Quote:
Originally Posted by Wayne at Pelican Parts
Most good real estate agents will not make you sign an exclusive to be your buying agent. In general, that side of the equation is the "easy money", especially in the age of the Internet where many people find listings on Zillow and Realtor.com and then have their agent walk them through it. I don't recommend that *anyone* sign a buyer's agreement - a good agent will not need this - a bad one will, which makes this a red flag in my opinion.
-Wayne
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I would offer a counterpoint to this. There are surprisingly a LOT of potential buyers out there that have no qualms about pumping an agent for info, and having them show several houses, sometimes over weeks or months. Then they will turn around and submit an offer on something (or already have an offer on something) via their existing buyer-agent, whom they failed to disclose up front (usually a close friend or family member). Or, they will waste days/weeks/months of a buyer-agent's time, only to then submit an offer directly to a listing agent (thinking that can get a better deal by doing so). Does the agent have legal recourse in some situations? Yes, and sometimes a compromise is worked out between buyer/seller agents behind the scenes. In cases where the buyer-agent didn't show the subject property to the buyer previously, they are basically screwed.
Everyone poo-poo's RE agents, and often with good reason. However, the lack of loyalty, consideration, and basic business ethics is pretty shocking amongst the home-buying public as well.
So, the use of a buyer-broker agreement can be a useful tool to separate the "contenders from the pretenders" so-to-speak. Do some lousy agents use them as a crutch? Sure. However, when I was slinging residential, I had no problem asking for buyers to sign a buyer/broker agreement, and never had any legitimate buyer push-back. However, that was only after meeting with someone at length and building a rapport. If I was fairly confident of their intentions/vetting (referrals, etc.), I would at least ask them point-blank if they were working with any other agents.
Also, it could be argued that the "easy money" is with listings. All a listing agent has to do is attend listing appointments, and do a bit of marketing (which is usually sub'd out). Granted, there is usually more up-front costs to the agent on the listing side, but they are not shuttling multiple different clients all over town, to see countless houses on a daily basis. IMO, the process of securing/vetting a legitimate buyer, finding a property, submitting an offer, and having that offer make it all the way to a successful closing is much harder than listing a property and waiting for the offers to roll in. YMMV...
