Yeah, of course not, freedumb you dummy. In fact, most aren’t. A lot of Realtors are professional, honest folks, and I think I’ve found one. In my search to find a realtor, I’ve interviewed a few. I decided to go with a Realtor that I’ve known for awhile, but never really got to know too well (classmate in a few college classes). He’s actually younger than I am, by a year or two, but he’s a fulltime Realtor, and one I feel comfortable discussing my finances with, which is really important in my opinion. It also means that I trust him.
Here are some of the questions I asked:
- How many clients do you handle at any given moment?
10 - 15
- Have you worked with clients looking to purchase in the range I’ve
mentioned?
Yes.
- If I’ve set my budget at $650,000, would you let me go above?
The house you buy and the price you pay will always come down to you. I make recommendations, and will give you my honest opinion, but in the end, it’s you that’s going to have to pay the mortgage.
- Are you doing real estate fulltime?
Yes.
- Are you comfortable with backing out of an offer if something is not
right, for whatever reason, even as something as simple as “it just doesn’t seem right?” Or is this something you would recommend against?
If you want to back out of the contract, not a problem, however, it depends on when you decide to do so. My hope is that if you were to buy something, I will do my job to educate you about the property and the process.
- Are you even looking for new clients?
There have only been a couple of times were we’ve been so busy I had to turn clients away. If there’s too much to do and I don’t feel we can service the client to the best of our ability I let them know that. It’s the right thing to do in my opinion.
He even offered this advice, considering I don’t need to buy a house immediately:
Buy only if housing prices are growing so fast your income can’t keep up. A $500,000 home appreciating 30% over the year is moving up in price at $12,500 a month! Buy!
I know for a fact that the housing market has stalled in Hawaii–it’s nowhere near what it was doing the past few years. A housing crash? I don’t know, but I do know for a fact that prices have stabilized. That’s great, because now I can wait. I can build up my savings to put a bigger down payment, which means less of a mortgage!
Realtor: CHECK!
Sounds pretty solid. I would also ask:
What he thinks of the current state of the Hawaii market?
Is he a buyer’s agent, or does he go both ways?
I would also ask him how much house he thinks you can afford based on your financial situation. If he overshoots, be cautious. Then again, you have already given him a number.
I would ask what he thinks of different types of financing options. I wouldn’t want anyone who would recommend neg am ARMs and such.
LMD, Good question! I’m not sure if he sells…As far as the Hawaii market, I did ask him…His response:
He did not recommend fancy loans…said to go with a traditional. Once I get more serious, (next year), we’ll definitely look at the numbers…It’s not set in stone, but I’m thinking this agent will work out well…I’ll keep you, and everyone else of course, posted…
[...] Back to the PF topic, I just posted up about why I couldn’t be a realtor…you might want to check out this little conversation between LAMoneyGuy and a random one he ran into…I’m glad I found one already. [...]
I had 5 realtors tell me to “buy now” back in June 2007… because pricing will go up.. just look at the stats now in Oct 2007. It’s so far been more realistic than say last year at the hype of the situations.
The funniest thing a Realtor told me down here. “We won’t be affected by the Nation’s Housing Bubble” in 2005. If that’s the case why do we have so much inventory in 2007?
Yeps, we do live on an island, so things are different out here, but thats what Long Island, NY said….. just a clue.