What separates a good real estate agent from a really GREAT one?  I am an observer by nature and I am always observing agents to determine who the good ones are and who are not.  Quite honestly, there are times when I look at listings that I am about to show to a client and I cringe after I notice who the listing agent is.  I do that because, as in all businesses, there are real estate agents who are not pleasant to deal with, who aren’t very efficient at doing their job (my #1 pet peeve), and, in terms of their negotiating techniques on behalf of their clients, they are operating at a 2 or 3 year old level.  “This is MINE and you can’t have it!”

Our tag line for our business is:  “Connecting Buyers & Sellers for a Win/Win Result.”   It pretty much sums up who we are and how we do business.  First, our belief is that the real estate business is about matching willing buyers and willing sellers.  We’re not trying to convince anyone to do anything they don’t want to do.   Secondly, we believe that we can do that that in a win/win way for all.

There are some in the real estate business who would take exception to our strategy about the win/win aspect and say that representation is exclusively about getting your client the very best deal (e.g., it’s not a win/win, but a win/lose, with the “win” in favor of MY client and the lose in favor of  YOUR client).  Another way of saying it is, “We absolutely won’t leave anything on the table.”

While it certainly IS our goal to get our client the very best deal possible (and we really are quite good at it), the problem with the Win/Lose approach is that it creates an adversarial relationship between the parties.  Win/Lose negotiators often have strong egos and they have an extremely limited view of what the client’s REAL interests are.  To say it a different way, they are negotiating based from their own ego, not in the true interest of the client.  Even though the strategy sounds like a good idea for the client, quite often the results are less than what you might expect.  The problem is that adversarial negotiating quite often ends up in compromise in order to get the deal done and so …  sometimes they win, sometimes they lose.  And sometimes the adversarial relationship continues … even into the courts.

The alternative way of negotiating is based on interests. It’s a bigger picture view and it provides for many more possible solutions.  The truth is that people and situations are complex and every transaction has multiple factors that influence whether a person is getting a good deal or not.  For example, who wants a great price on something that doesn’t interest them? or work for their family?

What we are trying to do is match interests and so we we feel like it is our job (and we spend most of our time observing and anticipating) what the changing interests of both parties are so that we can create a contractual agreement that both parties want to live up to.   Sometimes, the hardest task is getting people to “see outside the box” … that their interests truly are being served with the creative solution that we are offering.  See future articles with the keyword, “Interest Based Negotiations” for further elaboration the subject.

Connecting Buyers & Sellers for a Win/Win Result:  It’s what we do. It’s who we are.  And, it takes advantage of what people truthfully want to do.  It is our feeling that if we are creative in putting deals together, we will get much better results than the next guy … and those results will be win/win for all!

If you are looking for win/win results, give us a call at 830-995-2511.  We’d love to visit with you.