[FutureSDguy]

High end of range? What high end? I don’t see any high end. I just see one price. Here’s my offer. 🙂

Tempers aside, the problem I have with range pricing is that they are trying to get search hits on a higher priced home among lower priced homes (this is said in the blog). As a buyer I would like to know “what’s your asking price?” If the seller says asking = (max+min)/2, then I will feel that that information should have been advertised.

Frivilous point? I don’t think so. The buyer has a budget and sets a maximum price on a query of asking prices. A house makes it into that query but doesn’t belong there. Sort of bait and switch, but not exactly.

This is telling from Bryant: “Jon, your statement ‘the low side was still overpriced’ is exactly why a lot of Realtors do not use RP successfully” So if the low side is deemed overpriced, then that is equivalent to saying the low side needs to be underpriced. But then “underpriced” value is put in the same bin with real asking prices. This proves my point and MLS should not be allowing this. It’s intent should be to share information to the buyer–hiding the true asking price is not consistent to the purpose of MLS.

[FutureSDguy]

If you go to activerain.com and read this guy’s blog, you can see how cheeseball he is. “Never does open houses” and “don’t call me after 8” are examples how a Realtor(R) feels like he’s in the center of the game. He even says he expects buyers to pay the difference whenever he takes them to a house with a lower buyers %. He even says to his client “go ahead and host your open house–if you find a buyer who’s not represented, i’ll even give you a discount. And the client is thrilled!” He tells other realtors how to make sure clients sign the agreement before you go too far. He brags on how many listings he has, which gives further evidence that when you have an exclusive relationship with sellers, it doesn’t really matter how long it takes to sell.

What’s even more surprising is all the comments from other realtors applauding his site.

This is orthagonal to service and quality. I’m talking about attitude. This will go away once you get rid of the built in commissions. Arrogance persists when you have guarantees of income up-front.

Yes, I know everyone is not like this. The honest folks exist, but they are hard to discover, esp. since they don’t want to divulge their “trade secrets” online (understandable).

[FutureSDguy]

That article is a bunch of big time hooey!!!!! What a bunch of baloney sauce. The high end on that is a made up inflated number and only idiotic buyers would feel that they got a good deal by negotiating down from that. Folks, it’s the lower end that matters. Nothing else.

“Why would a Buyer offer and pay more than the bottom of the Range? Because they do!”

Blah blah blah blah…..

[FutureSDguy]

sddude: “Furthermore, I think Real Estate Agents themselves have contributed to making the process as convoluted as possible”

I see the same conflict of interest happen in IT departments. System administrators who maintain linux machines, for example, want the system to be difficult to use and want users to rely on them to get things up and running. For RE to be difficult is exactly what keeps these experts employed–it is not in their interests to simplify. This is exactly why I react when I hear them telling me that “it’s not as simple as I give it credit for” and “I need them for the deal to work out right.” Whether or not any of this is ultimately true in any RE transaction is beside the point–it’s the fact that you have an industry that supports an inefficient system out of economic self-interest.

[FutureSDguy]

PC, I 100% agree with you.

sdrealtor, based on what you just said, I would pick you to help me buy a property. (Already have one I’ve been eyeing for a long time, but it’s still above my budget.) So take that as a compliment. 🙂

The first realtor in the area wanted to give me the line that prices would stay high because SD is a great place to live with great weather. The second realtor in the area wanted to be my best friend and was frankly making me uncomfortable with offers for jobs, relocation, loans, etc. I can do all that myself. I just want get the right house at the right price, and I’m very picky on both.

[FutureSDguy]

You’re right. (And I’m not a lawyer… I’m an engineer of sorts.:) )

I think the RE industry and culture has trained itself on commissions. There’s so much special paperwork and jargon that I think anyone who’s embroiled in it would truly not see anyway to continue doing that without the commission cash flow.

I agree with PC: once you give customers more choice and the services are broken down then the industry will correct itself towards a more efficient and fair model. Right now you have MLS requiring the seller to commit to commission percentages (which shields agents from having to perform better to an extent), and the dirty politics of boycotts when agents won’t bring their buyers to houses with discount commissions. This all needs overhauling with the help of the government.

[FutureSDguy]

JES: “Can someone tell me why realtors – unlike accountants and lawyers – are paid on a percentage basis to begin with? Shouldn’t we be paying for the amount of work done, or the time involved and not just some arbitrary percent?”

My understanding is that the more expensive the house, the more you want to instill reward for the agent to find the special buyer. The risk of not selling an expensive home is greater than not selling a cheap home.

That justfication holds more strongly for the sellers agent; the buyer’s agent’s work is still roughly the same (sure there’s extra due diligence in the paperwork on a million dollar home, but the paperwork is still the same.)

But the problem is that it still takes the same effort to find a buyer for a home in a $200k-median-price city as it is in a $600k-median-price city.

And all this legal stuff seems like bull to me. More than half of the contracts that clients sign are there to protect the brokers and to lock in their fees. Any breach of contract in any kind of business relationship can be taken to court–why should the client pre-pay for the agents defense in the context of real estate?

sdrealtor has a couple times told us we are naive and we shouldn’t be trivilizing all this. Perhaps so, but I think there’s still kool-aid being served, and it’s healthy to get this out in the open. If I haven’t been following sdrealtor as long as I have, I would have considered him patronizing and trying to scare us into relying on them.

It’s disappointing that the 33% vs. 6% comparison is made. that analogy has more holes than swiss cheese. A lawyer works on relatively unique cases and is competing against the wits and knowledge of the opposing lawyer. A lawsuit can take months or years involving many people and experts. An RE agent is someone is trained to do the same paperwork over and over and to give non-legal advice (which the client pre-pays for whether they want it or not, or whether that information is public anyway.) The bar exam that admits lawyers is very very stringent (going to Ivy league schools is not the requirement to be a successful lawyer), so a client can have some expectation of quality in service. RE agents can get licensed in far less time and schooling (I don’t need to tell you how much), and even after that they STILL don’t know what the hell they’re doing on average.

[FutureSDguy]

sdrealtor: “The problem is that you dont know which kind of transaction you are involved in until it is too late. Seemingly simple transactions end up in arbitration every day. I’m not arguing that this is brain surgery, it isnt. However, it is not as simple and NOT as profitable as you think.”

In all his posts, I think he does an excellent job of making the case for the value of a realtor. The main counter I would make is: “What if the deal was clean and easy? Do I get a refund for the potential expenses that were never made?”

sdrealtor: “I would venture to guess that there are considerably more engineers, stock brokers, car salesman, plumbers etc. earning 6 figure salaries than Realtors. Furthermore, if you took the average after tax earning of realtors that get no benefits, pay both sides of SS tax, all their expenses and only get paid if escrow closes you would be very underwhelmed by the figure the saw. The vast majority (80%+) would make more money working at Target.”

I totally believe the salary disrecpancy, but I would attribute it to the overpopulation of realtors competing for the same (or fewer) sales. Still, there’s one of me paying a too-high price, and many realtors that have to average out what I have to pay.

sdrealtor: “One $100,000 judgement against him that is not his fault in any way but for which he is held liable and he is wiped out.”

Isn’t there insurance for this? $200/mo for E&O is what I’ve read.

In general, sdrealtor seems to be saying that being an agent is very difficult and not very profitable. I believe this. But should high commissions be used to subsidize this inefficient business?

[FutureSDguy]

What a xenophobic asshole with a hillbilly name.

[FutureSDguy]

They probably meant a 8.5% drop relative to the time of publication (today). But they’re probably using some sort of formula and using historical data. I doubt a single economic website has the pulse on every factor of every local market.

[FutureSDguy]

Moody’s Economy.com predicts a 8.5% drop bottoming out in mid 2008. Not a very large correction.

http://money.cnn.com/2006/10/05/real_estate/moodys/index.htm

[FutureSDguy]

Everyone: again, thanks for the honest info. Guess it goes to say you can’t judge a book by its cover. The quality of some of the older homes (1960-80) are spot on according to what I’m looking for, but I’ll have to match elsewhere. Thanks again!!!

[FutureSDguy]

The more I look at Vista, the more I like it. Many thanks for the I-78 warning. Google earth shows the various other streets mentioned in this thread. The Palomar airport road looks like a promising route for an early morning commute to whereever I might work.

I see several things about Vista that I am perceiving as good points:
1. big box shopping stores nearby (cuts down on commutes)
2. small-town feel, open land, particularly past downtown as Jim stated
3. Close enough to the ocean
4. More house/land for the money
5. At a hub to the central areas (despite traffic jams)
6. zoning restrictions that counter the mega-tracts (?)
7. the city website does say good things about schools, but this needs further investigation

I’m not afraid of a hispanic community, so long as there is no gang presence.

Despite the negative comparisons to, say San Marcos, if I’m looking to move somewhere I’ll be happy with for a while, sometimes going when a town at its low is the best tiime.

The pictures of Vista reminds me of Issaquah, WA in some respects.

FSDG

[FutureSDguy]

ziprealty is the best so far i’ve seen, but i found it frustrating how it ignores things like sqft in the search when i choose certain options, like ocean view. grrrr…

[FutureSDguy]

Thanks very much. I suspected that it wouldn’t be an ideal place from which to commute. But it does look like an escape from cookie-cutter hell. I’m still focusing on Carlbad/Oceanside area, but trying to stay away from cookie cutters. I’ve been eyeing MLS 061076019 , for example.

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