Meeting With Real Estate Agents – Interviewing Realtors

So you’ve decided to sell your home and have a fairly good idea of what you think it is worth. Being a sensible home seller, you schedule interviews with three local real estate professionals who’ve been sending you fliers and magnetic calendars for years. Each real estate agent comes prepared with a listing presentation complete with a Comparative Market Analysis and a marketing plan for your home. Each recommends a list price for your home.

Amazingly, a couple of the Realtors you meet with have come up with prices that are lower than you expected. Although they back up their recommendations with recent comparable sales data, you remain convinced your house is worth more. When you interview the third agent’s figures, they are much more in line with your own anticipated value, or maybe even higher. Suddenly, you’re a happy and excited home seller, already counting the money.

Before choosing a Realtor that may be overpricing your home, ask a few probing questions that will weed out the wheat from the chaff during your interview process:

1. What are the average days on the market for a similar home in my neighborhood?
2. What is the average days on the market for your listings?
   -You’re not looking for a super low number but  a better number than the average days on the market in the whole neighborhood.
3. How many homes have you sold in my neighborhood in the last year?
   -The Realtor may have sold no homes in your neighborhood but if he has active homes for sale there, it would be worthwhile to know why he believes they have not sold.
4. Can I see the listing histories of the properties you currently have for sale in my neighborhood?
   -What you’re looking for in this data is how many times the price has been reduced by this real estate professional and how soon after the initial listing appointment it was reduced. A reduction after a month or two could indicate a truly overpriced listing from the start.