to charge fees. I agree to a certain extent, but I think that TV and newspaper ads have deceived people into thinking that Battiata can sell your house. The truth is in the numbers, and after looking at MLS data for him, for every home he sells there is another one he doesn’t. So, my theory is that he just takes as many listings as he can within reason, and hopes that a certain percentage of them sell.
To me, this could work, if the right buyer for my home happened to be watching his TV commercial at the time, but if not, I think going with him would be a bad thing because he wouldn’t be networking with other agents and calling all of his past clients to try and sell my home. When you have 60 listings you don’t have time for all that, but when you’re a well established and respected realtor with a small number of listings, with a lot of contacts in the business, I think that can go a lot further in getting a home sold….
Just my theory of course, I’m by no means an expert here. 😉
