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selling Vancouver condo

3 Secrets Realtors Won’t Tell You When Selling

Steve Saretsky -

Top 3 Industry Secrets Revealed to Save You Thousands

A Recent survey shows 67.5% of the public doesn’t trust Realtors. With all the negative stigma around the industry how can you trust your Realtor will get you the best price when selling your Vancouver condo? In this post, i’ll outline the industry secrets and show you how you can avoid them to ensure a smooth sale.

  1. Selling Your Condo Below Value

    Studies from the popular book Freakonomics show that most Realtors won’t work harder to get you a higher sales price. Seems counter intuitive since they get paid on commission, right? However, due to the way commissions are structured there is little incentive to fight for that extra dollar. Let me explain, let’s say you get an offer of $600,000 on your condo. It likely doesn’t make mathematical sense for the Realtor to tell you to hold off and try and get $620,000. To keep things simple lets say commissions are 3% of the price, which is shared equally with the buyers agent. If you sell for $600,000 the Realtor will make $9000. If you sell for $620,000 the Realtor will make $9300. Most Realtors would rather a quick sale than wait a couple week for the extra $300. Hire a Realtor who has your best interests in mind and this could save you thousands of dollars.

  2. Not Showing You All the Sale Prices

Now that you’re aware some Realtors will try to convince you take a low offer you, it doesn’t stop there. Realtors will try to justify the lower offer by only showing you select sale prices comparable to your home. Because access to sold listings is only available on the Realtor MLS system they can be selective when showing you all the information. The Realtor may try to facilitate a quick transaction and quickly move on to their next listing. This allegedly happened several months ago when New Coast Realty tells agents to rip off clients and sell quick as possible. Do you think these sellers had all the data to make an informed decision?

3. Discounting the Buyers Commission

Have you ever tried to discount a selling agents commission or used a discount brokerage? While you may think you are saving money you are almost certainly costing yourself thousands of dollars. Let me explain, when the selling agent discounts their commission, it is almost certainly coming out of the marketing budget. But more importantly, it’s discounting the buyer agents commission. If you have two condos that are similar but one offers a higher commission, which one do you think that buyers agent will convince their client to make an offer on? Yes the buyers agent has a fiduciary duty to act impartially, but sadly some Realtors put their own interests ahead of their clients.  If you do come to an agreement to discount the commission with the selling Realtor, make sure those discounts aren’t coming off the marketing budget or the buying agents commission.

Now that you know these 3 industry secrets you should be able to navigate through the mess and maximize your profits from the sale of your condo. Just remember, don’t immediately jump on the first offer, know and insist on seeing all the comparable sale prices then make a decision. Also, make sure your selling Realtor hasn’t grossly discounted the buyers commission. If you follow this advice you will maximize every dollar when selling your Vancouver condo.

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