The real estate industry is giant and one of the most competitive and cut-throat to deal with. If you’ve ever sold your home, you’ll know what we’re talking about. For every property on sale, there’s a legion of real-estate brokers that want to sell it for you.
It’s interesting to take a closer look at a day in a broker’s life. These people with bright smiles and immaculate hairdos have loads of exciting stories to share. When you’re pursuing a career in real estate, you should know that you’re following a path where you work with people, not buildings.
Most of us tend to take them at face value and completely underestimate the importance of these agents’ role in successfully concluding the sale of a home. They are polished, professional and get the job that we hate to do ourselves, done.
There are many exciting aspects to selling a home. After talking to many agents, we compiled a list of the five most interesting facts that they’ll never tell you.
They Earn Less Than You Think
For every time in your life that you work with an estate agent, they deal with hundreds of clients. The problem is that their hit rate is not 100% because the industry is so competitive and sometimes downright volatile due to clients who are in and out of the market frequently.
According to statistics from Real Estate Express, the average broker closes 12 successful deals per year. If you consider how many sales they work on that goes wrong for countless reasons, you’ll understand that the percentage per deal they work on doesn’t make them overnight millionaires.
It’s Much Harder Work Than it Seems
For the same reason why brokers earn less than you might think, they also work extremely hard to make their earnings. Meeting you and taking pictures is only a tiny step in the process of selling your property.
Arranging open houses, title searches, marketing, and meeting prospective buyers all take up a chunk of time and effort. Keep in mind that potential buyers also scout, and once again, the real estate success rate is meager compared to the number of people they canvas and show your property to.
Most real estate brokerages work well together and are eager to match their client lists to close more deals. They might use this interesting link to a Denver area to help sell your property. It means that your agent probably spends quite a bit of time making phone calls and sending emails trying to match your property to other agents’ buyers. In such cases, they also earn much less in commission, as they have to share it with another agency.
It’s Not Always a Glamorous Job
The profile pictures on real estate ‘For Sale’ boards are glamorous indeed. You don’t see the photos of a broker who has to prepare a house for viewing, and the owner who neglected to clean it or take out the trash.
The job can go from glam to damn in a matter of minutes when an estate agent has to jump in and help with the heavy lifting to sell your home. As their income depends on it, you’ll often find them doing odd jobs that weren’t covered in their real estate training manual.
You’re Probably Overestimating Your Home
Your home is your refuge, and you have tons of sentimental value and memories attached to it. It’s good to keep in mind that you take your memories with you when you decide to sell your home. It’s normal to overestimate your home’s actual value based on the love and effort you spent on it.
The reality is that property evaluators don’t consider that. They only value what they see, and various regulatory bodies strictly guide them by rules and regulations as determined for each region.
It Won’t Be Cheaper to Sell Without a Broker
It sounds appealing to try and bag the commission that a real estate broker charges. The truth is that you probably won’t save it in the long run.
The work that goes into preparing all the relevant contracts, documents, title searches, bank documents, and more could overwhelm you midway through the transaction. You could end up paying somebody for work that you’re going to spend unnecessary time and effort on.
Take Away
It’ll help you understand your broker better now that you have more insight into real estate agents’ daily lives. it’ll help you make the right choice when it’s time to sell your home. Look for a brokerage that’ll walk the mile with you and help you find the perfect buyers to keep on making memories in the home.
