Top 10 Lies Real Estate Agents Tell Sellers Before they list their home…144

#realestateagent #homeseller #lies

Deerwood Realty and Friends Podcast

I feel like I’ve always been pretty honest when working with my clients, but I know that it’s easy to lie in the real estate game and it seems like few agents ever get caught to where it affects their business so I thought I’d take a look at some of the more interesting ones.

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Thoughts:

1. “Now is a great time to sell your home.” Is it? Right now, probably. When the market is down, is it still a good idea to sell your home?

2. “I can’t negotiate my commission.” You can’t or you won’t? That is the real question. And, to be honest, I think the average seller has no idea what to expect in terms of commission.
a. Going with the lowest commission you can find as your only basis for choosing an agent will usually land you in a bad spot. For one, the agent isn’t going to be putting their best foot forward, or another, you might not be getting the service you’d expect.
b. There’s a time to negotiate a commission. If you call up an agent, and the first thing you do is try to negotiate commission, without any sort of context, the agent is probably, rightly not going to want to have anything to do with lowering their commission. They may raise it because they perceive that you will be a pain in the ass.

3. “Your house is worth x.” There’s an odd dance that occurs when home sellers are looking to list their property for sale. They tend to work in two camps. The first camp looks at commission as the only determining factor on choosing an agent, and the second camp looks at how much the agent says the house is worth. In the real estate industry, we call this practice buying the listing. It’s pretty simple: Let’s say you see a Zillow estimate and it says the house is worth 300k. Zillow estimates are still pretty terrible, so then you call 2 agents out. One shows you actual recent comparable sales that indicate the house is probably worth 325k. The second agent comes out and asks what the first agent says and says he can sell it for 350k.
Sellers in their mind think, I’m going with guy that says 350k…even though there is no justification for the price…but why?
a. They like the confidence of the real estate agent. They think it will help sell the home.
b. Seller wants to make the most possible on the house.

4. “I have a list of a thousand buyers ready to buy your house” They don’t have a thousand buyers ready to buy your house as soon as it’s listed.

5. “Your house is perfect and you just need to list it” Could there be a house out there that is perfect before you list it? I guess. Would your home sell faster and for more money if you made some tweaks to the home before listing it? Absolutely. Is this the worst lie ever? I don’t think so. In making compliments to your home that are unwarranted, the agent is looking to position themselves as your buddy. They don’t want to come across as insulting…after all, you own the home and usually have pride in it.

6. “Something, something, something, we’re number 1” Top listing agent in St. Louis? By transaction or volume? Top brokerage in St. Louis? By transaction or volume? It’s usually a lie.

7. “Your house doesn’t need professional photos” Why do people fall for this one? You’re paying a listing agent to sell your house, and you are going to let them use their iphone and snap a few pictures for the listing?

8. “If I don’t sell your house, I’ll buy it, Guaranteed” What kind of nonsense is this?

9. “I’ll personally work with you through the entire selling process” If you are working with a real estate team, the chances that the listing agent is going to work with you through the entire process is slim.

10. “Open houses don’t sell houses” This is a super contentious issue that will never end. You’ll read somewhere where some agent or some investor will say, the listing agent is only having an open house so they can find more listing opportunities.

There can be instances where not having an open house makes sense, but the blanket statement that open houses don’t sell houses is a lie.

Source: ME

media@deerwoodrealtystl.com

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