In today’s market, hiring the right agent to sell your house has never been more important. Hiring the wrong agent can delay the sale of your house for months. You need to interview an agent to learn about their background, to see what they know about your neighborhood, and to find out if they are a good fit with you and your lifestyle.

Here are some important questions you should ask each agent you interview and I’ve also included some things you should look for in their answers.

1. How many years have you been involved in real estate?

Ideally you want a career real estate agent that has been in the industry for at least 2 or 3 years. Or at least you want to make sure that they are under the direct supervision of someone with 3 to 5 years of experience.

2. Are you a REALTOR and do you have any special real estate accredited designations or certifications? How would those designations benefit me?

All REALTORS are licensed real estate agents, but not all licensed real estate agents are REALTORS. REALTORS hold themselves to a higher standard in addition to the standards required by the state licensing board. For more info regarding Realtors and real estate agents, go to:

www.realtors.com – National Association of REALTORS
www.texasrealtors.com – Texas Association of REALTORS
www.trec.state.tx.us – Texas Real Estate Commission

3. Is real estate your full-time career or a part-time career?

You only want a professional full-time real estate agent to sell your house. To do it right, real estate is a full-time job. You shouldn’t hire an agent that only spends a few hours a week on the job.

4. What makes you a better choice for me than your competition?

Use this question to discover how competitive they are and how well they have researched the market and their competition, especially in your area. Their answers can also reveal their level of experience.

5. Are you a member of a team? Would I be working only with you or would I be also working with other members of your team? Who are the other members of your team? Who is responsible for what?

A team is a group of agents that service the same customers. Usually one agent does a specific task or works with a particular client or specific area. Find out how their team works. There are advantages to working with teams however their approach may seem less personal. Make sure you feel comfortable with the way their team operates and how they will service you. Also make sure that you have a list of teammates and their duties and contact information.

6. Do you or a member of your team speak a foreign language?

If your neighborhood has a large portion of non-English speaking residents, an agent that speaks the language may be able to better market to those non-English speaking residents. Ask your agent how they would address a non-English speaking customer.

7. How accessible are you? Will I be given your cell phone, home phone and any other phone number where you can easily be reached? How often will you contact me?

One of the biggest criticisms about agents is communication. Make sure your agent knows you demand a high level of communication and that you want as many contact numbers as possible.   If they do give you their home number, please be considerate of how you use it.

8. Do you just work with sellers, or do you represent buyers too?

There’s nothing wrong with working with both as long as they don’t spread their time too thin. Buyers take up a lot of an agent’s time when showing homes. Find out their ratio of buyers to sellers.

9. How many clients are you currently working with? How many are buyers and how many are sellers?

Once again, just make sure they don’t spread themselves too thin. Make sure they have enough time to sell your house.

10. How do you deal with disclosed dual-agency?

Dual-agency is a tricky situation where the agent represents both the buyer and seller of the same transaction. When representing both sides, they in effect can not really represent either side well. If that sounds like an awkward explanation, I assure you the law is even more unclear. Read “Information about Brokerage Services” to learn about the law of agency. This is a standard form published by the Texas Real Estate Commission and the agent you choose is required to give you a copy. I can give you a copy if you would like.

11. What areas of town do you specialize in?

Ideally, they should be familiar with your area. However, it may not be the only area they specialize in. If they say they specialize in the entire DFW area, remember that the DFW metroplex is an area of 9,286 square miles, making it larger in area than Rhode Island and Connecticut combined according to Wikipedia.com. Have them narrow it down a bit.

12. What can you tell me about the demographics of my neighborhood? How will you use this information to my advantage to market my home?

This question reveals how much they know about your area and how specialized their marketing campaign can be tailored to your specific situation.

13. How will you determine the appropriate sales price for my home?

Usually this is done by comparing sales activity of similar houses. The big debate is how your house compares to other houses that have sold. They may be able to offer ideas to improve your house and make it sell for more. If done correctly, all of the agents you interview should price your home pretty close. If an agent prices your house significantly higher or lower than the other agents’ prices, find out why they priced it that way. Remember, if it’s too good to be true then it usually is. Some agents promise to list your house at a high price knowing that once you’ve signed the agreement, they can make you lower it to a reasonable amount later on. That wastes time and the longer your house sits on the market, the less money you’ll sell it for. Theoretically this should not be a problem you’ll run into because these agents usually don’t sell that many houses. However, a quick way to check is to look at the agent’s MLS stats and look for the SP%LP column. This list shows the difference between what the house was first listed for and what the house finally sold for.  The average should be between 90% to 100%, the higher the better.

14. How are you going to advertise my home? How often will you hold open houses? How will you promote it?

Make sure they don’t just list it in MLS and plant a sign in your yard. They may advertise in newspapers, magazines and other publications. Also find out how they will feature your home on the Internet. Open houses are also a way to promote your house, but their effectiveness is up for debate. Ask your agent about their views on open houses.

15. What does the listing agreement entail? What are the starting and expiration dates? What’s your commission and how negotiable is it?

Make sure you read the contract and ask them to leave you a copy. Be sure you understand It before you sign it. The important things to know are when the starting and expiration dates are, how much the commissions and fees are, and how to terminate the agreement due to non-performance. Remember, if you have a problem with the agent, you can always ask AgentHarvest to talk with them. Regarding commission.. Don’t think you win when you beat an agent down to the lowest possible commission. You usually end up losing. By lowering their commission you also lower their motivation. Remember, you are already getting a portion of your commission back just because you are using AgentHarvest. Good agents usually do not budge on their commission rates because they know there are lots of clients willing to pay for good service. Don’t cheat yourself out of the opportunity to hire a good agent. If you think about it, hiring a bad agent for less will usually end up costing you more in the long run. Of course I’m sure they’ll have more to add on this topic.

16. What haven’t I asked you that I need to know?

This question shows you what they think is important for you to know. Remember, it’s their job to help you understand and become comfortable with the process.

17. The most important question you need to ask yourself…
Do I think this agent will do a good job selling my home and can I work with him/her to achieve this goal?

Now that you have all this information, what comes next? Read over all the information they gave you. Read over the contracts, look at their handouts and compare each agent. Ask the agents questions if you do not understand anything. You are welcome to go to http://forum.agentharvest.com if you need to ask a question or look for answers. You can also email me directly at bpetrey@agentharvest.com too.

What Should I Do Now?

LOOK AT YOUR INTERVIEW NOTES

Look at your notes. What did you like about that agent and what did you not like about that agent.

GO TO THE TEXAS REAL ESTATE COMMISSION

Here is the link: www.trec.state.tx.us – Texas Real Estate Commission – At the top of their home page, you can look up the agent and find information like the classes they’ve taken, their license status and number of years they’ve had that license.

CHOOSE YOUR AGENT

Remember that agents recommended by AgentHarvest are chosen based on their track record in your neighborhood. That agent or team was one of a small number of agents that sold the highest amount of houses, similar to yours, in a 5-mile area around your house. Given this information, you really can not make a bad choice. Feel comfortable in knowing that you are only interviewing qualified agents that are capable of selling homes in your neighborhood.

If you don’t find an agent that you like, we can send you other agents that sold a large number of houses in your area. What matters most is that you are happy with your choice of agent.

LET US KNOW THE RESULTS

Tell us who you like and we’ll notify all of the agents so you don’t have to relay the bad news to the other agents. We’ll take care of it.

I hope you find these questions useful and good luck in your agent search.  Let us know what we  can do to help.

Now Go Out And SELL THAT HOUSE!

Bill Petrey
AgentHarvest

Related Articles:

Realtor Interview Techniques That Get Results

Analyzing a Real Estate Agent’s Track Record

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