The word kickback has such a negative connotation. There are different scenarios and people have different levels of sophistication and different needs. As a buyer, it almost always benefits you to use a realtor, especially one on his own turf, look for one that can tell you the square footage or model layouts off the top of their head and look for a good negotiator, not just a pretty one (my personal weakness).
For short sales you “need” one. For organic sales, you “should have” one. For an REO that you found yourself in your hood that you are familiar with, with multiple bids, they can be a handicap because their commission comes off your net offer, they can slow you down and about all they can do for you is the negotiation which doesn’t really exist with banks, they aren’t going to fix it or change it, they just look at the net offer. I spent a few thousand hours educating myself about r/e, I found the house myself, but in the end I still had a buddy in the biz proofread my stuff and take a look at my deal, I’m still paying him off in alcohol. I didn’t get a kickback, I used the listing agent, had them write a fraction of the normal buyers comission and it sweetened my net offer. I did try to get one of the piggy realtors to handle my deal but the three that I trust and have had a drink with (a prerequisite for my business, sd, SD and urban) all work too far away from me, so I went it alone, but i don’t reccomend it for most scenarios or most people.
