Estate Agent discussion

Skywalker786 said:
Brilliantly said!!!!

Amazing how many bad experiences posters have had with estate agents.

I am doing my internship for 6 months now with an incredibly reputable agency.

I am averaging 3-4 sales a month.

Average comm on a deal 5 to 7.5%. I prefer walking away from deals where sellers want to beat you down to 2 and 3%. not worth my time in the long run. I strongly believe in the ethos "goed koop is duurkoop"

General split in comm in 50/50 agent and agency. Dependant on performance split improves to 60/40 and 70/30.

I motivate sellers as much as possible to go the Exclusive Mandate route and this creates competition amongst buyers rather than agents. When you have an open mandate the agents chase to get the FIRST deal rather than the BEST deal, because you are so afraid that another agent is going to beat you to the post.

There will always be the seller on the street who believes private sale is the best. Good luck with the work.
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That's amazing - hope it continues for you!
 
loc said:
I would use an estate agent if I could afford it. I only bought my house a year ago and am now selling. Spent 50k on transfer and lawyers fees then, would now spend 70k on estate agents fees. I'd make a huge loss. I know people who have sold their properties privately with no issues. They just saved 100k + - hard to argue with that
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Why are you selling so soon? too many latent defects? Work?
 
Skywalker786 said:
Brilliantly said!!!!

Amazing how many bad experiences posters have had with estate agents.

I am doing my internship for 6 months now with an incredibly reputable agency.

I am averaging 3-4 sales a month.

Average comm on a deal 5 to 7.5%. I prefer walking away from deals where sellers want to beat you down to 2 and 3%. not worth my time in the long run. I strongly believe in the ethos "goed koop is duurkoop"

General split in comm in 50/50 agent and agency. Dependant on performance split improves to 60/40 and 70/30.

I motivate sellers as much as possible to go the Exclusive Mandate route and this creates competition amongst buyers rather than agents. When you have an open mandate the agents chase to get the FIRST deal rather than the BEST deal, because you are so afraid that another agent is going to beat you to the post.

There will always be the seller on the street who believes private sale is the best. Good luck with the work.
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You can stay away from my property then. Any agent (If I ever decide to deal with one that is) who suggests an Exclusive Mandate will get told to fsck off. Competition between the buyers se moer, it just makes for a lazy agent for 2 months or whatever. There is always competition between buyers and at the end of the day, the acceptance of the offer is on the seller and no matter what the agent has brought to the table they have a figure they'll be willing to accept.

In terms of the level of work involved, private property.. deal with calls, show the house a few times, use the standard proforma type OTPs (that agents use as well), and then hand it over to the lawyers... its not worth anywhere NEARLY the amount of money estate agents think they are worth in my opinion.
 
Skywalker786 said:
Brilliantly said!!!!

Amazing how many bad experiences posters have had with estate agents.

I am doing my internship for 6 months now with an incredibly reputable agency.

I am averaging 3-4 sales a month.

Average comm on a deal 5 to 7.5%. I prefer walking away from deals where sellers want to beat you down to 2 and 3%. not worth my time in the long run. I strongly believe in the ethos "goed koop is duurkoop"

General split in comm in 50/50 agent and agency. Dependant on performance split improves to 60/40 and 70/30.

I motivate sellers as much as possible to go the Exclusive Mandate route and this creates competition amongst buyers rather than agents. When you have an open mandate the agents chase to get the FIRST deal rather than the BEST deal, because you are so afraid that another agent is going to beat you to the post.

There will always be the seller on the street who believes private sale is the best. Good luck with the work.
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Are you telling me, when you sell 4 houses a month at R1 000 000 each you will make about +- R30 000?
 
ToxicBunny said:
You can stay away from my property then. Any agent (If I ever decide to deal with one that is) who suggests an Exclusive Mandate will get told to fsck off. Competition between the buyers se moer, it just makes for a lazy agent for 2 months or whatever. There is always competition between buyers and at the end of the day, the acceptance of the offer is on the seller and no matter what the agent has brought to the table they have a figure they'll be willing to accept.

In terms of the level of work involved, private property.. deal with calls, show the house a few times, use the standard proforma type OTPs (that agents use as well), and then hand it over to the lawyers... its not worth anywhere NEARLY the amount of money estate agents think they are worth in my opinion.
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Please advise why any agent would choose to sit on a property when the only salary they earn is on registration- average of 3 months for registration.

What a stupid argument.

Any sensible agent will sell your property as fast as possible. However, flip side to this is a type of client like yourself who would probably turn around and say well you only worked on this sale for a week. So guess I am cutting your salary down.

My response would be would you have rather preferred taking 2 months longer to sell your home so I can justify earning my salary.
 
loc said:
I would use an estate agent if I could afford it. I only bought my house a year ago and am now selling. Spent 50k on transfer and lawyers fees then, would now spend 70k on estate agents fees. I'd make a huge loss. I know people who have sold their properties privately with no issues. They just saved 100k + - hard to argue with that
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Too soon to be selling. Good luck with the private route. If you get stuck call in an agent and chat to them re salary.
 
Random Hero said:
Are you telling me, when you sell 4 houses a month at R1 000 000 each you will make about +- R30 000?
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One simple word YES

But it's a ton of work and you have to deal with the likes of clients like Toxic bunny who make you honestly want to hurl. Where you genuinely want to turn around and say we'll sell your house yourself.

I will give you an example I have a deal at the moment

Told client I will take apartment to market at R2.4/R2.5 at 5% com

Brought client a cash offer of R2 mil and another offer of R2.2 with 50% dep. now brought an offer of R2.3. Seller is hell bent on R2.350 and she will not budge

I have had 6 show days taken 95 people though the property.

I moved my salary from 7.5% to 5%

Last samilar unit in the complex sold for R2.150

Now making a decision to walk away from the deal.
 
Random Hero said:
This weekend I spoke to someone telling me that becoming an estate agent was easy.

And apperantly they make a lot of money on their deals. about 7% of the sale. Which is insane because that means if you sell a house for R1,000,000 then you make R70,000.

Can anybody validate this?
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It's a really good career.BUT make sure you have a back up income if you hit lean months.

Research the suburbs you intend marketing. Check the Saturday star to see how many properties come up for sale.

If you prepared for hard work then you will find it a rewarding career.

And 7.5% salary per deal is very achievable.
 
I agree that this is not an easy job, just remember that 10% of the agents sell 90% of the properties.

And to become an estate agent takes a lot of effort these days.
 
Ahh yes... clients like me that demand value for money. Honestly dude, estate agents do not do enough to justify the amount of money they charge. Plain and simple. You can bring all the sob stories you want to the table hut the reality is anything more than 15k cost to sell a house is too much.. and a percentage of selling price is just never ever happening.
 
First property I bought was a private sale and ran smoothly. In the process of buying a second property and the Estate Agent has been the weak link in the process from day 1.

She did a deed search using the seller's name and surname, and used the first result that came back. Didn't bother to check that it was the correct seller or even the correct property, so we ended up with an OTP with the incorrect full names of the seller as well as the incorrect erf number (At least the address was correct)! It's been a real nightmare having to explain this to the banks where we're applying for bonds...
 
Often both seller or buyer make it easy for estate agents to make quick money. They cave in too early to just get it done as opposed to waiting for what you really wanted. On the other hand there are those that dont barge and make the estate agents work for their money. These types are less common than the other.
 
I got this email the other day.. but im not going

Hello.
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Join one of South Africa’s fastest growing Real Estate Agency Groups and become part of a nationwide network of Property and Neighbourhood Experts. Click here to see what we’re all about!

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I recently bought a place and the commission was brought down to 4% without my asking, likely due to my making a lower offer in an area that generally gets higher offers.

Competition in Cape Town is rough (most properties in Atlantic Seaboard I see selling same week). Guess agents here are more likely to do what it takes to sell a place...
 
ToxicBunny said:
Ahh yes... clients like me that demand value for money. Honestly dude, estate agents do not do enough to justify the amount of money they charge. Plain and simple. You can bring all the sob stories you want to the table hut the reality is anything more than 15k cost to sell a house is too much.. and a percentage of selling price is just never ever happening.
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Hey guess you are entitled to your opinion and choices :D
 
Skywalker786 said:
Hey guess you are entitled to your opinion and choices :D
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That I am... :)

And yes, even though I am massively anti-estate agents.. there are a few good ones out there, but the majority are just time wasters and useless at doing anything to even vaguely justify the type of fee they want to charge.
 
I could never understand the value of an estate agent in a sale.
I have only bought one property. And that was a repo. No agents comm.
I helped a family member to buy a flat and the agent didn't add value.

Maybe someone can say what value an estate agent brings to the table
 
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