Real estate agents who help Fremont home buyers look at homes spend a lot of time out in the field. Today, I was one of the agents doing just that--spending a lot of time out in the field showing Fremont homes. My home buyers and I looked at 11 homes today. It may not be considered a lot of homes by some, but we did it smoothly and effectively within 2 hours without being rushed. That was nice. The odd part of it all was that during the whole time, I felt like I was being stalked. Not by my clients but by other Fremont home buyers."Are you the agent?" or "Open House Today?" They exclaimed. I had to say, "no." I was not the listing agent nor was I their agent. As I opened the door for my Fremont home buyers, they, the stalkers, assumed they were going to see the home and take their time with it. In they went wiping their feet with a sort of look that I don't necessarily have the words for.
This happened four times today until finally one of my Fremont home buyers, the husband chimes in and says, "Uh, this isn't and open house. You need to get an agent." Kudos, naturally, good agents are worth their weight in gold I thought to myself. Then, Mrs. Fremont home buyer takes a gentler approach saying, "You should call Jeff. He's really good. You need to get together with him. Oh, he does loans too. You need to be approved or the seller will not really look at your offer." Wow, double kudos. My Fremont home buyer lessons sunk in.
When the day rolled to an end, I thought, will these stalkers call me? I doubt it, but truth be told, they should really get with an agent. Think of it this way:
- The stalkers waited around hoping to get inside a house for sale.
- My clients were being escorted by a professional to see 11 homes in 2 hours. Keys in hand at the door.
- The stalkers had to rely on a flyer if there was even one there or try to find the info in the Internet.
- My clients knew all the info already; heard the stats straight from me as I was able to compare the info to other homes I had professionally closed escrow with.
- The stalkers, if they found a house they liked, would have to call the listing agent to make an offer. This can be risky and perhaps tempt the listing agent to just close the deal without thoroughly negotiating for the Fremont home buyer/stalker. Sometimes it happens.
If you are stalking, please consider the FREE benefits of having a buyers agent as mentioned above as opposed to your current method of house hunting.
If you have an agent, good for you. The agent really cares about your transaction. Any business owner or agent wants to get referrals after doing a great job http://www.tricityhome.com/ondemand.html and they can only get them from caring about you and your transaction.
If you do not believe me, ask my current Mr. & Mrs. Fremont homer buyer. They really stuck up for having an agent. I later told her that it was very nice of here to say that to strangers about me and to keep up the good work.
Although I mainly represent buyers, I get calls from sellers who know I 'know my stuff' and want me to represent them. The other day a potential buyer caught me on the street in front of one of my listings and said that she didn't use a buyer's agent, she wanted to deduct the commission and I said "WHAT? please explain" REALLY, it doesn't work that way here and now. We have very low inventory in my market. It's important to find someone that will counsel you on writing an offer that might possibly be accepted.