What to say to a Real Estate Agent

Posted On 10:23 AM by Scott Costello |

I contacted one of the Real Estate agents I met on my open house tour and asked him if he was interested in working with a beginner investor. He said he has worked with many investors before and would be happy to talk with me and share his experiences (not sure if this means good or bad).

I'm going to try and setup an appointment to talk with him on sunday. I'm going to follow Steve Cook's advice and go about it the following way...

First I'm going to ask him about his experiences with the other investors. What types of deals he found for them. I'll then ask some follow up questions so I can gauge his knowledge of investing.

Second I'll explain to him how we can work together. That I'd like to get weekly listings of expireds, foreclosures and handyman specials. That I'll need him to submit my offers (but I will see if I can fill out the forms and just give them to him to submit, saving him extra work). I will also tell him that once in a while I'll need him to run some comps and show me a house, but this won't happen to often.

Third I'll get into the amount of offers I'll be making (hopefully) and that they will be very low offers. I expect to get most of them rejected, but am confident a few will be accepted.

If he asks me about signing a "exclusivity agreement" I will decline and tell him I have no problems giving him the commision on all properties I get through him, but if someone else brings me the property it wouldn't be fair to cut them out of the deal.

So how does all that sound? Leave me some feedback if you have other ideas.
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1 Response to 'What to say to a Real Estate Agent'
  1. Shae
    https://sjcostello.blogspot.com/2008/10/what-to-say-to-real-estate-agent.html?showComment=1224114720000#c3516691609950757669'> October 15, 2008 at 4:52 PM

    Scott, this is an excellent plan! That was my approach with my realtor and its working nicely. I know some people work directly with the listing agent, but I like working with a buyer's agent to submit my offers. She deals with all the negative responses that come back to her and just tells the other agents that we're investors and not going to pay list price...and that we're not emotionally attached so no big deal. The other day she got a call from an agent saying "This is a house! Not a boat! What kind of offer is this?!" LOL! No biggie..just on to the next one!

    Wishing you well!
    Shannon
    goodfaithinvesting.blogspot.com