Back HomeMake Sure Your Buyer’s Agent Is Working For You
July 8th, 2016 by keithandkinsey
The real estate market has been crazy lately! Real estate agents and lenders are swamped, and buyers are stressed out because they are being outbid and houses are moving too fast. However, don’t let this be an excuse for your Buyer’s Agent to be lazy. Here’s several things to watch out for from your Buyer’s agent:
- Buyer’s Agent’s should see a property in person before writing an offer for their client. Recently we received 4 offers on a property and only 1 of the 4 agents had actually seen the property in person. How can an agent offer good advice to their client about a property’s value, condition, or any other terms a buyer may want to consider if they have never actually seen it in the property in person?
- Offers should be well written. I recently saw a very poorly written in a competing offer situation that did no favors for the buyers. The offer that had lead based paint provisions in it, but the house was 25 years newer than what the lead based paint provisions were written for. There was a Radon testing contingency when the house had a recently installed Radon system and the test results were posted on the MLS for the agent to access. This Radon contingency was written 3 different places with 2 different deadline dates. The loan value that was written in the financing contingency was for more than the purchase price, and there was no interest rate for the financing contingency to be based on. I’m amazed at how little mentoring some rookie agents receive. The agent who wrote this should have definitely asked their broker for some help!
- Agents should be responsive to buyers for scheduling showings. In a market where some houses are selling within a day or two if they are appropriately priced, an agent can’t wait a week to fit a buyer into their schedule. If a good house comes up, the agent should do everything in their power to show it ASAP!
- Buyer’s agents need to be have good communication with their clients and with other agents. This is critical when it comes to a competitive offer situation. I’ve had cases where agents just wouldn’t respond fast enough to coordinate information, and their buyers lost out on a house because my sellers where tired of waiting (it was Midnight!) and wanted to accept another buyers offer.
The bottom line is, if you have a buyer’s agent representing you, just make sure they are providing you good service and information. In a seller’s market it’s really tough to be on the buying side, a good agent makes all the difference in the world!
