As a Real Estate agent, your job is usually to sell. You work for the vendor, promote the property and do what you can to sell the property for the best possible price.
Normally, these sales interactions and negotiations are all done directly with a buyer, and their experience in real estate and knowledge of the property industry varies greatly.
So does your sales process have to change when you’re dealing with a buyers’ agent rather than with the buyer directly?
What is the role of a buyers’ agent?
A buyers’ agent works for the buyer. They provide expertise and advice for people who have little knowledge and experience in buying property and who might be daunted by the whole process. Or, for those who simply don’t have time for house hunting.
They take a brief from the buyer and do all the property searching and negotiation with the buyer’s budget in mind. They’ll even arrange pest and building reports and deal directly with a conveyancer or solicitor.
As a selling agent, what are the advantages of working with a buyers’ agent?
As a selling agent, you can work closely with a buying agent to form an ongoing business relationship. This means you can offer advanced, off-market opportunities to the buying agent and save yourself and the vendor the time and expense of a four-week marketing campaign.
Buying agents can refer you to new buyers, often from overseas, who may not have been marketed to by other selling agents yet. A buying agent can also refer you to others as an excellent selling agent after they have a good experience with you. When markets are not so strong, this kind of relationship is well worth having, since the buying agent will be a repeat buyer.
Some other advantages include:
- A buying agent will bring you qualified buyers who won’t waste your time. They know what they want and they’re ready to commit.
- They will only place genuine offers from buyers who really want the property.
- Transactions will be faster and smoother with fewer stumbling blocks like pest and building inspection interpretation.
As a selling agent, what are the disadvantages of working with a buyers’ agent?
A buyers’ agent can tell the buyer whether the home is being offered for a fair market value, and they can point out reasons to a buyer why they perhaps shouldn’t buy the home. The negotiation process can also be tougher because the buying agent has more knowledge and experience, so you may not get a sale price quite as high as if the buyer wasn’t using an agent.
A buying agent has the ability to disclose inside information about the sellers position that you as a selling agent cannot legally divulge. This information can benefit the buyer when they are making an offer, and again result in a lower sale price.
While it should never be your intention to mislead a buyer or take advantage of their lack of knowledge, you are working for the vendor. It’s not in your best interest to point out reasons not to buy the home, whereas a buying agent will.
At the end of the day, working with a buyers’ agent has more advantages than disadvantages, particularly in the long term if you can establish a good relationship with a buying agent. It can result in more sales, a less stressful sales process and a happy vendor and buyer.
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