Buyer’s Agent is under quarantine, OK to fire him? … 118

#health #realestateagent #homebuyer

Deerwood Realty and Friends Podcast

The question was posed….Is it ok to fire your buyer agent if he is quarantining because you REALLY need a house?

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Thoughts:

1. So, the first thing is how self absorbed do you have to be to ask this kind of question? And if you are the agent, do you REALLY want to work with this client at the end of the day?

2. I have been fired for a medical issue. A younger fellow was looking to get into investment apartments and had no idea what he was doing. It was my goal to bring him along slowly, help educate him on the potential pitfalls and really help him find a property that would provide some sort of a return on his investment and not have it become a money pit.

I was responsive, when he was looking at properties, I was happy to answer any questions he may have had in a timely manner. About two weeks into working with him, I had a terrible pain in my foot that I ended up needing to go to the Dr. for. And, buyer never really contacted me during the foot issue…I’d say it lasted about a week. I reached out after a week and asked if he had any questions and he said that he’d found another agent and that I was no longer needed.

Was it bad? Well, I didn’t enjoy getting fired

What did I do? Well, I did feel bad about it for a day or two, but as a real estate agent, there are ALWAYS bad things that happen in your work with people. Always. That’s why you never spend a dime before you’ve actually gotten and cashed the commission check. As I sit here I have over six figures in potential commission from my clients, and yet, I know some buyers will disappear, some sellers will decide not to sell after all, and that’s ok. It happens.

3. Should you fire your agent under quarantine? What’s that actually doing for you? The typical deal closes in 30 days, and if the agent is out for 14 days, that puts you away from your target by only 14 days…and that is even if you found “the one” house to purchase. In this market, I’m not seeing that. I’m seeing it take months to actually get a house under contract…and that should mean that the 14 days isn’t really an issue.

4. In our office, we work as a team. So, if I get sick for a few days and a client needs to physically go see houses, I have my team member go show the house and there’s no issue with that. I’m a little confused why people don’t ask about this up front with their buyer’s agent. At our real estate brokerage, this can be a little different than others. For example, in a larger brokerage, you could literally have agents refuse to show a house because of commission concerns. I’ve always thought that was a little petty, so we don’t do it. Ask your agent BEFORE you sign with them.

5. In this advice given, the author says that the agent is doing the “ethical thing”. But, you’re dealing with a client who has a different set of ethics…at the minimum a different value system. In this case, you could be the most ethical real estate agent there is and still get fired. Sometimes ethics does that to you.

6. We do use exclusive buyer agency agreements in our real estate brokerage. They typically describe what each side should expect during the course of purchasing a home. I’ve never seen the benefit in holding a client to a buyer’s agency agreement if they are unhappy with me…I certainly wouldn’t hold someone to an agreement if I couldn’t perform on my end or they couldn’t perform on theirs. The only time that changes is if we have a house under contract. Then I would enforce the agreement because I’ve done everything on my end and I expect you to do the same.

Source:

https://www.realtor.com/advice/buy/my-realtor-is-isolating-after-being-exposed-to-covid-19-but-i-need-to-find-a-home-asap/

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