What Can Happen Without an Experienced Sacramento Realtor at Your Side

Hiring an experienced Sacramento Realtor tends to put more money into a seller’s pocket.

There are reasons to hire an experienced Sacramento Realtor. Experience means something. While being interviewed by a reporter from the Washington Post a few years ago, the reporter interrupted my diatribe to ask: how can I find an experienced Realtor like you? I had been describing a situation in Elk Grove in which the sellers had expected to do a short sale. We had signed all of  the listing paperwork and were down to the last thing I needed to do, which was inspect the property.

I had examined the prices of comparable sales from the comfort of my home office, and a short sale in that neighborhood was certainly doable. However, when I walked in the door of that home, a feeling washed over me. This home could sell to an investor at a cash price that — while exceeding the price of the comparable sales — would make this home a regular sale. Meaning my sellers would not have to do a short sale. It was worth the gamble, and I persuaded my reluctant sellers to let me try to market the home to an investor at a higher price.

My hunch paid off, and the listing promptly sold at that higher price. I called all the buyer’s agents I knew who worked with Bay area investors and one grabbed it. My sellers were not subject to a short sale. We pulled that puppy out of foreclosure, paid off the back payments and saved my sellers’ credit report. It was the right move. My duty is to my sellers.

Fast forward to yesterday: I am at the nail salon for a manicure. I see the same manicurist as I have for the past 10 years. This is a woman who gave me a bag of ginger and packets of tea for our trip to Vietnam, just in case I became ill. Sweet and loyal. Still, this woman’s boyfriend had hired a less experienced Sacramento Realtor when he recently sold his home, much to her dismay, but it’s his right to choose whomever he wants. The agent he hired was a relative, too. What I’ve heard others refer to as a DNA agent.

My manicurist showed me their closing statement and asked if 7% commission was normal in Sacramento. Yikes! My eyes bounced outta my head.

Well . . . it’s much more than I charge. Like many top producers, my normal fee is 6% commission, which I’ve received for the past 40-some years. I don’t know any reputable Realtor who charges that much. Although, there are no laws preventing a 7% commission because commissions are negotiable. She also complained that his final sales price was way less than the prices of surrounding homes. She seemed distraught. The transaction was dual agency, and the relative, in her agent capacity, represented both the seller and the buyer. Oy.

The problem with working with relatives is if they do a bad job, it will cause hard feelings within the family. Family tends to trust one another. Was trust served here? Will an inexperienced Sacramento Realtor do a bad job? You tell me. Because I certainly did not want to express my opinion of this situation to my manicurist.

Bottomline: it doesn’t matter how long an agent has worked in the business. Agents learn on the job. What matters is how many homes an agent sells. What matters is experience. If you want to capture the experience of an agent who sells on average about 100 homes a year, call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916.233.6759.