Same kind of shit. We purchased in NY state. Neither agents did jack shit except push to close and shuffle some bits of paper. Negotiated the price myself w the actual sellers and told the agents to split half the commission between themselves. Money for nothing.
Also lolfuckoff to title insurance.
The buyers agents goal is to get their client to buy the house that will give them the highest fee, that was one of the main issues with the old system
From reading reddit, realtors seem convinced that nothing is going to change and that sellers will still be paying buyer agent commissions otherwise ânobody will look at their houseâ (same as it is now) and that CNN doesnât understand the actual agreement.
In NYC you can get a discount buyer broker that takes something like a 1% commission and pays you the difference between that and 3% as a refund. Not sure how common that is elsewhere.
Which tells you all you need to know about the actual value of buyers agents.
Iâm once again begging, now do title insurance. Iâve shelled out 10s of thousands of dollars for this useless fucking nonsense.
Isnât that the same deal Redfin offers?
Maybe so. They didnât enter NYC until recently.
My buyerâs agent was great - shuffled me around to a bunch of places and held my hand through the whole process to closing. But Iâm lazy and donât want to research and figure out all that crap myself.
I do know I didnât get the best rate through the bank he recommended. So I refi-ed a couple years later when I could get out from under BMI or PMI or whatever it was.
Took a look at the website and if I read everything correctly, Redfin is 1% only if you sell and subsequently buy with them. Otherwise itâs 1.5%. In both cases, you still need to kick 3% to the buyerâs agent, so youâre only down to 4% or 4.5% total.
We tried Redfin in 2021-2022 when house hunting and werenât able to get under contract. Youâre correct that the good deal is if you also sell through them. As first time home-buyers, I think they gave us like $1-2k kickback which isnât much in terms of percentage in this market.
My agents on both ends have been pretty good. First time buying I didnât know what I was doing. Canât even evaluate my agents in hindsight but they walked me through the process and got it done. First time selling I just wanted to be rid of the place and I found someone who was super aggressive and helpful at calling contractors to get the house prepped. She took on a lot of work for a shit commission ($110k house in 2012).
Second time buying a house I didnât appreciate my agent enough but he was good. We walked through a lot of houses and he had a good eye for shoddy repairs and steered me away from a lot of properties with red flags. I soured on him at the end cause he suggested adding like $2k to my offer so as not to make it a round number, he thought it would look more thoughtful and less open to negotiation that way. Maybe he was right but after we submitted I was like wait I just threw away $2k for what? For selling I found an agent through a friendâs recommendation who only charged 5%, kept in touch constantly, and sold a difficult house at probably the best price I could get (new construction, extra large house in a low income neighborhood).
My first buyers agent on my current house was shit, passed me off to an assistant for showings who was no help, took half a day to respond when we tried to put in an offer on houses that were selling in a day. Fortunately I knew enough by then to not continue with her. Got another recommendation for a better realtor, didnât spend much time with her because we got the first house we looked at but I was really happy with her negotiating. She had some tricks she used to make competitive offers in a tough market (2023).
Donât ever settle for shit rates from loan officers. There are thousands you can use and youâre never committed until closing. Itâs the easiest thing in the world to call multiple officers, shop for the best rate, and even continue shopping while under contract in case rates drop.
Clever might be what econphile is referencing.
Title insurance. How do I get into owning one of those businesses. Absolute money for nothing.
We put down straight cash when purchasing, agent put forward TI. I didnât know it here in USA#1 so checked it out a bit and itâs a straight lolno (unless youâre absolutely obligated). Told him to fuck off w that.
I dunno what the hidden deals and arrangements are but the agents, lenders, TI co are just looking to slice up free money.
May have stumbled into a great deal.
Yesterday we were on our way to an open house that is on an island and struck up a conversation with a lady driving an 80s Porsche in the queue for the ferry (we happen to have an 80s vehicle as well). It comes up in conversation that she and her husband were in the beginning stages of retirement and were in the process of moving to their retirement home. We asked a few questions and everything is sounding good for us. The neighborhood is great and <0.5miles to all schools, about 2k sq. ft, 4br, 2ba, has garage, flat yard, and (maybe most importantly) it needs some work. We want to gain some sweat equity and also understand a lot of people shy away from it.
Anyway, we exchanged contact details and actually ended up touring it today. It isnât a perfect house, but it checks every single box and we would happily fix the things that have some deferred maintenance. Weâre in contract with our agent on the buy side, so will have to give out their cut but I think the home owners plan to get a lawyer and do this with as little friction (and cost) as possible.
We feel pretty hopeless competing against a market with 5-10+ offers on most properties, so scoring before it hits the market would be huge. Still in the early stages, but itâs pretty exciting.
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Good luck. Hope you ship it.
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I just built a house in the San Juan islands. Less bedrooms, sloped lot, and have to take ferry to get to school. I would sell it and we could avoid all the fees!
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You are so oppressed
Continuing the timeline:
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Wednesday - our offer to the Bainbridge Island house wasnât accepted
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Thursday - we toured This House again with our realtor and the owner and had more conversation. They reiterated the interest in selling to a family and we decided to upgrade it to The House.
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Friday - crafted an offer that we felt was strong but also a fair bit below the sell price if it hit the open market, knowing it would cost them another $20-25k and about 2.5-3 months to get it ready to list.
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Saturday - offer submitted early in the day and
THEY ACCEPTED!
Only modification was a slightly longer close at the end of April rather than standard timeline to give them time to move things out.
Have only talked to realtor about it so far and havenât actually signed any papers yet but thatâs coming soon. The circumstances are still feeling a little surreal!
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Congrats! Is this house on an island too or is it on the mainland?
Mainland. Itâs in the Ballard neighborhood.
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