Thought I’d share my experience from last night, and thanks for all the responses so far…
One of their agents showed up at my door to talk to me about listing my house with them. He was dressed in a 3 piece suit, sharp as a tack, and carried a fancy tablet PC with him.
He gave me the whole sales pitch again about the Battiata way of selling real estate, and told me some interesting things about their company:
-They need to sell 8 homes a month to pay for their advertising expenses!!!
-They don’t put flyers out
-They don’t do open houses
-They don’t do broker caravans
Granted, none of these things usually sell a house, but I guess when you’re a real estate factory, you don’t have time to do open houses, or put flyers out, so to me “it doesn’t sell the home” is just a cop out for being too lazy to do it.
All that aside, we get to the contract part. He starts getting a little put pushy, like he might be in a hurry to get to another apointment or what have you, and that’s where I really start to feel uncomfortable.
I asked him “please email me the contract, i’ll look it over and let you know if I decide to go with your company”… At which point, he begins asking “So what are your reservations”… “Are there any other agents you’re talking to?” “What would I need to do to ease your concerns”….
I then asked him if I could see the contract, and so he pulls it up on his tablet PC. He says “it’s just standard boiler plate real estate contract material”, and starts scrolling through the DRE contract. I notice, however, on “Other Compensation to Broker”, they have a $695 “Transaction Coordinator Fee” to be paid by Seller. He quickly scrolled past that part, and then skips through the pages real fast, and he gets to the end, and there is a “Seller may not cancel this agreement prior to 90 days. Cancellation of this agreement will result in a $995 fee to cover Broker’s expenses.”
He quickly Put a big X over that and initialed it, and then he was all “See, I already made it easier for you by removing the cancellation clause”… And so then I proceed to ask him about the transaction coordinator fee, and he gives me this huge song and dance about “you need to protect yourself from getting sued, and the transaction coordinator is there to make sure all the ducks are in a row to make sure the transaction closes smoothly and to make sure all the paperwork is filed correctly so they can’t sue you later”.
That was the biggest WAD of BS I’ve ever heard in my life. First of all, it’s a realtor’s job to be the transaction coordinator, or at least someone in their office is. That’s what the 3% commission to them pays for! Secondly, it doesn’t matter WHO handles the transaction or HOW the transaction is handled. If a buyer decides to sue you because of something you didn’t disclose, a transaction coordinator is not going to prevent or stop that from happening. And what’s to say their transaction coordinator doesn’t make mistakes or slip up from time to time.
So, in summary, I felt like i was being taken for a ride by a fast talking salesman, for that reason I would never consider using them to sell my house.
