Make your estate agent work for you - or else fire them
CLIODHNA O’DONOGHUE
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There are various way to get agents to work for you: “in areas where several agents are experienced in the market it is often best to invite up to four different agencies to compete for the business”
In the slower market you need an estate agent who will really work for you
MORE THAN ever vendors are desperately seeking a professional, effective, marketing and selling service. But many of our frazzled estate agents accused of not being up to the job claim vendors expect miracles in this market.
Certainly miracles are required if prices remain at the expectation level of 2008. And, given the performance of the market over the last year, all asking prices are in need of downward revision.
The financial market free fall has put many vendors under serious pressure to sell now. Their homes may have languished for a year or more in a falling market where capital values plummeted and funding sources for buyers dried up, exacerbating an already torturous saga. But they cannot afford that debatable luxury any more.
But nothing will change unless vendors accept market realities and lower their asking prices. Equally, some agents must resist being too fearful of telling vendors the real truth about the market, opting to “hand hold” and consume more “humble pie”.
“After all,” one agent despaired, “we were the ones who told them to buy it, or advised them to seek the initial selling price which is now significantly reduced and about to drop further.”