Thank you for the feedback from the last edition of Real Estate Talk, and your questions. July and August has seen an uplift in buyer enquiry here locally, and prices are holding, if not improving, on the sales side, with rental vacancy rates still low from a shortage of rental property on offer.
A question from D. Brown of Banksia Beach was “All agents seem the same, how do you recommend we choose to maximise our sale price?”
Big question! There are several factors that need to be taken into consideration. We have everything from the cheap and nasty, to the extreme service levels within real estate agents in the Bribie and surrounds area. Bottom line is you get what you pay for. Pretty much every agent and agency will be competitive in regard to their fee, and there is a large difference out there with marketing. The question here is that if an agency bases themselves on a cheap fee and puts this as their point of difference, how are they able to negotiate a top price for your home? This style of agency usually also has a cheap marketing strategy which costs next to nothing. Their aim then becomes to sell your home at any price to achieve their outlay back rather than negotiating the best price for you. Every property is different, and generic approach from an agent can cost you money. This needs to be discussed at the point of your appraisal before you list. Differentiate on the agent and not what you can save, as a good agent will get more through their negotiation skills than the initial outlay and at contract stage. A thorough appraisal meeting should take at least an hour with sales data, and the whole marketing strategy. Treat your meeting with agents as a job interview and ask the hard questions.
The next thing is the experience and tenure of the agent in the local market, as well as their profile. For this piece, I suggest jumping onto realestate.com.au, and seeing who jumps out with their presence here, and also taking a look at the agent’s profile. Do they have testimonial? Do they have the experience and knowledge? Are they a part of an international group which allows a buyer referral programme, or are they only local with no real presence, which leads to no database. Also, check out how prominent the office is, and moreover, does their window display stand out, or do they have no office and run from their home. This is vital to getting the most exposure for your property. Also, and one of the main pieces is look at how properties are marketed. Are they using virtual tours? Do they use floor plans and/or videos? This is how your property appears to the buying public. A badly presented property can miss out on potential buyers.
Whilst on websites, check who they have a global partnership with. For example, we have an association with List Globally. This means when you list for sale, as well as having access to the best realestate.com and Domain portals, your property goes live on 27 portals both domestically and internationally across 26 countries and is translated into the appropriate language. Personally, I had an enquiry from Miami not long ago, and recently a sale was made to someone from Alaska as a direct result.
Another part to question is, does the whole agency work to sell my property? This is important as a lot of internal agency politics happens in a lot of other agencies here where the listing agent is the only one that gets to show your property, and not any other salesperson. This works against the seller and does not maximise the end sale result.
There is a whole array of things to consider here, and if you would like to know more, please reach out.
Don’t forget, if you have any question on anything real estate, email me at jfarrenprice@ljhooker.com.au and we shall endeavour to answer it in the forthcoming edition.
Comments